Justice of Cambodia

The country has a constitutionally independent judiciary composed of lower courts, an appeals court, and a Supreme Court. However, the judiciary has been closely allied with Cambodia’s ruling party and often has been suspected of corruption. A nine-member Constitutional Council determines the constitutionality of legislation. It also resolves electoral disputes. The Supreme Council of Magistrates appoints and disciplines judges. There is also a separate military justice system.

Political process

The two most-important political parties in Cambodia are the Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) and the Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP). The CPP, proclaimed in 1991, is a noncommunist party descended from the pro-Vietnam and communist Kampuchean People’s Revolutionary Party that was founded in 1951. The CPP was long the dominant party in national politics. The CNRP was formed in 2012 through the merger of the Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) and the smaller Human Rights Party (founded 2007). The SRP, founded in 1995 as the Khmer National Party and renamed in 1998, grew to be the second largest party and to constitute the official opposition—a role continued by the CNRP. A third party, the United Front for an Independent, Neutral, Peaceful, and Cooperative Cambodia (Funcinpec), is composed of the royalist supporters of the former king Norodom Sihanouk and his son Prince Ranariddh (although the latter was removed from the party in 2006). Funcinpec, formerly the second largest party, participated in governing coalitions with the CPP between 1993 and 2006. It subsequently lost its influence in the national political scene.

The 1993 constitution provides for universal suffrage for citizens 18 years and older, and all citizens 25 years and older have the right to hold elective office. The number of women holding governmental positions in either the National Assembly or the civil service was small but increasing.

Security

The king is the commander in chief of the armed forces, called the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF), which include the army, navy, and air force. The RCAF was created in 1993 through the merger of the Cambodian government’s military forces and the two noncommunist resistance armies; the Khmer Rouge and royalist forces were absorbed into the RCAF in 1999. The army is much larger than the other two branches and is staffed mainly through conscription.

In the early 21st century, Cambodia was at peace, but its proportionally large armed forces imposed an enormous burden on national resources. The government has tried to reduce the size of its army by seeking funds from foreign countries to compensate demobilized soldiers, but donors have been reluctant to make such expenditures at the expense of the projects to rebuild Cambodia’s infrastructure that have been the main focus of foreign aid.

Health and welfare

Cambodia has long had an acute shortage of medical personnel, which has been a major obstacle to implementing an effective public health program. Phnom Penh has the country’s best health care facilities and trained medical personnel, whereas most rural areas are served only by local infirmaries. Even before the civil war of 1970–75, Cambodia had few doctors, hospitals, or medical facilities. The civil war strained and eroded the fragile structure. The rulers of Democratic Kampuchea moved medical personnel to collective farms and, as part of its policy of self-reliance, encouraged non-Western medical practices based on the use of local herbs.

Providing adequate health care remained a serious problem. Scarce funds, unsettled conditions in the country, poor sanitation, and a shortage of medicine contributed to high incidences of diseases such as tuberculosis, malaria, and pneumonia. Adding to that, tens of thousands of Cambodians were maimed by land mines, but only a fraction of them received proper medical attention. However, that issue received widespread worldwide attention, and considerable international effort was made to clear land mines and to provide prosthetic limbs for land-mine victims.

Another issue seriously affecting Cambodia is HIV/AIDS. By the late 1990s, HIV infection and AIDS cases had peaked at epidemic levels in urban areas. The government subsequently implemented programs among commercial sex workers to promote mandatory condom use and to treat sexually transmitted diseases. In addition, international organizations set up programs to treat those infected and to care for children orphaned by the epidemic. Those initiatives significantly reduced the proportion of the population infected with the virus in the early 21st century.

Housing

Prior to 1975, housing in Cambodia was comparable in quality to that of other Southeast Asian countries. The evacuation of Phnom Penh and other cities in 1975–76, however, left urban residential structures abandoned and produced tremendous housing pressures in the rural areas, where many people lived in temporary shelters. Overcrowding increased dramatically in Phnom Penh as people started returning to urban areas. Some people have lived in squatter huts built on the rooftops of buildings in the downtown area. The municipal government, with the cooperation of community groups and with the support of the national government and international agencies, has been trying to construct more residential units.

In rural areas more than half of residential structures are built by using bamboo, thatch, grass, reeds, and similar materials. In urban areas the majority of residential buildings are constructed of wood, concrete, brick, stone, metal sheets, and tiles. About one-third of all urban residences have access to safe drinking water, electricity as their main source of lighting, and indoor toilet facilities; the proportion of houses with those facilities in the rural areas is far smaller.

Education

Cambodia’s educational system, as it had developed in the first 70 years of the 20th century, was another casualty of warfare and ideology. Only primary schools were open during the Democratic Kampuchea period; older students attended irregularly scheduled political and technical courses, often held in the communes. After 1979 the government in Phnom Penh gave high priority to primary education, and it reopened secondary schools and institutions of higher education. Although a large number of young Khmer attend some form of educational institution, schools and colleges are severely hampered by shortages of funds, books, equipment, and adequately trained and compensated staff. Fewer than half of the country’s students enrolled in primary school proceed beyond the fifth grade.

Cambodia’s main public institutions of higher education—all located in Phnom Penh—include the Buddhist Institute (founded 1930), the Royal University of Phnom Penh (1960), and the Royal Academy of Cambodia (1965). The overwhelming majority of students at the country’s main institutions of higher education are male. Some four-fifths of males and two-thirds of females are literate, although some studies have indicated that functional illiteracy has increased.