In a last ditch attempt to find a compromise which would allow them to remain in their homes, villagers living in the Sesan II dam area say that they could get by with some minor flooding if the hydro-electric company agrees not to open all their flood gates. When only eight gates were open last month the level of flooding was at about 1m in the villages.

25 August 2017
- Villagers representing some 700 community members will petition the Ministry of Mines and Energy today, asking them not to use Stung Treng province’s Lower Sesan II dam at full capacity.
Representatives from the ethnically Phnong village of Kbal Romeas and from the ethnically Lao village of Srekor will today seek government intervention to oblige the Hydro Power Lower Sesan 2 Company to operate only eight of its 10 gates in an effort to prevent their homes from becoming submerged next month.

“We do not stop the development, but if the company closes only its eight gates, our villages will not be so deluged, so we can live at our homes,” Kbal Romeas villager Lat Vibol said...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/s ... ention-dam

'I Will Lose My Identity': Cambodian Villagers Face Displacement By Mekong Dam
26 August 2017
Michael Sullivan

Cambodia needs energy. Almost half of this Southeast Asian country is without electricity. Work will soon be completed on the country's largest hydropower project to date, the Sesan 2 dam, on the Sesan River, a tributary of the Mekong River near the border with Laos.

The dam is an $800 million joint Chinese-Cambodian venture from a company called Hydro Power Lower Sesan 2 Co. Ltd. When it's finished, two nearby villages, Srekor and Kbal Romeas, will be underwater.

Most of Srekor's residents — about 400 families — have already been resettled in a new village about an hour's drive down the road.

Fisherman Fout Kaeun isn't one of them.

"You see that we live next to the river," he says — a river that provides almost everything. "We can catch fish to eat, it provides water to drink and the land alongside is good for growing crops."

He says there's no way he's going to the new village.

"There's no river there," he says. The soil's no good, either, he says: "You can't grow anything, so how will I survive? How will my family survive?"

Kaeun doesn't believe Srekor village will be entirely submerged by the dam. But if it happens, he says, "We just make it a floating village, a tourist attraction" — like the one on the Tonle Sap lake, near the temples of Angkor Wat.

If the villages do that, he says, they can also protect the forest nearby. And everyone, he says, can make money.

A lot of people are already making money from cutting down Cambodia's forests to sell its luxury hardwood abroad. Some indigenous villagers here say the new dam is helping hasten their forests' destruction...
Full article:
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Local authorities are blocking all access to the future dam area to outsiders, particularly activists wishing to document or support the villagers' plight.

Students blocked from dam
More than 30 university students from Phnom Penh were blocked by police on Saturday from visiting communities affected by the Lower Sesan II hydropower dam project in Stung Treng.

Meng Heng, an activist with conservation NGO Mother Nature, said that the students were on their way to visit villagers in Srekor and Kbal Romea who are refusing to relocate. The students were denied entry by about 20 police and Military Police who claimed the area was unsafe.

Choeun Sreymom, a villager from Kbal Romea, said she was disappointed that the students were denied entry, and accused the authorities of violating human rights...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/s ... locked-dam

14 September 2017
Phnom Penh:
According to Ministry of Mines and Energy, 25 September will be the official date to shut the river temporarily.

The Lower Sesan 2 Dam is currently the biggest dam in Cambodia which has cost approximately $781 million. Construction on the dam started in 2004. It is projected to supply 400 MW of power to the residents of Phnom Penh City, Kompong Cham Province, Kratie Province, and Steung Treng Province.

Khmerpress

Indigenous villagers say they are being forced off ancestral lands.
13 October 2017
Thirty indigenous people representing 136 families living near the Lower Sesan II hydropower dam gathered in front of two government ministries yesterday asking for intervention to stop local authorities attempting to push them off their land.
The residents of Sre Ko commune in Stung Treng province’s Sesan district called on the government to instruct local officials to cease the deployment of armed forces and resume public services in their village.

Kim Roeun, 51, a member of the Pnong ethnic minority, was one of those who submitted petitions to the Interior Ministry and Ministry of National Assembly-Senate Relations and Inspection on behalf of the families. He said local authorities were persecuting them in a bid to force them to relocate away from the dam.
“The authorities do not allow people to gather or visit their relatives. They do not allow anyone to go in or out of the village. They removed our bridge, deployed military forces to suppress us, and are disrupting health and education services. All of this is making our lives very difficult,” he said...
http://www.khmertimeskh.com/5085981/ses ... suffering/

Villagers driven to high ground as dam floods
23 October 2017
About 70 ethnic minority families who declined to move to land offered by the government when their village was flooded by the new Lower Sesan II dam rushed to move their belongings to higher ground last week as the rising waters engulfed their houses.

For the people in Stung Treng province’s Sesan district, the battle to stay on their traditional land has been a long one, and it’s far from over.

As the new dam becomes operational, quickly rising water in the area has flooded their houses in Sre Ko commune, forcing them to scramble to gather their belongings and move to a new location.

The water level last week reached the roofs of the houses of the last families in the commune, who declined to accept the compensation offered by the Lower Sesan II dam company...
http://www.khmertimeskh.com/5087174/vil ... am-floods/

2 November 2017
STUNG TRENG - Flooding in the old Srekor village has now reached the town’s rooftops and, according to Siek Mekong, chief of Srekor commune, the new settlement area provided by the company, with the assistance of the government, is also being inundated.

According to Mekong, rice and cashew crops in the new town have been submerged for around two weeks already, and are completely destroyed.

“The water is at hip level,” he explained. Mekong also said the villagers are unable to use the newly built road because flooding there is a metre high. Some have resorted to using boats...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/r ... rs-flooded

Unexpectedly good news ! The indigenous families from the Sesan dam flood area will be permitted to remain on their land, and the authorities appear to be falling over themselves to be fair and even generous, offering public services for the new community. Most unexpected to say the least.

Sesan locals win right to stay
6 December 2017
Local authorities have agreed to allow the last families refusing to relocate from their homes near the Lower Sesan II dam to establish a new village on their community forest and ancestral lands.

The remaining 76 families from Sre Ko and Kbal Romeas communes decided to move to their community forest and ancestral lands in October, after their villages flooded when the gates of the hydropower dam were closed.

Stung Treng provincial authority spokesman Men Kong said local officials had visited the villagers at their new homes and designated a health centre for them, meaning they can continue to live there.

“They would not live in the place where we offered to relocate them, so we agreed to let them live on their community forest and ancestral lands,” he said.

He added the authorities will now conduct an investigation into how villagers were affected by floods to provide them with fair compensation.
“Even if they are going to live on their farmland, our policy is still to provide them with fair compensation,” Mr Kong said.

“We try our best to serve the public and do not want developments to harm them. We want both parties to profit from development projects.”...
http://www.khmertimeskh.com/5094169/ses ... ight-stay/

Its so nice to hear good news

if it happens, he says, "We just make it a floating village, a tourist attraction" — like the one on the Tonle Sap lake, near the temples of Angkor Wat.

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