Challenges
in tackling land issues in Cambodia
Khmer Times, Opinion, 11 June 2019
Cambodia is facing complex structural
challenge to deal with land disputes. As the economy grows with high influx of
capital investment ready to rip benefit from speculation and structural
weaknesses of the land management system, tackling the land issues is becoming
even more difficult.
The first Land Law was promulgated in
1992 and amended in August 2001. Cambodia has a dual land tenure system
containing both ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ titles. Soft title applies to land rights
that are registered by a local authority. Hard title applies to land rights
registered by national level under the jurisdiction of the Land Management and
Planning office. Cambodia aims to eventually register all the estimated 7
million land parcels with nationally recognized hard title by 2021. By the end
of December 2018, around 5.1 million land titles were issued, which is
equivalent to 73.25%.
In any land dispute, it is extremely
difficult to identify who is the real victim. There are conflicts between the
poor and the rich but there are also conflicts among the riches. For instance,
an anecdote had it that a commune chief certified soft title over the same plot
of land to two different tycoons. When asked why he did so, the commune chief
told the court that he had no choice because he was threatened by two very
powerful tycoons.
On another aspect, it does not mean to
say that the poor are always the victims. There are some cases that certain
individuals exploit the public sympathy by labelling themselves as the “poor”
and “vulnerable” but in fact they are illegal land encroachers who stand on the
mantra that say, “if you win, you get the land; if you lose, you will get the
government’s compensation.”
Whenever there are land disputes, it is
hard to find examples of successful resettlements owing to the involvement of
many stakeholders. Sometimes the issues are politicized, demonized and
victimized. So far, the settlement of the relocation of peoples from the White
Building can be considered as a model for future redevelopment projects, where
resolutions were smooth and acceptable by parties concerned.
In addressing land dispute, it is
suggested that Cambodia should set a uniform standard formula to address those
issues; however, such requirement is quite challenging- considering that
different locations of lands would pose different sets of problems and
resolutions, including the size of financial compensation and types of lands
for resettlement.
Despite many structural challenges and
limited capacity, coupled with challenges posed by social, economic and
political externalities, many practical measures have been put into place to
accelerate the resolution of the outstanding land disputes so as to provide
justice for the people who are the real victims and to promote social harmony.
Concerning the dispute settlement
mechanism, with the recent nomination of the Minister of Land Management to
lead the National Authority of Land Conflict Resolution, Cambodia now has a
single window to address all land disputes.
Regarding the economic land concessions
(ELCs), a moratorium was put in place in 2012 owing to the understanding that
some companies did not conducted investment activities as pledged and only
created problems such as deforestation and forced evictions. After the review
in February 2016, 23 of the 113 ELCs issued by the environment ministry had
been revoked and other four companies had voluntarily handed their concessions
back to the state. State also pledged nearly 1 million hectares of
re-appropriated property to be handed over to the poor families.