Damning report exposes Hun Sen clan’s stranglehold on Cambodia’s business world
A NEW report by research and advocacy group Global Witness says the family of Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Sen uses a business empire worth at least US$200 million, along with influential positions they hold in the military and government, to keep a lock on power.
The extensive report reveals that a network of high-profile businesses controlled by the family of Cambodia’s longtime leader sustains and is sustained by his authoritarian rule, making foreign investment in the country risky.
The London-based group, which focuses on exposing the corrupt exploitation of natural resources in the developing world, says the Hun family has significant holdings in the media, along with close ties with other powerholders and business cronies which help them tighten their grip on power.
The report, ‘Hostile Takeover – The corporate empire of Cambodia’s ruling family’, sheds light on a huge network of secret deal-making and corruption that Global Witness says has “underpinned Hun Sen’s 30-year dictatorial reign of murder, torture and the imprisonment of his political opponents”.
Based on official data on company ownership in Cambodia, the report says Hun Sen’s family owns or part-controls companies with listed capital of more than US$200 million – with links to big international brands such as Apple, Nokia, Visa, Unilever and Honda – but says this is likely “just a fraction of the true value of the family’s business holdings”.
It found that 27 relatives of the prime minister have links to vast holdings across 18 sectors.
“Hun Sen has abused his position as Prime Minister to allow his relatives control of, or [have] major stakes in, most of Cambodia’s major industries,” the report states.
“However, this is not just about the accumulation of personal wealth or specific links between Hun family members and particular companies – the Hun family’s domination of Cambodia’s public and private sectors has resulted in Hun Sen having near-total control over the country.”
Source: Global Witness.
The report found that Hun Sen’s immediate family have registered interests in 114 private domestic companies. Of these, 103 have family members as chairperson, director or holding a shareholding of more than 25 percent, meaning that they exercise total or substantial control.
Here is just a small sample, as provided in the Global Witness report:
- Hun Sen’s youngest daughter Hun Mali chairs TK Avenue, Phnom Penh’s first luxury shopping mall.
- Hun Sen’s eldest daughter Hun Mana has interests in K Thong Huot Telecom, which claims to have exclusive distribution rights for Nokia phones in Cambodia. She chairs NVC Corporation, which makes Vital bottled water promoted by the Ministry of Tourism for use in official events; and owns newspaper Kampuchea Thmey Daily and Bayon Media, which broadcasts via three TV stations and on Bayon Radio.
- His nephew is a director of LHR Asean Investment, which runs a network of petrol stations across the country.
- His niece is the chair of Gloria Jean’s Coffees, which has six stores in Cambodia.
- Three of Hun Sen’s children are listed as owners of company Electricity Private – which sells energy to the state.
- The wife of Hun Sen’s nephew chairs iOne, Cambodia’s leading Apple retailer.
Aside from the Hun family’s stranglehold on the business world, the report delves into a number of other abuses, including extra-judicial killings, illegal land grabs, and alleged heroin smuggling operations.
“These revelations point to a cruel irony of Hun Sen’s model of dictatorship – his family has Cambodia’s economy so sewn up that Phnom Penh residents are likely to struggle to avoid lining the pockets of their oppressors multiple times a day,” said Patrick Alley, Co-Founder of Global Witness.
“Foreign investors, on the other hand, can and should opt out of bankrolling a regime that kills, intimidates or locks up its critics.”
Additional reporting from the Associated Press
