Deal #4013

Namai village, Nambak district, Lungprabang. The village is part of the Nayang village development cluster (Kumban Nayang), one of the GoL’s priority development zones to exercise its Sam-Sang (Three-built) strategy.

The Khmu from Ban Samsum, widely considered to be the most impoverished and marginalised of the ethnic minorities in Luang Prabang province, were forced to consent by the district governor by threatening the villagers with resettlement if they did not comply. It is also reported that locals did not prevent the accidental spread of a fire in the rubber plantation that started due to villagers burning weeds along the road. This incident prompted the company to station a representative in the area to deal with local conflicts. There is a mixed reaction for the case in Namai village. Several meetings were held in Samsum village to gain local permission for the concession, and each time the villagers rejected the proposal. They were not opposed to rubber, and many households expressed interest in planting rubber trees if they themselves owned the trees, but they did not want to give away their land to the company.

Because the operation area company wad granted was formally classified as state land, the villagers did not receive any compensation. The land conflict was presented at the National Assembly.