LAOS: Phoui to the Communists

Although Laos had been a month without a government, a Laotian official explained: "We have a proverb which says, 'Do Not Hurry,' so the formation of a new government will probably take some time." Last week Laotian Deputies finally got around to confirming a new Premier, and he seemed to be worth waiting for.

Phoui Sananikone, 54, whose 6-ft. height makes him giant-sized for Laos, is a muscular, quick-witted politician who in World War II was his country's deputy commander of anti-Japanese partisans. A firm friend of the West, Phoui served as Foreign Minister in the last government and is former president of the Laotian National Assembly. Most remarkable feature of his new government: it excludes Communists from its Cabinet.

Laotian Communists are led by Prince Souphanouvong, who last year convinced his half brother, ex-Premier Prince Souvanna Phouma, that he was really just a harmless agrarian democrat, and got included in the government. Last week, seeing himself about to be shoved outside again, Prince Souphanouvong rose in the Assembly to deny that he was a Communist. Answered Phoui smoothly: "I did not definitely say the Prince was one. I simply wondered why he had sent 100 Laotian students to study in North Viet Nam and 300 to study in Red China, including his own children." Phoui was excluding Communists, he went on, because, "a horse cannot have two riders—one going right and one left."

Laos will remain "neutral" but pro-Western under Phoui's ministry. The great danger is that it will also remain corrupt, inefficiently run and economically chaotic; e.g., in 1956 the tiny country exported goods valued at $3,000,000, imported goods worth $31 million. If so, the Communists under Prince Souphanouvong will be heard from again.