The government has again called off the royal ploughing ceremony over COvid-19 concerns. Twenty-five youths will cycle to and around Boeng Tamok to raise awareness about the fast-disappearing lake.
Among the first real estate offerings on Phnom Penh’s shrinking Boeng Tamok lake are being put up for sale. Marketing materials show only around 5% of the lake remaining as water in the midst of development projects, military and police bases and state buildings.
A tranche of government documents released this week shows hundreds of hectares of state-land plots privatized for connected individuals and companies across the country.
The government privatized more than 2 hectares of Phnom Penh’s Boeng Tamok to the chief of Phnom Penh’s Pur Senchey district council, who is also an appointed assistant to Prime Minister Hun Sen.
Six suspects have been arrested for allegedly murdering a family of five for allegedly performing witchcraft, and CNRP leader Kem Sokha’s trial is delayed on account of a Covid-19 positive case.
The government continued its land privatization drive by allocating more than 400 hectares of Phnom Penh’s Boeng Tamok to businesspeople and the National Election Committee, leaving little of the lake.
The filling of Phnom Penh’s Boeng Tamok lake is continuing briskly as the government allocated more landfill plots to people close to government and military leaders.
Prime Minister Hun Sen granted the Justice Ministry permission to sell 140 hectares of Boeng Tamok lake and use the proceeds for infrastructure upgrades, according to a royal decree, with the new diktat coming weeks after the ministry was given land in the lake area.
Prime Minister Hun Sen took serious umbrage to criticism his government has faced for filling lakes throughout the country and justified the moving around of ministries through land swaps.
Prime Minister Hun Sen has promoted 25 people to be his official assistants, including a bodyguard who has received land on Phnom Penh’s Boeng Tamok lake and another who was nearly scammed online by a 14-year-old.
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