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Yorm Bopha

 

Yorm Bopha is a Cambodian housing rights and land activist who was jailed for her opposition against a luxury development in her community that led to the ousting of thousands of local residents from their homes. The Boeung Kak Lake is centrally located in the Khmer capital of Phnom Penh, making it prime real estate for foreign developers to expand. When a foreign company was given a 99-year lease to develop in a central, urban area surrounding the lake, Bopha and her neighbors found themselves being pushed out of their homes.

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Many residents received meager compensation and were left without enough money to buy new homes while others were relocated to areas far from their places of employment and were left without transportation. The development company filled the lake with sand to drain it, causing fish and agriculture to virtually disappear, thus having an economic impact on the local community who relied on these as income sources. Angered by over 3,000 local residents losing their homes, Bopha grabbed a megaphone and organized her community to stand against their government and developers. Bopha fought her way through police barricades, withstood water canons and demanded that residents were compensated fairly. She was eventually arrested and charged with allegedly assaulting two taxi drivers, and served jail time on what many believed were false chargers to squash the resistance she led. After protests and an international outcry, Bopha was released and continues to fight against gentrification.

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