Umesh Pandey
COMMENTARY
Bangkok Post
There is no bigger news in Asean these
days than the collapse of efforts to produce a joint communique after the
recent 45th ministerial meeting in Phnom Penh. Much of the blame has been laid at the feet of host Cambodia
but that misses the larger point.
The failure to issue a
communique was the first in the history of the 10-member organisation
that prides itself on harmony and consensus. Some observers have begun
to question what Cambodia was doing as the Asean chair this year.
What happened in Phnom Penh, in a
nutshell, was that one country’s fear of
offending China somehow managed to trump all the others’ desire
to send Beijing a stern message about its behaviour in the South China
Sea.
The fact is, people could have
seen this bust-up coming. During the April summit, Cambodia nearly managed to singlehandedly derail efforts
to discuss a “code of conduct” in the South China Sea.
Prime Minister Hun Sen spent
nearly an hour trying to explain to journalists how important China was
to the region, but the others prevailed and the code of conduct was
deliberated. It was hoped at the time that the July meeting would build
on that progress.
Hun Sen’s defence of Beijing in
April came just days after Chinese President Hu Jintao had visited
Cambodia. Indeed, had the April summit collapsed, it would have been
much easier to point the finger of blame.
The Cambodian premier in the
past has praised China’s approach to giving money with no strings
attached. Perhaps he’s annoyed that some other members of the
“international donor community” want some accounting for the billions of
dollars they have spent helping one of the world’s sorriest basket
cases become a functioning economy.
It should come as no surprise,
then, that Cambodia
has little to lose by ditching the long-term interests of Asean for the
short-term benefits it can receive by siding with China.
Other politicians with short-term vested interests and patrons in
Beijing would probably do the same.
Apart from this, the region
itself is so intertwined with China that it is difficult to separate and
not be influenced by the goliath to the north.
At the heart of recent tensions
has been the Spratly Islands, in which Vietnam, the Philippines,
Malaysia and Brunei all claim some interest, apart from China and
Taiwan.
Therefore putting all the blame
on Cambodia is not entirely fair. Instead it should be said that China is the
culprit.
China, it seems, has learned its lessons
well from the colonial powers of
a bygone era. A divide-and-rule strategy
works well in Asean, where Beijing can exploit the wide gap between rich
and poor nations with some well-placed giveaways. No wonder Foreign
Ministry spokesman Hong Lei described the historic debacle of the
meeting as “positive”.
Cambodia is hardly the first
country that has gone out of its way to stay in China’s good books, and
it won’t be the last. In 2014 the Asean chairmanship shifts to Myanmar,
which was a client state of China when the military junta was in charge.
Beijing has poured billions into infrastructure in Myanmar, but the new
government now aims to counter China’s influence by putting out the
welcome mat to investors from all over the world.
Even Thailand, much higher up the
development ladder, has relied heavily on support from China for big
projects, an ambitious new rail network the most recent
case in point.
So why then should we blame only
Cambodia for the cracks in Asean’s harmonious facade? Blame China if you want, but
also blame ourselves, Asean citizens and leaders, for not sticking
together, especially on an issue that involves four of Asean’s 10 member
states.
Finally, blame the way Asean
works, and the obsession with “consensus” that sometimes flies in the
face of reality. What’s so wrong with adopting decisions based on the
wishes of the majority? There may be times when members have to sideline
a few bad actors so they can’t derail efforts to work for the benefit
of the 600 million-plus other citizens of the region.
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