Khmer Citizens That Cannot Speak Khmer

Posted on 17 February 2008.

The Mirror, Vol. 12, No. 547

In two communes at the northern border of the country, people are far away from the national society

“Preah Vihear: Khmer citizens living at the northern border of the country, including in Sralau Muoy and Sralau Pir communes, situated along the upper Mekong river bank bordering the Laotian side of the Mekong river, have until now not yet received any influence in terms of any dissemination of information from their own society and the cultural relations of their own country, because they are in a remote area next to the border of Laos.

“The people in the two communes of Sralau Muoy and Sralau Pir live very far away from the Khmer society ever since the border was set between the two countries of Cambodia and Laos during the French [colonial] era. The area is around 150 kilometers far away from the provincial town. There are no roads there connecting them to the town. In the dry season, the two communes can only be reached by trucks, because they can use cow-cart roads. It is very difficult to reach Kompong Sralau village, located in Sralau Muoy commune, at the Mekong river bank. In the rainy season, both communes cannot be reached, neither by car nor by motorbike or even cow-carts, because vehicles would get stuck, and many creeks cannot be crossed.
“In the two communes, all Khmer people were under the ideological influence of Siam [Thailand] during the time of control by Siam. Currently, in their villages and communes, their general language is 95% Laotian, while the Khmer language is used only when they meet with guests coming from outside once in while. Recently, a reporter from Koh Santepheap has traveled to the Khmer-Lao border with a delegation of the Provincial Department of Education, Youth and Sports, to Sralau Muoy and Sralau Pir. ‘At that time, we met a Khmer woman named Sen Mi. She is 36 years old, living in Kompong Sralau village, in the Sralau Muoy commune.’ She told Koh Santepheap in Khmer, with a Laotian accent, that she is Khmer, living in this village since she was very young. She had completed school with grade 6 (in the Laotian language), but she does not know any single Khmer letter, because in her village, a Khmer school existed only since 2000. So older people do not know the Cambodian language. Most of them can only speak Laotian.

“The people, who live in Sralau Muoy commune, have close relations with Laotian people, where they live on each side of the Mekong river bank, and they regularly cross the river by small boats to do business and exchange information with each other. Regarding their occupations, besides farming, the Kompong Sralau villagers enter the forest to seek non-timber forest products such as limes, rattans, and vines etc. All of these products are brought to the Laotian side of the river bank for Laotian businesspeople, because all of them have more trust in Laotian people, more than in their own Khmer people living nearby. Almost all of their life depends on business with Laotians. Most of those villagers also use mobile phones connected to Laotian services provider companies, to contact other people in Laos, and they travel by boat to reach each other, both Khmers and Laotians, without any document. As for the currency, people in both of Sralau’s communes generally use, the Kip, the Laotian currency only. There is hardly any Riel used in the area. However, if they want to relate to business more closely to Cambodia, they exchange their Laotian Kip into Dollars in a Laotian market.

“It is to note again that 95% of the children 10 years old and below do not know Khmer, they know only the Laotian language. Nowadays, when a delegation or tourists come and look at the upper areas of the Sralau communes, they see the area where our Cambodian citizens live next to the Great Mekong river border: at night, the other side of the river bank at the Smao island in Laos, has a lot of electricity, but if one looks back to our Khmer Sralau commune, it is dark and quiet…
“Monks, who stay at Wat Botom Phallaram in Kompong Sralau village, as well as commune councilors, and people in the Sralau Muoy commune, appeal through Koh Santepheap to the Royal Government to build a road connecting the Preah Vihear provincial center to Kompong Sralau village, a distance of around 150 kilometers, and they hope that Samdech Akak Moha Senapadei Dekchor Hun Sen will respond to this request, in order to enable them to have easier communication in all fields with the present society of Cambodia as well as in the future. They want this area to regularly get connected to the Khmer community again, and to reduce the use of the language and culture of another nation.”

Koh Santepheap, Vol.41, #6273, 16-17.2.2008