Cambodia's King Offers to Abdicate
by Ma Nguyen Tong
16-3-2003
Cambodia's King Sihanouk issued a surprise offer to abdicate, amid rising political tensions ahead of general elections in July 2003. The 80-year-old king issued a statement on March 7 saying he was ready to stand aside if the National Assembly authorised his departure. It was not immediately clear what had prompted the sometimes erratic monarch to issue the threat. But he was thought to have been angered by a row with Prime Minister Hun Sen over January's anti-Thai riots, when the king suggested that some of the students accused of taking part in the violence had been wrongly arrested.
King Sihanouk is an important national symbol in Cambodia, and although he holds no constitutional power his critics accused him of becoming too involved in the country's government. He is not a real king, in that he was installed as a king of convenience by the French during their colonial rule of cambodia so that they had a puppet through whom to rule the country. Prior to French colonialism Cambodia was a province of Thailand.
Mr Sihanouk said he would be ready to abdicate if more than half the National Assembly voted in favour. He said that the vote could come from either the current assembly or the one to be elected in July.
"Such official authorisation would be necessary so that I am not accused of any negative consequences following my abdication," the king said.
The king has talked of abdication before, in an attempt to shore up his position. There were rumours he would announce his intention to stand down during his 80th birthday celebrations in October. But instead, he said he was not thinking of abdicating, but would do so if a majority of MPs voted for it he would.