A recent article in the Asia Times states that Cambodia is about to overhaul its laws that deal with NGOs.
In late September he [Hun Sen] called for the revival of a controversial law which would require the country’s more than 2,000 associations and NGOs to complete a complex registration process and submit to stringent financial reporting requirements. The draft law is expected to be passed by Hun Sen’s Cambodia People’s Party (CPP)-dominated National Assembly in the coming months. “Cambodia has been heaven for NGOs for too long,” he said in a speech broadcast on national radio on September 26, adding that he had given up hope of reading any positive reports written by international or local NGOs. “The NGOs are out of control … they insult the government just to ensure their financial survival”
Although many NGO, both international and local, are liable to see this as further silencing of government critics, similar to the recent banning of the UN’s Human Right’s Commission member Yash Ghai, few can deny that cleaning up the NGO sector of Cambodia is long overdue. There are literally thousands of “NGOs” operating in Cambodia that are simply used as a tax loop hole. NGOs don’t pay taxes and can employ foreigners without much bureaucratic fuss. NGO laws, or lack there of, for many years have provided relatively easy visa entry for foreigners of dubious morals to stay for extended periods in Cambodia.
In many cases, what should be registered as a business is actually registered as an NGO so that the managing director may conduct business whilst still attracting funding from larger bilateral donors or international NGOs. It has for local agri-businesses especially, been a useful form of foreign direct investment from donors. Some have used donor money to establish contract farming relations, with the NGO acting as marketing agent. This has occurred in some cases due to donor perceptions of Cambodian agriculture. Direct assistance to local NGOs has been justified in the name of agricultural and private sector “development” that is typically characterised as backward and poor. Furthermore, many local NGOs are run by part time, ex or full-time government employees as sideline businesses.
Thus the Cambodian institutional landscape has long been blurred between aid, business and government. Tighter law enforcement should help to seperate out clearly the different functions of government, business and charity. It remains to be seen however, as Asia Times suggests, whether this law signals Cambodia’s distancing from western donors due to expected oil revenues and towards further Chinese patronage or whether it is simply a move to finally address a longstanding problem.
You are dreaming if you think that more stringent law enforcement against NGOs is going to be used by the Government to do anything other than silence critics. This is the kind of wishy-washy “rule of law” thinking that does not work — precisely because the enforcement of the law is so selective, based on connections, political position, and willingness to pay off enforcers to look elsewhere. The idea that the Cambodian Government will do this in a participatory manner is also a pipe dream. The Cambodian Government should in fact have more gratitude that many national and international NGOs are actually working for local economic and social development — while the Government officials divert and steal whatever resources they can get their hands on.
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So the country should be grateful to the NGO’s for all the marvelous work that they do? Piffle, about time a clean up occurred.
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So who decides which ones are the “real” NGOs?
BTW, aren’t we assuming here that all NGOs are non-profits?
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“There are literally thousands of “NGOs” operating in Cambodia that are simply used as a tax loop hole. NGOs don’t pay taxes and can employ foreigners without much bureaucratic fuss. NGO laws, or lack there of, for many years have provided relatively easy visa entry for foreigners of dubious morals to stay for extended periods in Cambodia.”
Sounds a little bit like Thailand. An NGO or missionary status soliciting donations is a much easier way for people to support themselves and stay in Thailand long-term than running a business subject to the usual cut-throat competition and strict laws and capital requirements. Unquestioned praise with no critical questions asked is the usual response to NGOs. Who is going to question an NGO that helps AIDs babies or hill tribe orphans? This is the idea that one do-it-yourself NGO guy uses that he recommended to me also (not interested). A lot of fishy stuff is associated with NGOs also, like not drawing a line between your own personal assets and the NGOs assets, males overseeing large numbers of young women or boys unsupervised, accusations of human trafficking in collusion with the police, NGOs might even be a deceiving front for criminal activities sometimes…Thaksin cracked down on NGOs. Made the rules tougher. If anyone knows a source for Thaksin’s NGO policies please let me know. I only have anecdotal evidence. They probably want to eliminate the diehard cowboy activists like Matthew McDaniel who actually do reveal all sorts of things that powerful people don’t want people to know.
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I don’t see any need to choose sides here: the NGO law will certainly be used to silence critics of the regime, some of which do find homes in NGOs, and the most radical of which would never be able to complete the stringent new registration requirements. The regime will never reform itself in a participatory fashion (what regime does?), but NGOs have had little sway on government policy thus far anyway, so I fail to see a real threat here. Similarly, the NGO sector as a sector is a mess, full of predatory experts living high on the hog in Cambodia in a way they never could at home, all the while patting themselves on the back for ‘doing well by doing good,’ when in fact they are only doing the former.
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What might get very hurt, in a bureaucratic free for all, are the very low budget NGOs, hundreds of them, that look after the children of Cambodia. The breakdown of families across all sectors has produced a torrent of desperate children: all with specific needs: HIV+ve, traumatised, handicapped. Maybe, some of the writers above are just as guilty of hotel room journalism and need to get out to some of these Centers and have a look.
Cambodian politicians neither have the will nor the money to look after these sad children and without the small NGOs these children (about 600,000 by UN estimates) will suffer tremendously.
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As someone who has done a lot of research on but no research in the country, it still feels like this law will be used against the people who need it the most.
It is likely that any NGO calling for change (or otherwise criticizing the current regime) will end up feeling the negative affects of this new law, while other organizations entrenched in patron-client networks will probably be let off the hook.
The law is an excellent idea, but it will be enforced under less then excellent circumstances.
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The NGO’s help virtually no one but themselves. They stay in their own cosseted section of Phnom Penh and live the high life. It is a disgrace. They should be expelled from the country. They are as corrupt as the government. Ordinary people cannot be blamed for being cynical in the face of this carry on. Get the NGO’s out…yesterday!
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Interesting to stumble on this range of views about the proposed NGO law. I am working with the Co operation Committee for Cambodia – as a volunteer I hasten to add incase anyone mistakes me for a fat cat NGO ex pat. I write here in an unofficial capacity.
A couple of points – firstly the new law hasn’t been published yet, uit may well turn out to be simialr to the one that was arounda few years ago but as yet we don’t quite know. We also don’t know if this is just sabre rattling or whether it will get pushed through – bets on the latter. In any democracy we would encourage debate and involvement in a new law of this type – so that it works well. But one can harldy think of Cambodia as a democracy and this makes it particualry worrying to thnk of a new Law being imposed. The absence of an independent judiciary is of major concern – if an NGO was closed down where could appeals be fairly heard etc
There already exists a regualtion procedure and the government already has powers to take action on tax evasion etc – so a new law isnb’t really necessary. Funds for terrorism have aso been mentioned but again there exist laws that cover this. I can’t really identify any bad practice by NGOs that couldn’t be dealt with by existing laws. It’s interesting that this as far as I am aware has never been done by government. Rather adds to my worries about the real intention of any law – to close down opposition to the govenment even further ? I think human rights and other NGOs are legitimate in their concerns about the people they work with and their right to have a platform, a voice and to organise to protect theri rights – to land , to fishing etc.
Secondly in a broader context we can see that NGO laws have been used extensively to curbe human rights in a variety of way – go to the International Centre for Not for Profit Laws to check this out.
The CCC is co-ordinating hte NGO response and there is a joint statement – the requests are to delay the law until other priority laws that have been agreed with government, donors and NGOs are passed – anti- corruption and judicial reform. But if the law is going to be pushed through there is space for genuine discussion.
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Of course there are many corrupt practices in the NGO sector, and the NGO Law may help to expose these. The question is: will that lead to the end of these corrupt practices? Or will it just help the Cambodian government to take a cut of the loot? While silencing anyone who might want to complain about that?
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