Cambodia PM Hun Sen’s party wins by landslide election critics call the ‘death of democracy’
Government rejects international criticism as attempt to intimidate, insists country will move on amid ‘peace and political stability’
The ruling party of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen congratulated itself Monday on its election victory, while the opposition party unable to contest the polls said they marked the death of democracy in the Southeast Asian country, making its government and any dealings with it illegitimate.
Sok Eysan, the spokesman for Hun Sen’s Cambodian People’s Party, described Sunday’s vote as a “brilliant victory” and said the country would move forward “under the umbrella of peace and political stability”.
Although 20 parties contested the election, the only one with the popularity and organisation to mount a real challenge, the Cambodian National Rescue Party, was dissolved last year by the Supreme Court in a ruling seen by some as political and ensuring Hun Sen would extend his 33 years in power by another five-year term.
The opposition CNRP, in a statement issued on Monday by some of its former leaders in Jakarta, Indonesia, said after the “sham election … what was left of a democracy in name only has been replaced with an outright dictatorship”.
Declaring Hun Sen’s government illegitimate, it warned “governments and businesses across the world that the agreements, deals and accords signed as of today by Cambodia’s de facto regime will have no legal validity and will be revised by the future democratic government of Cambodia”.