Three years after the government shelved its plan to construct a road through the compound of Masjid Alserkal following protests by Cham Muslims, it’s still not clear whether the project has been buried for good or will be resurrected.
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Phnom Penh’s iconic Masjid Alserkal, Cambodia’s largest and most beautiful mosque, and the huge tract of land on which it sits are facing uncertainty in the wake of a controversy that involved proposed construction of a road project right across the mosque’s compound.
Built at a cost of US$1.5 million by the United Arab Emirates’ Alserkal family, the Ottoman-style two-storey mosque in the Cambodian capital’s Boeng Kak neighbourhood was officially opened in March 2015 by Prime Minister Hun Sen. The inauguration ceremony was attended by more than 1,000 people, including Mr Eisa Bin Nasser Bin Abdullatif Alserkal, the Emirati businessman who had funded the mosque’s construction.
For Buddhist-majority Cambodia’s 800,000 Cham Muslims (5 per cent of the population), the construction of a massive mosque that can accommodate some 1,500 worshippers was a grand achievement. It had replaced a mosque that once stood on the same site and was torn down in 2012. That mosque was also built by the Alserkal family in 1992. It wasn’t long after the inauguration of the new mosque, however, that rifts began to form in the Muslim community for which the mosque was built.
In May 2016, the palatial, white-tiled Alserkal mosque and its surroundings suddenly found themselves in the eye of a political storm after the Phnom Penh City government announced a plan to construct a road-building project that would see a new road run right in front of the mosque’s entrance and eastern facade.
After the government’s announcement, rifts began to appear among the Cham Muslim community. Many Cham Muslims opposed the road’s construction, saying that traffic noise would disturb the faithful during prayers, ruin the peace and calm of worship and destroy the tranquillity of the mosque. Some Cham Muslim leaders, however, supported the road’s construction, arguing that it would ease traffic congestion and flooding, as well as bring new opportunities and greater prosperity to the area.
Protests ensued, politicians got involved, accusations began to fly, and the whole issue caused quite a stir. On May 23, hundreds of Cham Muslims protested against the controversial road project. The protest was led by Ahmed Yahya, then-president of the Cambodian Muslim Community Development Organisation and Secretary of State in the Social Affairs Ministry. He claimed only a minority of Phnom Penh’s Cham Muslim community supported the “divisive” road.
He alleged that Mr Othsman Hassan, Secretary of State in the Labour Ministry, “and his groups want to build the road through the mosque, and our people oppose that. Our people say that if they want to build it, please let them build it – but do it along the fence and do not break our mosque’s land into two parts”. Mr Yahya said, “It will affect us through the noise because of the vehicles that cross. In a place of worship, we need quietness.”
The 65-year-old prominent Muslim leader accused Mr Hassan of organising the road project and benefiting from it by way of a land swap for its construction. He said it was Mr Hassan who drew the first design for the road and that he also had plans to build condominiums in the area. The controversy over the road was being used to paint the Cham community as anti-government, Mr Yahya claimed.
Mr Hassan claimed that opposition to the road was being concocted. He, however, acknowledged that he would like to see the area developed with high-rise buildings to benefit the Muslim community.
Mr Yahya denied defaming Mr Hassan, who happens to be his nephew. But Mr Hassan filed a US$1 million defamation case against Mr Yahya, claiming he had told local media that Mr Hassan had requested approval to build the road. Mr Hassan maintained the plan was initiated by Phnom Penh City Governor Pa Socheatvong.
In August, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court found Mr Yahya guilty of defaming Mr Hassan and ordered to pay 100 million riel, or about US$25,000, in compensation to Mr Hassan.
City Hall spokesman Mean Chanyada asserted that the road would be built as planned. “This matter is an internal dispute between the Cham leaders. If together we think about the general benefit, this is not an issue.”
In December 2016, tensions flared as members of the area’s Muslim community demolished a temporary fencing erected to cordon off land allocated for the development. More than 100 men emerged from the mosque after midday prayers and spent an hour kicking down the metal fencing installed by City Hall after crews began surveying the road.
The land for the mosque, measuring about two hectares (20,000 square metres), was donated by former Mauritanian president Moktar Ould Daddah when he visited Cambodia in 1963 and wanted to pray in a mosque. As he could not be escorted to a mosque across the Mekong River for prayers due to security reasons, he was asked to pray in the Royal Palace instead.
In 1992, the Alserkal family constructed a mosque on that land. The current mosque, commonly called the Boeung Kak Mosque, stands on the land of the old mosque. It is the biggest of Cambodia’s more than 520 mosques, according to Cambodian mufti Sos Kimri.
In an interview in Phnom Penh last week, Mr Yahya said Mr Eisa, the UAE businessman, chose to gift the mosque to Cambodian Muslims because he had come to Cambodia as a private citizen after the restive 1970s and had also done some business. “He wanted people to enjoy praying in it.”
Mr Yahya said the construction of the mosque, which is located on Monivong Blvd, a few metres from Phnom Penh Hotel, has been an important bookmark in the history of the Muslim community in Cambodia. The gleaming structure is a big draw with Cambodians as well as foreign tourists to Phnom Penh, he added.
But surprisingly the mosque, which is now managed by a government-controlled committee, has no permanent imam or muezzin, and conducts no other activity except the five-times-a-day prayers. The air-conditioner is also on only for Juma’a prayers. No one would give a satisfactory reply as to why it is so.
Every Friday, the usually quiet Boeng Kak neighbourhood – which is better known for having had its lake filled in and thousands of people evicted to make way for a development project – is abuzz with life as Cham Muslim men, women and children eat and shop at several ad hoc stalls that spring up selling clothes and jewellery.
The mosque’s interior is amazing and magnificent. Inside the prayer halls, the walls are lined with rose and turquoise tiles, the ceiling is covered in tessellating mosaic and a grand chandelier hangs from the central dome vaulting. The calligraphy and ceramic were commissioned from Algerian artisans. The wudu (ablution) facilities are housed in two gazebos flanking the mosque. On the right side is a separate prayer area for women.
The road project seems to have stalled for now. But it could be revived with a proposed route change or even scrapped to appease angered locals. As for the mosque, it remains a much-loved hub for the Muslim community of Phnom Penh and of Cambodia as a whole.