Free pass to Thailand gets political in Poipet town
Local authorities in Poipet are grappling with a dilemma of their own making after the ruling party for months footed the bill to make day passes to enter Thailand free for Cambodian vendors – a populist move now complicated by the CPP’s apparent electoral loss in the border town. Now, with Cambodian People’s Party officials balking at the cost of subsidising the crossing in a commune that no longer supports it, it is unclear who will pick up the tab for what local opposition members characterise as an inappropriate CPP effort to buy votes in the first place. On Friday, vendors attempting to cross the border were informed that the day pass they required was unavailable, causing a pile-up at the main border checkpoint. Hang Sim, a porter, said authorities did not give them tickets to cross the border. “Yes, there was some problem, and they did not want to give us tickets. But it seemed OK later on,” he said on June 11.
