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Philip Hirsch of Sydney University has a fascinating article in Sunday’s (1 May 2011) Bangkok Post on the broader ramifications of last month’s decision to take the prior consultation process on the Xayaburi dam to ministerial level. Here are a couple of excerpts:
Messy and inconclusive though the interim outcome on the Xayaburi dam may seem, it nevertheless carries considerable significance for the way in which river policy decisions are conducted in the Mekong. It reflects a maturing of the relationship between the four riparian countries, and it represents a tentative step toward a much more inclusive and informed process of decision-making and influence around the all-important question of the Mekong’s future as a flowing river or a stepped series of lakes.
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Formally, the consultation process over Xayaburi has been elevated to the [ministerial] council, which meets once a year in October. It is conceivable that a special meeting could be convened prior to this. In principle, Laos could even go it alone, but just as decisions to date over dams have been bound in a wider regional geopolitics geared at respecting national sovereignty, the Xayaburi decision is now caught up in a regional geopolitics in which a decision to proceed would represent a snub to downstream countries and also poison the normally close relationship between Laos and its larger political ally to the East.
Hirsch also draws attention to the fact that at least one of the Thai banks underwriting the project is wavering, “which could foreshadow an unravelling of the commercial arrangements necessary for the project to proceed”. Other reports suggest work on the project is proceeding regardless.
A couple of questions spring to mind here. First, the 3.5 billion dollar question: where is this particular project likely to end up? It’s obviously too early to say with any certainty, but it is worth considering some of the main factors at play. In particular, how might the Laos-Vietnam relationship figure in any outcome? One of the intriguing aspects of this episode is the loose coalescence of Lao and Thai government interests and those of Cambodia and Vietnam – unlikely sets of bedfellows indeed.
More fundamentally, where might a “new geopolitics of Mekong dams” – together with the stalling of the $7 billion Boten-Vientiane train project – leave the Lao government’s strategy of fostering high economic growth and “mega-projects” through regional investment in resource extractive industries (see last year’s 7th National Socio-Economic Development Plan)? Are the resultant delays blips on the way to implementing this strategy or do they speak to broader problems with it? To be sure, the train project seems to have been held up by domestic issues in China rather than cross-border complications. Moreover, Lao polities – small and surrounded by much larger ones – have long reconciled regional dependancies with autonomy (what choice do they have, after all?) But delays in these two “mega-projects” also show how much must go right (and what can go wrong) in the government’s plan to mobilise regional resources.
I don’t think Thailand and Laos are such unlikely bed fellows. Since Chatichai’s “battlefields into marketplaces” statement, what tension has there really been to suggest that they would be unlikely? And moreover, what is there to suggest that Cambodia and Vietnam are not integrating more? I think the analysis of the relations between the former Indochinese states and Thailand is rooted firmly in a rut. The rut is that we are only able to know the history of negative events. We don’t know how those issues were resolved for these states to keep floating along peacefully. Perhaps the relations are primarily determined by paranoia of each other, but isn’t there an element of paranoia in most (international) relationships?
I feel that the Xayaburi dam will go ahead, but with much stronger regulatory commitments from Laos. At least regulatory commitments… in writing.
Thanks for posting the Hirsch article.
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One of the most interesting aspects of what has happened is the considerable amount of open Vietnamese government criticism/concerns about the Xayaburi dam. Many would not have predicted that, as behind-the-scenes communications and criticisms between Laos and Viet Nam are generally the norm. In fact, they are basically the rule. This was something quite unusual, whatever the final outcome may be.
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It is worth looking at the full mosaic of dam projects in the region. While Vietnam and Cambodia seem to be speaking up about Xayaburi they are pushing ahead with the Lower Sesan 2 – long identified as a killer dam and barely viable for electricity power generation. LS2 is funded by VN which is in the strange position of being an upstream country of the Sesan – and already experience something of a water crisis – but also being downstream of the Sesan, Sekong and Srepok as these 3 rivers and the Mekong make a major contribution to the flow into the Delta.
The decision-making process for Lower Sesan 2 has been far from transparent or accountable
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Yes, I agree that Viet Nam and Cambodia have been quite contradictory by on the one hand raising concerns about Xayaburi and on the other hand moving ahead with the Lower Sesan 2 dam, which would indeed be a very destructive project located on a large tributary not far from the mainstream Mekong. Local people have expressed a lot of concern about that dam, and it would also have serious regional implications as well.
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