Cambodian Stamp Catalogue of 1997
by Graham Shaw
In 1997, the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications (MPTC) of the Kingdom of Cambodia made an attempt to publish a complete catalogue of all stamps issued by the country since its independence from France in 1953 and also stamps used in Cambodia prior to independence.
This rarely seen catalogue is, however, far from complete. It comprises a total of 217 pages including a preface in the Khmer language, with a relatively poor English language translation, by the Secretary of State of the MPTC, H.E. So Kun, who states that, “The main Objective of binding this Stamps Album is to keep forever the historical Stamps to be in existence.”
The preface also states the following:
“Some Stamps are not presented in this Album that they have never been found during the time of Democratic Kampuchea, April 17th, 1975 – January 6th, 1979. And it is a great regret that the Ministry is unable to collect all kinds put in use before 1951.”
There is also a two-page background history, in relatively poor English, of Cambodian postage stamps at the front of the catalogue followed by scanned images of one page of stamps issued prior to 1951 but not in chronological order.
The first stamp is the 6-cent red/carmine of a young King Norodom Sihanouk issued May 10, 1943 (Michel 294, Stanley Gibbons 286) in mint condition (see Fig. 2) followed by the 1931 Apsara set with scanned images of SG192 (used), 193 (mint) and 195 (used) (see Fig. 3).
The final issue shown in the catalogue is a set of railway locomotives issued April 20, 1996 to celebrate the ‘CAPEX’ international stamp exhibition in Toronto, Canada (Michel 1585 to 1590; SG 1525 to 1530; Scott 1507 to1512).
Between the first and last entries, there is a wealth of information although many of the scanned images are of used stamps and not every stamps issued is shown in the catalogue. Of particular interest to collectors, perhaps, is one of the entries for 1971 on page 17 of the catalogue showing the unissued musical instrument set that was later overprinted with ‘Republique Khmere’ scheduled for release, but never was, in 1975 (see Fig. 5).
The catalogue also does not include any references to the alleged printing in Japan of ‘propoganda’ stamps by Democratic Kampuchea sometime in 1978. Nor does it include any references to the ‘RPK’ overprints on Kingdom of Cambodia and Khmer Republic stamps used in the 1979-1980 period.
It is not yet known how many catalogues were printed, nor how many were made available to the public. However, within the MPTC in Phnom Penh, there are very few editions of this 1997 catalogue remaining amongst the staff.