…I have a great pleasure to return here after my last visit on April 16 to inaugurate a Buddhist temple. Today May 12 or it is just a distance of 28 days ago and I am in the district of Ponnhealoeu again, only to a different place. I wish to take this opportunity to express my sincere appreciation to efforts made by our people in overcoming consecutive hardships in the last few years, especially from 2000 when we had serious flooding and drought in the two years that ensued. As in this district, one part of it closer to the rivers was affected by flood and another farther is affected by drought. It was in this vision that we have placed the districts of Ponnhealoeu and Udong in our comprehensive development strategy, and a part of Kompong Tralach of Kompong Chhnang would also be in our target of irrigation.
… According to the report by HE Lim Kean Hor who heads the work team here a number of small canals built by human labour in exchange for rice have completed and our larger canal could supply water to those smaller ones. Yesterday we have proven that this hypothesis is working as we had a boat race yesterday in Kompong Speu on a spot that there used to be no water, especially in dry season. As for this area we might be able to let water down from the areas called Krapeou Truom and Peam Lovea of Udong. Water will be caught up there and will be released for our people to grow rice when the natural flood recedes. This is what we have tried to fulfil in order to make our policy of poverty alleviation working rather than making statements and speeches in hotel rooms. Once the secular world is making progress, our Buddhist world is also ready to reap its benefit.
… According to the report by HE Kandal Deputy Governor Khem Bo, we have gone along way on issue of education. In the school year of 1982 we had only three classes of junior high school. As for Chhveang itself I know very well because I was told about it on the day that I took part in a ceremony to inaugurate a monk’s residential building built at my mother in law’s donation on top of the Trai Troueng Mountain. It was from its top that I learnt about Chhveang and I would say the request to build junior high school in the district at this time is appropriately reasonable. I agree with our people that sending our kids to the Junior High School of Tep Pranam would be very far away. We have in all five buildings to be inaugurated today making this a junior college itself and I think as we will have more students finishing junior high school in the school year 2003-2004, we should also see to the possibility of making it a senior high school. Our problem here is not lacking teachers/professors because the Royal Government has allowed the Ministry of Education to recruit more teachers (about 5000 more), while we have brought down the figure of soldiers and civil servants.
… We have to make sure that our children at six years old have to schools to attend and those who finish junior high school could proceed to complete senior high school education. In this direction, I would declare offering two school buildings of ten classrooms, one sewing training building with fifty pieces of sewing machines, a director’s office of three rooms and eight to ten solar energized lights making it a complete senior high school.
Samdech Hun Sen offered on that occasion one computer, one printer, one photocopier, two 14″ colour TVs, two VCRs, a 5 KVA generator to the Junior High School of Hun Sen-O Kong, twenty million Riels for the pagodas of Keo Muni, Chum, Sovanvari, and the mosque of Phum Daung, a school building of five classrooms to the Junior College of Prek Taten, a school building of six classrooms to the Primary School of Tuol Prich, and a school building of six classrooms to the Primary School of Tropeang Roka.
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