Phnom Penh: Prime Minister Hun Sen has lambasted the opposition who criticized the government’s effort in fighting the Covid-19. He says that critics find the coffins prepared by the government for Covid-19 deaths as an insult to the Cambodian people. Prime Minister says that they should be grateful that their relatives who died of Covid-19 had a decent coffin, not wrapped in mats. He says, "Even though we are trying to protect, we cannot stop people from dying, including myself. Therefore, the preparation of the coffin is not an insult, but my way of paying respect to the bodies of those who died of Covid-19. I do not want to see any Cambodian who died of Covid-19 be wrapped in mats and buried or cremated without a coffin. I want to prove that I am not insulting the lives of the people."
The Prime Minister has also added, “The important thing for me is the well-being of the people and the lives of the people are guaranteed. The first life is not the right to freedom of expression or democracy, it is the right to life that must be acquired first. So, no matter what anyone wants to say, criticize Cambodian law, but Cambodian law is made to protect human life. You say what you want to say, but what I have been doing is protecting people’s lives not to die.”
Prime Minister has targeted a part of his speech during the arrival of Astrazeneca vaccines from Japan on Friday evening, to the critics who have constantly thrown a harsh comment to the efforts of the government in fighting the spread of Covid-19. He says that Cambodia, at all cost, must strive to obtain vaccines to be able to successfully inoculate its people that will lead to community immunity against the deadly coronavirus disease.
The Royal Government of Cambodia has planned to vaccinate 10 million people against Covid-19. So far, Cambodia has received more than 17 million doses of the vaccine and has already vaccinated more than 6.4 million people, which is 64.55% of the target population of about 10 million people. At the same time, the Royal Government has also added a vaccination plan for children between the ages of 12 and 17, with a campaign to vaccinate children and adolescents between the ages of 12 and 17 on Sunday, 1 August.
Prime Minister says, "If 12 million people are vaccinated, we have 75%, if 13 million people injected, we will have 81.25%, so we will be immune in the community." He has also said that in the past, some people have commented that perhaps the biggest legacy of "Hun Sen" is the vaccine. He answered, "I just want to emphasize that Hun Sen's legacy is not just a vaccine, Hun Sen's great legacy is to take the people out of the massacre on January 7, 1979. Hun Sen's legacy also took the Cambodian people out of the war, brought peace and development up to this day.”
Prime Minister Hun Sen has urged the relevant ministries to continue to implement health measures and jointly fight against Covid-19. He has asked the public to continue to implement health measures to save the Cambodian society.
