Addressing the economic and environmental impacts from two major road projects, the Ministry of Public Works and Transport on Tuesday said issues related to the renovations of National Road 2 are 98.5 per cent resolved while for National Road 22, it is 100 per cent resolved.

Officials urged relevant stakeholders to wrap up the problems to allow the construction company to implement the projects more efficiently.

Ministry secretary of state Touch Chankosal said on Tuesday the construction company, technical inspection company and other stakeholders must ensure waterway systems on both sides of the road are in line with the project plans to avoid flooding villages and damaging property during the rainy season.

“All relevant working groups continue to work closely with private companies and vendors on clean water and relocating and installing electrical poles and fibre optic cables. The goal is to ease the burden on the construction company to allow it to complete the project as planned,” Chankosal said.

He called on all working groups and both sub-committees – the Takeo and Kandal provincial sub-committees – to cooperate with relevant stakeholders to inspect affected areas along the two national roads and find solutions to avoid more construction delays.

He said those who have already received compensation need to follow the agreement and not be a burden to the construction.

Vann Sokrat, 41, a resident living in Kandal Stung district’s Prek Kampoes commune said on Thursday that she hasn’t received any compensation from the impact of National Road 2, although her neighbours have.

Sokrat said she moved her house backwards, and away from the national road before the authority came to evaluate the impact and therefore she didn’t receive any compensation from the government.

“I received information that there was going to be road construction, so I moved my house away to the end of my land. After that the authority came to get statistics on people who were impacted,” she said.

She said everybody in her village was compensated and some received from $1,000 to $2,000.

“I didn’t get any compensation because my house wasn’t affected, only my land. The authority said if it’s land only they don’t give compensation,” Sokrat said.

Koem Sam Oeun, 40, a resident of Kraing Thnong commune, in Bati district, Takeo province, said on Thursday that the front of his house was affected, but he had already agreed to move out and his family got almost $1,000 from the authorities.

The National Road 2 (62.56km) and National Road 22 (9.61km) construction projects are being handled by Hanshin Engineering & Construction Co Ltd under the framework of a loan from the Republic of Korea.

The projects are estimated to cost about $56 million. The funds come from the Korean loan and $8.5 million from the Cambodian government. The construction projects are expected to take 30 months.