Credit: Reuters |
Reference: SRP Youth making a Difference in Local Government
Op-Ed by School of Vice
Opposition parties will need more young recruits and
activists like Ms Sin Rozeth who will help the party to reach out to the towns
and villages across the country. The more recruits it can attract the better if
only to compensate the party's current lack of mass media coverage. But, it is
vital that every recruit is thoroughly screened and their activities
meticulously monitored to guard against lapses in discipline or infiltration
and sabotage effort aimed at weakening the party's movement in every respect.
The party should be 'fun' and relevant to join, but should
be rewarding in terms of personal development or growth as well. Exceptional
talents should be welcomed; someone who will be morally upright and steadfast
and, if needs be, training and further guidance should be extended to them so
that the leadership can entrust them with specific responsibilities vis a vis
the population as well as carrying out their role as commanding officers in
relations to the rest of activists acting as the party's foot-soldiers.
The party must clearly spell out its core principles first
and foremost to its own rank and file members and be prepared to take ‘ruthless
measures’ or subject them to stern internal disciplinary codes if and when any
of them violates or breaches such codes. If the guilty member shows clear
manifest desire to reform him/herself and the misdeed committed not serious
enough to warrant expulsion then the party should also show reciprocal desire
to persevere with such individuals. Sometimes a reformed offender can turn out
to be the party's more loyal member.
The party's leadership itself needs to compose of varied
individuals and talents: it needs to be able to relate to specific situation or
phenomenon unencumbered by its own dogma and theoretical refinements. Every arising phenomenon,
every social calamity and crisis presents forth possibilities and opportunities for the
party to pitch down its tent and make its political presence felt. Activists
must be encouraged and trained to grasp social geography and terrain with all their
apparent and less obvious features clearly laid out and sussed in their minds
even before arriving at the scene. Ordinary people may lack the gift of vision
or ability to see things beyond their immediate want and preoccupations, but
they know what really matters for them and their families; it is this certainty
that the prospective activist must address, work around on or add something to,
and more. It is no use decrying their perceived mental ‘insularity’ as an
example of backwardness or "ignorance".
The mindset of a peasant or an urban worker can be just as opaque and cunning as that of a scholar; and in fact, generally they are more so as can be demonstrated by the longevity of the country's incumbent rulers who had been extracted from the stock of the peasantry, and since they had once shared and lived the life of the peasants and drank from the same well, they perhaps know instinctively how best to exploit the peasants' fears or to appease the latter’s aspirations to their own political advantage.
The mindset of a peasant or an urban worker can be just as opaque and cunning as that of a scholar; and in fact, generally they are more so as can be demonstrated by the longevity of the country's incumbent rulers who had been extracted from the stock of the peasantry, and since they had once shared and lived the life of the peasants and drank from the same well, they perhaps know instinctively how best to exploit the peasants' fears or to appease the latter’s aspirations to their own political advantage.
The ideal party activist will have something material and
pertinent to offer every potential recruit encountered, be it a remote
hill-tribesman, a slum-dweller, a garment worker, a state employee, a rice
farmer, a high school student or a university graduate; and even members
of opposing parties provided the said activist is in sound intellectual command
of each and every such prospective individual's overall or specific
situation can be similairly engaged. However, if you don't know any of these things try Plato's tentative
method and ask him relevant questions likely to yield the answers you seek!
"Pragmatism" is often mistaken or exploited for
all kind of motives - we should not seek to "change things for the
better" and yet end up reproducing the precise same things in new clever
guises. There must be an undoubted political will to overhaul the overall
political culture, and reinstitute a healthy one in replacement on a sound,
steady footing. Sihanouk, for example, had had his chance to do this during his lengthy reign, but hadn't
bothered to do so. The present leaders . . . well, they are a nightmare really
since they are nothing more and nothing less than causal embodiments and
outcomes of that former monarch's crucial political failings for whatever
reason, including the one just mentioned.
I cannot emphasise enough the importance of organisational
cohesion and mobilisation. Cambodia is being confronted with ‘threats’ on two
main fronts even if both can be described as intertwined in relations to one
another i.e. external and internal threats. It is up to opposition party
strategists to devise appropriate means by which to counter or neutralise these
threats. For now, however, it must expand and consolidate its influence and
presence through mobilisation and activism.
It is of secondary importance that a party's leader is in exile, but he or she must ensure that his/ her moral and strategic guidance and spiritual presence is felt by all the party's affiliates and followers at every level; that every party member must be promoted and demoted on merit and not through personal favour and connection. Above all, there shall be one unified life force coursing through the veins of the party and into the channels of every commune, every district, every principality, every factory, every place of work, every place of leisure... enriching the impoverished with practical support and insights, converting the affluent with ideas and unquestioned patriotism.
Go forth and multiply!
It is of secondary importance that a party's leader is in exile, but he or she must ensure that his/ her moral and strategic guidance and spiritual presence is felt by all the party's affiliates and followers at every level; that every party member must be promoted and demoted on merit and not through personal favour and connection. Above all, there shall be one unified life force coursing through the veins of the party and into the channels of every commune, every district, every principality, every factory, every place of work, every place of leisure... enriching the impoverished with practical support and insights, converting the affluent with ideas and unquestioned patriotism.
Go forth and multiply!
1 comment:
Perspective: How to free Cambodia from Hun Sen and Vietnam
The situation in Cambodia is not just human right or democracy.
The Hyena Hun Sen was installed by the evil Vietnam to carry and execute Vietnam's plan to annex Cambodia slowly but surely.
This one eye monster Hun Sen has shown and proven to his master Vietnam that he would do whatever it takes - killing Khmer people, destroying Cambodia - to implement all Vietnam's orders.
As a result, Cambodia has encountered all kind of problems that infuriated Khmer people but they could not do anything against Hun Sen.
Khmer people have never thought that Hun Sen could dissolve the CNRP but Hun Sen did when he saw that the CNRP was a formidable threat to his power.
If Khmer people want to win over this crazy animal Hun Sen, they need to have patience, perseverance, and unwavering conviction in their struggle to free Cambodia from Hun Sen and Vietnam.
For example, Khmer people have overwhelmingly supported the CNRP and Hun Sen plus Vietnam unconstitutionally dissolved the CNRP.
To fight back, Khmer people must stick with the CNRP and peacefully struggling including sacrificing their life for the CNRP to be reinstated.
If we abandon the CNRP and create a new party or a new front as suggested by Yim Sinon, we will go to nowhere because if that front is strong enough to be a threat to Hun Sen, Hun Sen will kill such front again. And Khmer people pain will go on and on until the Vietnamization of Cambodia is complete and Cambodia will be just a part of Vietnam.
Notice that the new front or movement that involves with guns will empower Hun Sen to crush such front legally. We must stick with our peaceful means including our willingness to sacrifice our life.
In brief, fighting with great determination to get the CNRP reinstated is the only option that Khmer people must do. Hun Sen and Vietnam will not give it up easily but the economic pressure mainly lacking of revenues, the massive social unrest stemming from unemployment, the international pressure will surely force Hun Sen to reinstate the CNRP and bring the democracy back to Cambodia. Hun Sen cannot withstand all kind of pressures from people all over the world. In addition, even Hun Sen's backbone supporter China has its own problems too.
Khmer people must stay united behind the CNRP. Kanha Leukeu Kem Mono Vitia and Yem Ponharith must shut their mouth up and stop creating frictions among the CNRP's members.
Notice that in 2017, Hun Sen could no longer control the National Election Committee (NEC), which prompted him to dissolve the CNRP to prevent his downfall.
93 Years Old Woman
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