Savang Vatthana
Savang Vatthana (completely Boroma Setha Khatya Sourya Vongsa Phra Maha Sri Savang Vatthana; born November 13, 1907 in Luang Prabang , † probably March 1980 ) was the last king of the Kingdom of Laos from 1959 to 1975 .
Life as a prince
Savang Vatthana was the second of five children of King Sisavang Vong of Luang Phrabang and Queen Kham-Oun I . The northern Laotian kingdom of Luang Prabang had been under French protectorate since 1893 - like the southern kingdom of Champasak and Vientiane in the middle and thus belonged to French Indochina . The French installed Sisavang Vong as king in 1905. He was superior to the monarchs of the rest of the Laotian territories. In addition to the king, there was in Luang Prabang (as in other Southeast Asian empires) an Uparaja (“second king” or “viceroy”) with his own succession and his own court.
At the age of 10, Prince Savang Vatthana was sent to France for training. There he attended a lycée in Montpellier . He then studied at the École libre des sciences politiques in Paris, where French diplomats were also trained at the time. On his return to Laos, he could no longer speak Lao and had to laboriously learn his own language again with the help of a court scholar.
On August 7, 1930, Savang Vatthana married the future Queen Khamphoui and they had six children: Crown Prince Vong Savang , Prince Sisavang Savang, Prince Savang, Prince Sauryavong Savang, Princess Savivanh Savang and Princess Thala Savang. Savang Vatthana already took an active part in state affairs during the reign of his father. From 1932 to 1941 he was general secretary of the royal court in Luang Prabang. In 1936 he was made a Knight of the French Legion of Honor .
Because of his notoriously pro-French stance, Savang Vatthana was interned in Saigon during the Japanese occupation of Indochina , while his father had to proclaim the "independence" of Laos as a Japanese puppet state . After the country was liberated from both the French colonial and Japanese occupation powers at the end of World War II in August 1945, King Sisavang Vong had to abdicate at the urging of the Lao Issara national independence movement . Prince Savang Vatthana contacted the French and actively supported the return of French colonial troops and the re-establishment of the Protectorate in 1946. His father was reinstated as king by the French. Prince Savang Vatthana became head of his father's royal government that same year. During this time the Indochina War (1946–1954) fell, in which the Lao Issara also fought against the colonial power in Laos.
On July 19, 1949, Savang Vatthana signed the Franco-Lao treaty that granted Laos independence. It remained, however, as part of the Union française , which was dominated by France , whereby the former colonial power retained special rights in the country. The Lao Issara then split: The radical, pro-communist wing - Pathet Lao - continued to fight against the French and the royal Laotian government. At the head of this movement was Prince Souphanouvong , the son of the former Viceroy ( Uparaja ) - only distantly related to Savang Vatthana.
In October and November 1951, Prince Savang Vatthana was brief prime minister of the Kingdom of Laos. In this position, he was succeeded by Prince Souvanna Phouma (also a son of the former viceroy), who wanted to keep Laos neutral between the two global political blocs during the Cold War . In 1954 France lost the Indochina War and with it its entire colonial empire Indochina. This gave Laos complete sovereignty in the same year. From the mid-1950s onwards, Savang Vatthana gradually took over the representative functions of his sick father. In August 1959 he was appointed regent .
Reign as king
King Sisavang Vong died on October 29, 1959, and Savang Vatthana ascended the throne on November 1. However, he was never ceremonially crowned. Until his fall in 1975, he lived with his family in the Ho Kham Royal Palace in Luang Prabang , far from the political capital Vientiane, and did not have much influence on political events.
His entire reign was marked by the Lao Civil War , which had smoldered in previous years and which really broke out in July 1959. Three opposing groups faced each other: the pro-communist Pathet Lao with its most prominent representative Prince Souphanouvong ( left resistance), the neutralists of Prince Souvanna Phouma and a right-wing movement of Prince Boun Oum of Champasak. This right wing tended towards Thailand and later towards the USA. King Savang Vatthana was also decidedly anti-communist and pro-American. Nevertheless, he endorsed the Geneva Treaty of 1962, which enshrined the neutrality of Laos, and expressed his support for the subsequently incumbent coalition government under the neutralist Prince Souvanna Phouma. He rejected the two right-wing coup attempts in 1964 and 1965.
Disappeared after the 1975 revolution
After the end of the civil war in 1973, the communist forces of the Pathet Lao and the Laotian People's Revolutionary Party (LRVP), which emerged from it, took power after a bloodless revolution and proclaimed the Democratic People's Republic of Laos on December 2, 1975. Crown Prince Vong Savang read out his father's abdication in front of the National Congress of Representatives in the Lao capital Vientiane in 1975. The official version says that the king donated his palace to the Lao people. At that time it was said: "King Savang Vatthana abdicates of his own volition for changing Laotian politics." The 622 year old monarchy was abolished. Prince Souphanouvong became the first President of the People's Republic. He named Savang Vatthana his "chief advisor," a meaningless position he never filled.
In the first years of communist rule, tens of thousands of Laotians had to go to re-education camps to train the “new man”. Many had to spend 13 years doing field work and political training, others never returned at all. Initially tolerated by the new rulers, King Savang Vatthana was arrested along with Queen and Crown Prince Vong Savang in March 1977 after resistance activities flared up in the north of the country. They disappeared in one of the notorious re-education camps in the north, near Vieng Xai . There he died because of the poor living conditions, of malaria or because he lost his courage to live, probably in March 1980. The German news magazine Der Spiegel , however, reported that he died in Vientiane at the beginning of January 1981.
The former residence of the king, the Ho Kham in Luang Prabang, is now a national museum. The former reception room of the queen is decorated with pictures of King Savang Vatthana, the queen and Crown Prince Vong Savang. It can be visited.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Laos: The White Elephant. In: Time , March 17, 1961.
- ↑ a b Savang Vatthana in the Munzinger archive ( beginning of article freely available)
- ↑ a b c d e f g h Martin Stuart-Fox: Historical Dictionary of Laos. Scarecrow Press, Lanham (MD) / Plymouth 2008, p. 290.
- ↑ [1] Celebrate the heirs of the "Red Prince"
- ↑ [2] History of Laos
- ↑ Died: Savang Vatthana. In: Der Spiegel , No. 3/1981, January 12, 1981, p. 176.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Savang Vatthana |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Boroma Setha Khatya Sourya Vongsa Phra Maha Sri Savang Vatthana |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Laotian ruler, last king (1959–1975) |
| DATE OF BIRTH | November 13, 1907 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Luang Prabang |
| DATE OF DEATH | uncertain: March 1980 |