Trip to Kampong Chhnang

25-26 April, 2016

Leah Breevoort and Gabe Hendin

It is difficult to comprehend the idea of statelessness. What does it mean to belong to no one, to

have no official home, nationality, or citizenship? You are forced to abide by all the laws of a

country, but in the event of danger or disaster, to whom can you turn? No one.

In the Kampong Chhnang province, at the

southern tip of Tonle Sap Lake, more than

1,500 families have been experiencing this

sense of limbo for generations. Most of

them were born in Cambodia and some

even have lineage dating back to the French

Protectorate (1867–1953). However,

because they are ethnically Vietnamese, the

local authorities refuse to issue them the

appropriate documents to become citizens. Without citizenship, their entire way of life is

vulnerable to political corruption and environmental instability.

MIRO recently traveled to Kandal village, a floating refuge from the anti-Vietnamese rhetoric

that pervades the larger cities (politicians claim the Vietnamese migration is a predatory action),

and interviewed two ethnic Vietnamese residents. Departing from the banks of Kampong

Chhnang City, Deputy Director of MIRO Noun Sovanrith and MIRO interns Leah Breevoort,

Gabe Hendin, and Laura Welsch embarked on a small, rickety, wooden sampan owned by a local

fisherman. It swayed back and forth during the 20-minute ride to the first interviewee’s home on

the murky brown water of Tonle Sap, the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia, as an elderly

Vietnamese woman who was part of the boat’s “crew” continuously scooped out incoming water

to prevent the vessel from flooding.

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Upon arrival, MIRO was warmly welcomed inside a house that looked much like a modest home

you would find built on land, with wooden siding, shuttered windows, and a thatched roof.

Except this house was floating on bundles of bamboo in the middle of a lake. To simply borrow

a cup of sugar from your neighbors

would require hopping in a large metal

bowl and paddling your way to the

nearest doorstep. But these are the

circumstances to which much of the

Vietnamese community in Cambodia is

accustomed. It is impossible to ignore the

resourcefulness of these Vietnamese who

have accomplished an impressive feat of

survival and adaptation to their

environment. Faced with severe oppression and hardship, they found a way to reestablish their

communities, even creating floating temples and mobile convenience shops on boats. It is the

only way of life they know, making a living off of fishing, boat mechanics, and building and

repairing the nearly 1,500 houses in the community.

Life for the Vietnamese in Cambodia has historically been a struggle. In MIRO’s first interview,

the host recounted how when the Khmer Rouge held power, he was traded to Vietnam in

exchange for salt, as they equated his humanity to the value of a simple commodity. While his

narrative naturally differs in some ways from that of his fellow villagers’, it contains a common

thread: he is a stateless Vietnamese person who is denied citizenship in Cambodia despite being

born here and having lived here for the majority of his life. He is denied citizenship solely

because of his Vietnamese identity. As the Khmer Rouge spread anti-Vietnamese vitriol during

their time in power, both of the interviewees were forced to flee from their homes to Vietnam, a

country completely foreign to them, or face death. But Vietnam would also not grant these

refugees citizenship, and for them, living in a foreign land was impossible. Under a communist

regime, without the support of a community, and lacking a familiarity of their surroundings, the

Khmer Vietnamese struggled to find work. One woman proclaimed, “We’d rather die in

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Cambodia than die from starvation in Vietnam.” As a result, many Vietnamese began to return to

Cambodia in the early 1980s following the fall of the Khmer Rouge.

Today, the ethnic Vietnamese in Cambodia face two major problems: statelessness and

environmental collapse. Their statelessness leaves them paralyzed, unable to find more stable

employment, send their children to state schools, or apply for land permits. The closest private

school is too far away for the Vietnamese children of the floating villages, and because there is

no adequate and affordable transportation, the vast majority of kids do not receive a basic

education. Their parents cannot vote to change the gross misconduct that denies them citizenship

despite the fact that they were born here, a stipulation of citizenship under the Cambodian Law

of Nationality:

Shall obtain Khmer nationality/citizenship by being born in Cambodia:

Any child who was born from a foreign mother and father (parents) who were born and

living legally in Cambodia (or) any child who was born from an unknown mother or

father (a parent) and a newly born child who is found in Cambodia, shall be considered as

having been born also in Cambodia. (Chapter 2, Article 4)

As stateless individuals, these communities can be forced to move without prior justification

from the government, which is precisely what occurred in October 2015. A mass, forced eviction

uprooted thousands of ethnic Vietnamese families from an area with access to a privately funded

Vietnamese school, surrounded by deep water ideal for fishing, and close to the marketplace for

selling fish. At the new location three miles

upstream, the average depth of water was

insufficient for raising fish and far from the

Kampong Chhnang City center, destabilizing

the community’s economy. Families could no

longer afford the increased transportation fee for

school, so the majority of children dropped out

without hopes of ever receiving an education.

All part of the government’s five-year plan to

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“beautify” the riverfront, the move became a massive disruption to the economic growth of the

Vietnamese community, forcing them to restart their lives without any compensation.

The sustainability of the floating villages is in jeopardy and MIRO’s interviewees worry about

the futures of their families. Even if the issue of statelessness were to be resolved, a larger threat

looms just below the surface, threatening not just the Vietnamese, but the food security of

millions. While there is some carpentry and metalworking in the villages, the staple profession is

undoubtedly fishing. But one look at the brown

water filled with refuse clearly tells a sad story.

Under each floating Vietnamese house lives a

delicate ecosystem that is slowly collapsing from

decades of overfishing, climate change, and dam

construction. About 60 percent of Cambodia’s

inland fish catch comes from Tonle Sap Lake and

fish account for three-quarters of the animal protein

consumed in a country where nearly 40 percent of

children are chronically malnourished. “If the Tonle

Sap Lake does not function, then the whole fishery

of the Mekong will collapse,” says Chheng Phen,

director of Cambodia’s Inland Fisheries Research

and Development Institute. While the Vietnamese have no control over drought climates or

hydroelectric dams being built farther upstream, they are partly responsible for overfishing. For

three months out of the year, commercial fishing becomes illegal in order to give the fish

populations a chance to reproduce and grow. During this time, family fishing is allowed using

smaller nets and less invasive equipment. But many residents continue to fish illegally, asserting

that they need the larger quantities to feed their families.

If the Vietnamese fishing communities, like the visited in Kampong Chhnang, are not reeducated

to use smarter fishing techniques, the ecosystem on which they depend will continue to collapse.

When that happens, the communities will be left without food, and for many, without an income.

Unable to obtain citizenship and legally buy land, they will have nowhere to go to make a new

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living. The Cambodian government must take the initiative to grant citizenship to those that are

legal residents, having been born here or living here for more than seven years. Vietnamese who

have citizenship can send their children to school, buy land, learn agricultural techniques, and

become productive members of society. If the government continues to act in these negligent

ways, it will continue to drown these communities in poverty, sentencing them to a life of daily

survival in the floating villages. Something needs to give and it will not be the will of the

Vietnamese living in Cambodia. They believe in Cambodia’s ability to provide them with a

better life and in their potential to improve Cambodia. Cambodia should believe in them too.

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