Sunday, January 09, 2011

Why Cambodia would want to remain poor

This time back to Cambodia, I saw a lot more. Maybe because I could, maybe because I bothered to. As we were travelling down a wide road back to the hotel, he told us that the road was given by the Americans, but the Cambodian government built a toll station across it and used it to collect money. And then later on, he showed us a police officer letting a person go after collecting a small administration fee. Earlier in the day we rode pass the prime minister's house. What a magnificent house it was! Two huge houses side by side, with a one-story high chandelier in plain sight. The kind that even a house owner on Bukit Timah would clamour to have.

Doesn't it make sense now that Cambodia would want to remain poor?

As long as they suppress the progress of their country, foreign aid would keep pouring in. As long as they remain a third-world country, the country's infrastructure would be built by international coffers. In other words, as long as Cambodia remains poor, the country would continue to be developed by other countries, while the government gets to fill their pockets from taxes the development projects provide, and they get to protect their own reserves for their own luxuries! That's killing an entire flock of birds with 1 stone. Amazing, isn't it?

This corrupted government must be removed.

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