News reaches AGI of more police crackdowns last night on Phnom Penh’s slot clubs.
This time it’s not just borderline establishments dubiously classified as five star hotels, but clubs run by internationally recognised brands.
In another move, Cambodia’s sole bookmaker, Cambo Six, closed all its outlets on Wednesday in accordance with an order issued on Tuesday by Prime Minister Hun Sen, made apparently without warning at a Phnom Penh graduation ceremony, reports the English-language newspaper The Phnom Penh Post.
Finance Minister Keat Chhon told The Post early on Wednesday that the betting chain, which has 20 outlets across the country, had been given a week to close. But in Phnom Penh, Battambang, Sihanoukville and Siem Reap, Cambo Six branches were forced to end all gambling, the company said, and could only remain open to pay winnings on previously placed bets.
“The police are forcing us to close, but we have to pay our customers,” said Nancy Chau, the manager of Cambo Six’s head office in Phnom Penh.
Keat Chhon said the government would sign a licence termination agreement with the company on Wednesday afternoon, stipulating that the company would not receive any compensation. Its current operating licence had been due to expire in 2011.
“We are not slowing the closure process with this football betting company because we are working with them even at night time,” Keat Chhon said in comments reported by the PP Post.
It all raises the question, ‘What’s the end game?’
It doesn’t appear to be a ban on all gaming, as according to sources spoken to by AGI, NagaCorp and its resort NagaWorld in Phnom Penh has not been affected. And as AGI reported a few weeks ago, another casino resort, the Angkor Park Resort, near Siem Reap, was recently approved by the central and regional government.
A number of scenarios for the clamp down come to mind. One is a possible power struggle between the Phnom Penh city government and the central government. There have been suggestions that some ‘licensing fees’ for black market slot clubs had been siphoned off by local officials. The current clampdown coincides with a power vacuum created after the capital’s police chief died suddenly recently in a helicopter accident.
Another possibility is it’s a clean up designed to impress the world’s media. The latter has descended on Cambodia for the much heralded trial of Ieng Sary, a former leader of the Khmer Rouge.
It could of course be both or indeed neither of the above.
Watch this space.
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