Something to read about Buck Cheng Say"MA"Vong (Domestic Dog)
Soumaly1
Arms firm 'warlord' removed
THAILAND by Greg Torode in Bangkok
One of the most powerful and enigmatic leaders in Laos has been removed
from the head of the country's biggest firm.
After building up the military development firm Bolisat Phakhana Khet
Phoudoi, General Cheng Sayavong is now directing the National Tourism
Authority as it gears up for Visit Laos Year 1999.
General Cheng held no formal military or Communist Party post but his
rule of the shadowy company saw him control vast areas of central Laos
from a huge teak mansion in the mountains at Lak Xao, a tiny outpost he
turned into a booming town of 12,000 people.
His new task involves managing the one million foreign tourists Laos
hopes to attract on the back of Bangkok's "Amazing Thailand" campaign, a
highly sensitive issue for a country whose hinterland has only just been
opened up.
"It is hard to see this as a promotion for him," one foreign diplomat
said in Vientiane. "General Cheng personally controlled a huge area of
the country. He was the Government. He was a very new type of leader,
like an old-style warlord.
"He would deliver rice to a poor mountain tribal village one minute and
then sign a vast logging deal the next."
It is thought recent internal allegations of embezzlement and corruption
have rocked the firm, though no formal action had been taken, diplomats
said.
The firm earned the wrath of environmentalists by signing potentially
lucrative timber deals with firms from Hong Kong, Japan and Taiwan in
some of the region's most precious forests.
Particularly controversial was a zoo General Cheng was building on the
edge of the jungle containing some of Southeast Asia's most endangered
species.
His armed guards control key roads linking the central forests and
mountains with the Vietnamese ports of Vinh and Da Nang amid fears the
routes had become key opium and heroin trails.
The company also runs a fleet of huge Russian helicopters and landlocked
Laos' only ships - three freighters that ferry lumber to Japan from
ports in Vietnam.
In an interview with the South China Morning Post last year, General
Cheng dismissed his detractors, saying the firm was working for the
"development of the people" rather than for profit.
"We have to help our people to expand and develop . . . we will be going
straight down this path,' he said.
This time, neither General Cheng nor company officials could be
contacted for comment.
CHOWIGAN
>In an interview with the South China Morning Post last year, General Cheng
dismissed his detractors, saying the firm was working for the "development of
the people" rather than for profit.
>"We have to help our people to expand and develop . . . we will be going
straight down this path,' he said.
>
Very good goal, it is so noble of you to think about your own fellow Lao back
Cheng Say. Please don't forget to setup your own website so that everyone could
see your great deed.