20 March 2013
By Chea Sophal[1]
The
Paris Peace Accords required international communities to assist Cambodia in
reconstructing and restoring the country through the establishment of the International
Committee on Reconstruction Cambodia (ICORC), whose mandate is to monitor and
coordinate funds provided by international communities.
.
Cambodia’s
donors pledged US$896.04 million in aid for developing the governance and administration
sector from 1992 to 2011. From
2002-2011, donors disbursed and committed another US$959.35 million for this
sector and they projected commitment for 2012-2014 of another US$212.50 million
(CRDB/CDC 2011, p.47). The Human Rights Watch Report revealed that
foreign assistance accounts for over 50 percent of Cambodia’s budget, yet
donors have said little about Cambodia’s worsening human rights environment as
part of the crucial element for democratic development in Cambodia (HRW 2012,
p.5).
Why Donate to Cambodia?
Cambodia
is one of the most aid-dependent countries with a high level of aid
fragmentation, and it is ranked 129th out of 175 countries and
regions on the United Nations Development Program’s Human Development Index. There are varieties of reasons for the
international community and donor governments to provide donations to
Cambodia. Some governments would have
different prioritized areas of assistance, for example in the case of the U.S.
and Japanese government. They have
different interests ranging from health, economic development, to democracy,
human rights and good governance (See more details on the fragmentation of
donation in section 4.3).
Cambodia remains a developing country and
relies heavily on international aid from developing partners in order to
finance its development needs. The
concessional loans, grants and technical cooperation from the development
partners have significantly contributed to the development process of
Cambodia. Based on the CDC Development
Effectiveness Report 2011, it indicates US$1,075 million of total disbursements
in 2010is seen as an equivalent of 9.4% of GDP (NGO Forum 2012, p.1). In 2009, the disbursement and projection of
development partners stood over USD$1 billion, increased from $978.52 million
in 2008. The total disbursements by
development partners such as the U.N multilateral (Core U.N., World Bank, IMF,
ADB and Global Fund), EU (European Commission, Belgium, Denmark, Finland,
France, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and United Kingdom), other
bilateral (Japan, Australia, etc.) and NGO accounted for USD$ 12.13 billion
from 1992 to 2011(CRDB/CDC 2011, p.42). The pie graph below
shows the total disbursements by various development partners over the past two
decades. The four biggest donors in aid and loans to Cambodia are Japan ($2.08
billion), ADB ($1.2 billion), NGOs ($1.11 billion) and Core U.N. ($ 1.003
billion).
Source: Consolidated
data from the Cambodia Aid Effectiveness Reports of the Cambodian
Rehabilitation and Development Board of the Council for the Development of
Cambodia, 2007, 2008, 2010 and 2011.
Sector
wide, the concentration of aid and loans disbursed and projected from 1992 to
2011 focuses on five main sectors: Governance & Administration (15.3%
amounting to $1.85 billion), Transportation (14.2% or $1.72 billion), Health
(14.0% equivalent of $1.69 billion) and Rural Development (9.2% or $1.11
billion). See Figure 2: Disbursements and projections by sector 1992-2014 (USD 000s)
below for the percentage covered by other sectors. The total planned disbursement and projections
for 2012 accounted for $1.14 billion, 2013 ($841.15 million) and 2014 ($544.63
million). This is the planned amount
only for the three years, it may be changed when the actual plans have been
realized by the development partners. The programs included under the
Governance & Administration are Economic & Development Policy/Planning,
Elections, Human Rights, Legal and Judiciary[2], Decentralization &Deconcentration, Public Financial Management,
Public Administration Reform and Civil Society (CRDB/CDC 2011, p.47).
Source: Consolidated
data from the Cambodia Aid Effectiveness Reports of the Cambodian
Rehabilitation and Development Board of the Council for the Development of
Cambodia, 2007, 2008, 2010 and 2011.
Is Foreign Aid Effective in Promoting Cambodian democracy?
When
one talks about aid and development in Cambodia everyone will tell a different
story. For example, Human Right groups pointed to forced evictions that are the
result of an almost unrestricted elite capture of the country’s natural
resources. Development partners such as
development banks and bilateral development agencies on the other hand stress
the double digit economic growth of the country from 2004 to 2007 with the
average of 11.14 per cent for GDP growth (before the 2008 financial crisis) and
the poverty rate has been reduced on a one percent rate per year (Fforde and
Seidel 2010, p.6).
Based on the World Bank’s data, the poverty rate was reduced from 47% in 1994
to 30.10% in 2007.
Source: World Bank, 2012
The
2010 World Report of Human Right Watch highlighted that Cambodia’s donors
remained ineffective in persuading the Royal Government of Cambodia to keep its
promises to protect human rights and establish the rule of law as part of
promoting Cambodian democracy. This can
be seen clearly that years of funding for judicial reform have had virtually no
effect. A country donor like Japan,
which is the Cambodia’s largest donor and the single largest funder of the Extraordinary
Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), maintained its policy of not confronting the government about
rights violations. China, another big
investor and donor to Cambodia, continued not to link aid to reforms (HRW 2010,
p.283).
Chinese
assistance is usually defined as “no strings attached” because it does not have
requirements that come with Western aid such as governmental reform and human
rights protections. China expects the
aid beneficiaries to meet certain standards of its own such as the one-China
policy towards Taiwan, Tibet and Uighur asylum seekers. In 2010, the Chinese government provided $1.2
billion in aid and loans for Cambodia one day after the Cambodian authorities
forcibly deported 20 Uighur asylum seekers to China (Jonathan, Campbell and Katherin 2011, p.2).
Dr.
Caroline Hughes echoed the ineffectiveness of aid donations in strengthening
democratization in Cambodia as follows:
“The aid donations
are not effective. The bilateral donors tend to use similar ideological
approaches, but they are also motivated by security concerns. Since 2001, when Cambodia
suddenly appeared to be one of the safest countries for Western interests in South
East Asia, bilateral donors have downgraded concerns for democracy in favour of
a conception of public order that is very similar to the CPP’s. Consequently,
the minimal political space that was preserved by international pressure for
NGOs and other, mainly urban protest movements in the late 1990s has largely
disappeared”.
Caroline Hughes, Director
of the Asia Research Centre and Associate Professor of Governance Studies in
the School of Social Sciences and Humanities at Murdoch University 2012
The
Royal Government of Cambodia in July 2004 adopted a comprehensive strategy for
development called “Rectangular Strategy for Growth, Employment, Equity and
Efficiency”. The core of the strategy is
good governance surrounded by four main focus areas: the enhancement of the
agricultural sectors; the rehabilitation and construction of physical
infrastructure; private sector development and employment generation; and
capacity building and human resources development (RGC 2008, p.11). The good governance mainly focuses on:
Source: Adapted from (RGC 2008, p.11)
The
speech of Prime Minister Hun Senin the First Cabinet meeting of the Fourth
legislative National Assembly on 26 September 2008 revealed major achievements
attained by the RGC through its demonstration of RGC’s commitment to
multi-party democracy as the only path for Cambodia toward the “rule of law”
and to provide equal opportunity to all the people. Those achievements in the 3rd
Legislature are as follows (RGC 2008, p.4):
·
Peace, political stability, security and social order
have been strengthened by implementing the liberal multi-party democracy;
·
Respect for human rights and dignity, including
political, economic and social rights, has been enhanced; and decentralization
and de-concentration reforms, aimed at strengthening democracy and efficiency
of local public services, have been initiated;
·
Good governance through state reform, especially civil
service reform, legal and judicial reforms and armed forces reforms, has been
strengthened to ensure that all government activities are increasingly more
transparent, accountable, predictable, effective and efficient;
·
Macro-economic stability and unprecedented high,
double digit economic growth has been ensured while maintaining low inflation
and a stable exchange rate. Competitiveness of the national economy has been
strengthened by improving agricultural productivity, building a rural economic
base and expanding the industrial sector, especially to further the dynamism of
the garment sector. The services sector has also expanded rapidly. All these
have created jobs and skills training for hundreds of thousands of youth;
·
Institutional and human resource capacity has been
strengthened by concentrating on development of the education and health
sectors. The obvious outcomes are the increase in the enrollment rates and the
decrease in drop-out and repetition rates, infant and child mortality rates and
HIV/AIDS infection rate; and
·
Partnership with all stakeholders especially official
development partners, private sector and civil society has been strengthened by
setting up a range of effective mechanisms, allowing for mobilizing and
coordinating cooperative financing and investments.
Interests of Donor Governments
There
are multiple reasons and interests for providing aid to Cambodia, in the case
of the Japanese Government, the aid donations amounted to US$1.088 billion
dollars from1991 to 2006. As Figure 5: Grant Aid of Japan to Cambodia from 1991-2006 below
indicates, the aid distribution by the Japanese Government are for General
Grant Aid (Project for Rehabilitation of Chroy Changwar Bridge and Project for
Improvement of Medical Facilities) with over US$682 million, Non-Project Grand
Aid (US$158 million), Grant Aid for Cultural Activities (US$675,000), Grant Aid
for Disaster Relief-Emergency Aid (US3.77 million), Grant Aid for Food Supply
(US$77.79 million) and Yen Loan (US$133.51 million). Japan, Cambodia's largest
donor, said little about human rights, the draft NGO law, or the Khmer Rouge tribunal
debacle(HRW 2012, p.5).
Source:
Consolidated data from (JE 2006)
The
U.S Government has three main aid sectors such as Health ($424.42 million),
Democracy, Human Rights and Governance ($177.61 million) and Economic
Development ($112.10 million). The other
areas of focus for the foreign aid from the U.S are for Peace and Security,
Environment and Program Management. For
the planned foreign assistance for Cambodia from 2006 to 2013, the total amount
accounts for US$863.95 million (See Figure 6: U.S Foreign Assistance to Cambodia 2006-2013
below).
Source:
Consolidated data from (FA 2012)
In
Democracy, Human Rights and Governance Sector, the aid allocations are for Rule
of Law and Human Rights Programs ($88.61 million), Political Competition and
Consensus-Building ($20.40 million), Good Governance ($30 million) and Civil
Society ($38.69 million) See Figure 7: U.S Foreign Assistance by Sectors 2006-2013below. Besides the assistance for the rule of law
and human rights projects, the U.S. aid to Cambodia includes training and
material assistance to the Cambodian military, police and counterterrorism
units with track records of serious human rights abuses. For example in 2009, Cambodia’s
anti-trafficking ranking was maintained by the U.S. as Tier 2 on the ground
that Cambodia failed to protect trafficking victims and abuses committed
against “prostituted women” in police custody and state-run centers (HRW 2010, p.283).
Source:
Consolidated data from (FA 2012)
.
Based
on the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Australian Government,
Australia shows strong commitment to Cambodia’s development and its Official
Development Assistance (ODA) to Cambodia accounts for US$77.4 million allocated
for 2011-12. The ODA covers the
improvement of productivity in agriculture, strengthening law and justice
systems, health and infrastructure (DFAT 2012).
China
is another major investor and donor.
China continued to increase aid to Cambodia without conditions. This move undermines efforts by others to
address human right concerns. The Chinese
government announced $1.2 billion in aid and loans for Cambodia in 2010. This
took place when Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping travelled to Cambodia in
December 2009(HRW 2012, p.5).The move by China
pledging aid for Cambodia replaces Japan as the largest provider of assistance
to Cambodia.[3] In response, Western donors
pledged $1.1 billion in aid to Cambodia in mid 2010 up from the previous year’s
$950 million. More or less the Chinese aid would come in when the U.S has
restrictions on those nations. This means that China fills the empty space in
assistance left by Western donors in areas of grave concern to the United
States. For instance, in 2003, China
provided Burma with a $200 million loan after the U.S. imposed sanctions
against Burma for human rights violations.[4]
The
5-6 July 1997 event (coup d’état) made some donor Governments reduce the amount
of aid and loan to Cambodia. For
example, Japan reduced its donation almost 50% from $111 million to just $59.84
million in 1997[See Figure
8: Disbursements and projections by USA,
Japan, China and Australia 1992-2013 (USD 000s)]. China reduced from $10.85 million to $9.49
million. However, Australia provided
more aid from $20.17 million in 1996 to $27.29 million in 1997 and the U.S.
also did the same from $28.76 million in 1996 to $30.50 million in 1997.
Source: Consolidated
data from the Cambodia Aid Effectiveness Reports of the Cambodian
Rehabilitation and Development Board of the Council for the Development of
Cambodia, 2007, 2008, 2010 and 2011.
The Cambodia Aid
Effectiveness Report of CRDB/CDC that recorded the disbursement and projections
by the four main countries USA, Japan, China and Australia, shows that aid and
loan took place in 1992 in which USA disbursed $35.55 million, Japan ($66.89
million), China ($912,000) and Australia ($10.51 million). Japan has been the biggest donor in aid and
loans to Cambodia since 1992 until 2011 the estimate of disbursement and
projection by Japan ($120.63 million) is less $90.09 million than China
($210.73 million).
One could see how foreign-aid dependent Cambodia has been over the last
two decades from 1991 and question why that is the case and whether the foreign
aid assistance has been used effectively to improve the state of Cambodia,
reduce poverty, promote democratic space and respect for human rights. Since 2001, the country has moved steadily
back towards pseudo-democracy where authoritarianism is less pronounced and where formal
elements of liberal democracy exist (for instance various political parties, a
parliament with some ability to question the Government, a degree of press
freedom and some level of civil society activity); many international donors
placed little pressures for democratic space rather than for stability in the
country and the protest movements in the late 1990s disappeared. While
elections continue to be held at all levels, they do not offer voters a real
choice and do not amount to a genuine exercise in political
accountability. The opportunities for
holding the government to account are extremely limited.
What I could see with regards to the foreign policies of donor
governments is that they have different approaches and methods of working or
donating to the Royal Government of Cambodia.
For instance, the U.S Government would be on the opposite direction to
the Chinese approach of keeping and raising the bar for the promotion of
democracy and respect for human rights while the Chinese Government focused
more on road construction and agricultural development. The Japanese Government has not taken any confrontational
position to hold Cambodia accountable to the democratic principles under the
Paris Peace Accords.
References
CRDB/CDC. (2011). The Cambodia Development
Effectiveness Report 2011. Phnom Penh: The Cambodian Rehabilitation and
Development Board of the Council for the Development of Cambodia.
DFAT. (2012, May). Cambodia
Country Brief: Australia-Cambodia Relations. Retrieved June 14, 2012, from
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade:
http://www.dfat.gov.au/geo/cambodia/cambodia_brief.html
FA. (2012, June). Foreign
Assistance Data. Retrieved June 14, 2012, from ForeignAssistance.Gov:
http://foreignassistance.gov
Fforde, A., &
Seidel, K. (2010, November). Donor Playground Cambodia? What a look at aid
and development in Cambodia confirms and what it may imply. Retrieved
January 10, 2012, from Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung:
http://www.boell.de/downloads/20101119_Cambodia_Playground_Study.pdf
HRW. (2010). World
Report. Retrieved March 10, 2012, from Human Rights Watch:
http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/related_material/wr2010.pdf
HRW. (2012, May 16). World
Report 2012: Cambodia, Events of 2011. Retrieved June 19, 2012, from Human
Rights Watch:
http://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/related_material/cambodia_2012.pdf
JE. (2006). Japan
Grant Aid to Cambodia. Retrieved May 14, 2012, from Embassy of Japan:
www.kh.emb-japan.go.jp/economic/oda/odalist01.xls
Jonathan, W.,
Campbell, C., & Katherin. (2011, September 1). China's Foreign
Assistance in Review: Implications for the United States. Retrieved March
1, 2012, from U.S.-China Economic and Security
Review Commission:
http://www.uscc.gov/researchpapers/2011/9_1_%202011_ChinasForeignAssistanceinReview.pdf
NGO Forum. (2012). Term
of Reference. Retrieved June 14, 2012, from NGO Forum:
http://www.ngoforum.org.kh/docs/jobs/NBP_ToR_Donor_Efficiency_in_ODA-FINAL_1.pdf
RGC. (2008, September
26). Address by Samdech Akka Moha Sena Padei Techo Hun Sen Prime Minister
of the Kingdom of Cambodia on “Rectangular Strategy” for Growth, Employment,
Equity and Efficiency Phase II. Retrieved June 20, 2012, from Council for
the Development of Cambodia:
http://www.cdc-crdb.gov.kh/cdc/aid_management/Rectangular%20Strategy%20-%20Phase%20II.pdf
[1] Chea Sophal is taking the Doctoral Degree of Law (LL.D) at
Pannasastra University of Cambodia in Phnom Penh. This is an extract from the term paper study
on ‘The Paris Peace Accords and the Development of Democracy in Cambodia’ as
part of the term paper submitted for the coursework under the Doctor of Law
Programme on POL 712-Transnational Relations and World Politics
[2] According to the CDC database, 39 out of 324
projects under Governance and Administration sector are the programs or
projects on legal and judiciary that received the fund from EU/EC (16
projects), Japan (6 projects), Australia (4 projects), two projects each from
Spain, UNDP, France, and USA, and one project each Republic of Korea, Sweden,
Canada, China and New Zealand. Some of
the projects funded by EU/EC include Cambodian Defender's Project (CDP) Legal
Aid and Rule of Law Advocacy Action; Capacity Building - Complaint and
Procedure Advisor to NEC; Children's Legal Protection; EC-Cambodia Co-operation
Facility for Governance and Human Rights (ECCF)- TA LJR; and Providing Legal
Advocacy, Representation, and Education to Sustain Children Rights and Prevent Child-Related
Crimes in Cambodia Justice System. Japan
funded the projects like Legal and Judicial Development Project (Phase 2, 3 and
4); Project for Legal and Judicial Cooperation with the Bar Association of the
Kingdom of Cambodia; and the Project for the Improvement of the Training on
Civil Matters at the Royal School for Judges and Prosecutors of the Royal
Academy for Judicial Professions (Phase 1 and Phase 2). The USA’s funded projects consist of Improved
Political and Economic Governance (2005-2012) and Increased Competition in
Cambodian Political Life (2001-2006).
Australian funded projects included Cambodia Criminal Justice Assistance
Project (Phase II& Phase III), Law Enforcement Cooperation Program
(2008-2015), and Support to Khmer Rouge Tribunal (2004-2013).
[3] According to the CDC Databases, there are 38
projects recorded from 2004 to 2012 (2 in pipeline, 19 on-going projects, and
17 completed projects). The dominant
sector with the fund from China is the transportation sector (11 projects)
followed by governance & administration (7 projects). Those projects were included in the
Sub-sector of Governance & Administration such Local Government Reform (Survey
on the project of New Council of Ministers Building of the Kingdom of Cambodia
and Project of New Council of Ministers Building of the Kingdom of Cambodia),
Civil Society (Survey of Rehabilitation of Office Buildings and Library of
Senate of Cambodia; 400 Sets of Police Motor Cycles; and Cambodia with 30 Fire
Trucks), Elections (Provide Materials for Elections) and Public Financial
Management (One Unit of THSCAN Mobile Container System).
[4] Back in 1988 and 1989, a number of events
took place, China and Myanmar (Burma) strengthened their alliance through an
agreement to legalize border trade amounting to $300 million. In August 1988, a massacre happened when
Burmese military forces used violent action against non-violent demonstrators
killing thousands of Burmese people.
This led to the suspension of international aid and development assistance
to Myanmar. Later, the military junta
placed Aung San SuuKyi under house arrest after her political speech against
the government and refused to recognize the new government in which Ang San
SuuKyi’s party, the National League for Democracy, and its allies won over
eighty percent of the parliamentary seats in the general election to choose a
parliament on May 27, 1990. Internal
reaction to China’s Tiananmen square Massacre and events in Burma made the two
countries to further collaborate with each other and increase trade in natural
gas and arms(Genser 2006). According to (Kuppuswamy 2011), Myanmar sought for China’s diplomatic
protections with its veto power and condoning the anti-democratic policies made
Myanmar bounded to China since China does not care much about respect for human
rights and regards national reconciliation in Myanmar as an internal issue.
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