Escaping Arrest by The Hun Sen Police, Mr. Kong Kiet is Now in The U.S.

 October 30, 2011

ESCAPING ARREST BY THE HUN SEN POLICE, MR. KONG KIET IS NOW IN THE U.S.

 After three years in hiding in a neighboring country to escape arrest by the Cambodian police, Mr. Kong Kiet, 51, his wife and their three children finally landed this week in the USA where they will be resettled as political refugees.

Three years ago, a few days after the July 27, 2008 national election that gave a “landslide victory” to the ruling CPP, I met for the first time with Mr. Kong Kiet who was a resident of Boeung Tumpun commune in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district.

Mr. Kong Kiet was not registered as a voter in his commune of residence. However, he was able to cast a ballot for the CPP. His story is not an isolated case but reflects the pattern of a massive election trick that contributed nationwide to the CPP victory.

The pattern is the following: A few days before, and sometimes on, voting day, the CPP-controlled local authorities (commune chief, village chief) come to meet with people like Mr. Kong Kiet who look like any legitimate voters but are actually not registered on the voter list in the commune in question. They give them money and a fake ID document and push them to go to vote at a nearby polling station by casting a ballot for the CPP.

The trick is based on two irregularities:

1. The voter list is inflated with ghost names (the large number of ghost voters has been decried by independent observers and human rights NGOs).
2. A fake ID document (the controversial “1018 Form”) showing the name of a ghost voter is delivered to an illegitimate voter such as Mr. Kong Kiet (illegitimate voters could also include other unregistered citizens, foreigners, person below 18-year-old, passers-by paid to vote for the CPP).

In the “1018 Form” he received in 2008, Mr. Kong Kiet was given a stranger’s name: Yov Phet, and another year of birth: 1955 instead of 1960 associated with his real age.

Because he dared to publicly expose the truth and to accept to testify in the complaint that the SRP lodged against the CPP authorities (see documents attached herewith), the police came to arrest Mr. Kong Kiet, who luckily managed to escape just in time.

One can see why the National Election Committee (NEC) controlled by the CPP persistently refuses to provide the opposition SRP with the voter lists for all Cambodia’s communes: They don’t want us to check and to delete the names of ghost voters (dead persons, persons registered twice or more, persons who have permanently left the commune in question, persons who have never existed, etc). Only the SRP, with its over 3,000 locally elected officials in virtually all communes, can confront the CPP by systematically checking on the spot the names of ghost voters and asking for their deletion.

One can see why the NEC persistently wants the CPP-controlled local authorities to continue to issue controversial ID documents, such as the “1018 Form” or a new version of it in 2012 and 2013, rather than ensuring that every citizen be delivered the same standardized national ID card. Ghost voters combined with fake IDs given to illegitimate voters allow the NEC to boast a high voter turnout and to claim a strong citizen participation reflecting a democratic election!

One can see why a courageous man like Mr. Kong Kiet who exposed the CPP election tricks as a witness and a victim, can be a danger for the Hun Sen regime which has managed to "win" a long series of elections over many decades, using probably the same tricks as the Hosni Mubarak regime in Egypt that was toppled earlier this year after 30 years of dictatorship.

Sam Rainsy

Elected Member of Parliament