Cheng Heng

Cheng Heng (born January 10, 1916 in Takeo Province ; † March 15, 1996 ) was a Cambodian politician and head of state of Cambodia from 1970 to 1971.

Cheng came from a farming family with large land holdings and worked his way up to a successful businessman and landowner. He later married the daughter of the high dignitary and long-time minister under King Monivong and Norodom Sihanouk , Ung Hy. He served in the colonial administration in Cambodia, which at the time belonged to French Indochina , and achieved the degree of Oudom Montrey (higher-ranking Mandarin) in the mid- 1950s .

Cheng's early political career during the reign of Prince Norodom Sihanouk's Sangkum party is unknown. He went into politics in 1958 and served as Minister of Agriculture between 1961 and 1962. In 1962 he was elected to parliament for the Sangkum party in Takhmau , but in 1966 he lost this seat to a rival, the young activist Keo Sann. Cheng then returned to parliament after an early election in Phnom Penh and became President of the National Assembly.

Immediately after the 1970 coup, which led to King Sihanouk being replaced by General Lon Nol and Prince Sisowath Sirik Matak , Cheng was made head of state before general elections could be held. This function was essentially of a ceremonial character and did not result in political influence. Sihanouk therefore called Cheng from exile "an unimportant figure". He held press conferences and received state guests, and there was an incident in 1970, in which Cheng clashed with American security personnel when he was to receive US Vice President Spiro Agnew . In spring 1972, Lon Nol replaced Cheng as head of state after a political crisis.

After the US put pressure on Lon Nol to broaden the political base of the Cambodian government, Cheng became vice-chairman of the High Political Council that was supposed to rule the country. Its influence, however, was bypassed again and again by Lon Nol.

When the Khmer Rouge encircled the capital in 1975, they published a list of seven traitors, including Cheng, who would be executed immediately in the event of a victory. Cheng then fled to Paris on April 1 , where he joined a group of exiled Cambodians around Son Sann .

Cheng returned in 1991 after the UN- negotiated political pacification of Cambodia and founded the Republican coalition party, which participated in the 1993 election without success.

Cheng Heng died on March 15, 1996. He had seven children.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Cheng Heng (PDF; 142 kB), AEFEK, last accessed on February 2, 2010.
2. ↑ Sihanouk, p.51.
3. ↑ Shawcross, p.176

literature

• J. Corfield: Khmers Stand Up! A History of the Cambodian Government, 1970-1975 . Monash Asia Institute, 1994.
• W. Shawcross: Sideshow: Kissinger, Nixon, and the destruction of Cambodia . New York: Simon & Schuster, 1979.
• Norodom Sihanouk: My War with the CIA . Random House, 1973.