Cambodian Villagers Displaced by Dam Complain of Nonarable Land, Access to Fishing

[geovalin]

The planned Lower Sesan 2 hydropower dam is located in northeastern Cambodia's Stung Treng province.

RFA

 

Cambodian villagers who have been relocated by the government from areas near the U.S. $781 million Lower Sesan 2 hydropower dam project on Mekong River tributaries said Thursday that they cannot eke out a living in their new locale.

Forty-seven families from Chrop village in Kbal Rormeas commune of Sesan district in northeastern Cambodia’s Stung Treng province where the dam is being built previously accepted an offer from the government to move to Sre Sranok village, but now complain that life in the new location is even worse than it was before.

 

The government gave each of the families five hectares of farmland, a house on a 20-by-50-meter (66-by-164-foot) plot, and U.S. $6,000 in cash for agreeing to move to Sre Sranok, about 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) from Chrop.

Srey Lebek, who used to live in Chrop, told RFA’s Khmer Service that the new land is too harsh for farming and that Sre Sranok is too far away from the fishing grounds on which many villagers rely to make a living.

“We have faced more hardship after moving here,” he said. “I would therefore like to call on the government and the company to reconsider its compensation policy to ensure that people’s livelihoods are better taken into consideration.”

Speaking at a forum in Phnom Penh on Thursday hosted by the NGO Forum in Cambodia, Srey Lebek said he has been frustrated by being too far away from where he used to fish in the Sesan River to make a living. He also said he cannot grow rice in the new location.

 

The displaced fisherman was speaking at a forum funded Oxfam, an international confederation of charitable organizations, to examine ways to resolve the problems faced by villagers affected by the construction of the dam, which is being built on two tributaries of the Mekong River.

The government's response

 

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Reported by Savi Khorn for RFA’s Khmer Service. Translated by Nareth Muong. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.

http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/cambodian-villagers-displaced-by-dam-complain-of-nonarable-land-acess-to-fishing-03092017160301.html

 

 

-- © Copyright RFA 10/03

 

[Jonmarleesco]

'... Villagers Displaced by Dam Complain of Nonarable Land ...' I thought this referred to the name of the place, not to non-arable land.

 

Seems as though the Cambodian government was more generous than the Thai tends to be.