Hun Sen Offers ‘Back Pay’ to Ousted Opposition Lawmakers
Prime Minister Hun Sen has offered to pay back the lost salaries of opposition lawmakers who were stripped of their parliamentary posts in June by the then CPP-led National Assembly, a CNRP official said. The offer to back-pay the 27 lawmakers from the Sam Rainsy Party and Human Rights Party (HRP) came during the first day of top-level negotiations on Monday aimed at resolving a post-election impasse between Mr. Hun Sen’s ruling CPP and the CNRP. … Ou Chanrith, a CNRP lawmaker-elect and former HRP parliamentarian who was among those expelled by the CPP-dominated Assembly in June, said that parliamentarians earn a base salary of about $1,000, but earned up to $2,300 per month including allowances for petrol, rental cars, drivers and other expenses. Having been removed from parliament for more than three months, this would mean that, in total, the ousted opposition lawmakers in total are owed up to $200,000 in arrears. Though legal experts were split on the constitutionality of the CPP’s ouster of the opposition members of parliament, the move was nonetheless blasted by civil society groups and the U.S. State Department. … Those remarks drew the ire of CPP National Assembly spokesman Chheang Vun, who said in a press conference on June 11 that the U.S. should drop its “colonial ideas,” as the CPP leaders of parliament were simply following Cambodian laws. “The National Assembly did not strip their [opposition lawmakers] membership, the…laws did,” Mr. Vun said at a press conference held at the National Assembly on June 11. “If they had not joined the Cambodia National Rescue Party and made the announcement in the Assembly, this would not have happened,” he said at the time. That the CPP leadership is now symbolically reversing its June expulsion exposed the weakness of their original rationale to do so, said independent political analyst Kem Ley. …
Colin Meyn
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/elections/hun-sen-offers-back-pay-to-ousted-opposition-lawmakers-42679/
