Voice of Burma

Burma’s cry for democracy has largely gone unheeded in the world’s largest democracy, report OSAMA MANZAR and SHAIFALI CHIKERMANE
“THE executive, legislative, judicial and overseeing functions of the state have their origins in the ‘Pyithu Hluttaw’ (People’s Assembly) which in turn is controlled by the BSPP (Burmese Socialist Program Party), for it is the party that selects the candidates for office, and they run unopposed. The result is a monolithic political structure without checks or balances”. That is what the Burma scholar David Steinberg wrote on the happening that took place approximately two decades ago, when, in January 1974, the military government promulgated a new constitution that ostensibly turned power over to a unicameral national assembly, the ‘Pyithu Hluttaw’. This assembly elected a President and a Council of State, along with other ruling bodies. Because the military continued its centralised control over all aspects of government, the changes under the 1974 Constitution were thus more of form than of substance. Again, this January on 9th, the Junta held a convention on whether the Constitution has to change. Needless to say that the military junta will emerge triumphant because all the democrats are either in exile or under detention or too afraid to speak out. As a matter of fact, ever since the massive victory of the Aung Sen Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) that took up the cause of democracy, the SLORC (State Law and Order Restoration Council)- established in the late 1988 to suppress the struggle for democracy-has adopted a two pronged strategy to deny the transfer of power. On the one hand, it has tried to divide the NLD through coercion and cooption. While all the top leaders including Aung Sen Suu Kyi, the daughter of Burma’s national hero Gen. Aung Sen and winner of 1991 Nobel Peace Prize, have been kept under detention, other less important members of the NLD’ s Central Executive have been allowed to operate freely so as to diffuse the democratic challenge. In addition, since the NLD is coalition of diverse political groups and not a cohesive orgamsation, it leaves ample scope for the SLORC to exploit NLD’ s intra group indeologies, personality clashes and social cleavages to retain power. A NOTHER major, important and relevant issue today, being exploited by the SLORC to distort and defeat the democratic struggle relates to the constitution. An important component of NLD, Democratic Affiance of Burma (DAB), is dominated by the ethnic minorities, whereas, the rest of the NLD is dominated by the majority of the Burmese population. The question is of federalism versus the transfer of power. Moreover, to ensure greater autonomy for the various ethnic regions, the DAB wants the constitutional question settled first. In any case, this question of federalism and use of regional autonomy has dominated the politics of Burma ever since it became independent And so far, the experience of the ethnic minority vis-a-vis the Burmese majority has always been quite harsh and unpleasant, in this respect. This question and the mutual suspicion between the majority on the one hand and the ethnic minorities on the other has been at the root of Burma’s more than 40-year old civil war. Now, the DAB wants this question to be resolved to their satisfaction before actual transfer of power takes place from the Junta to the elected representative. On the other side the NLD is committed to the principle of federalism and regional autonomy and they have made their position quite clear. Going back to 1947, Gen. Aung Sen, father of Suu Kyi, had worked out the first amicable agreement on this issue with the leaders of the ethnic minorities, but the same could not be implemented as he was assassinated. The next per son also failed, though he tried his best to resolve the problem. Now, the NLD’ s stand on the federal question is quite clear, and it does not want the issue to come in the way of transfer of power which must take place immediately. NLD very much know and understand that framing a constitution is a long drawn and complex process, and if it allows its differences with DAB on the federal issue to precede the latter, then the SLORC will exploit the complexities involved to frustrate the establishment of democracy. Precisely, this is the unique argument, that the SLORC has come up with, to perpetuate itself in power. SLORC says: the May 1990 elections witnessed only a 40 per cent voter turn-out. Hence NLD’ s victory is really based on a minority verdict. Therefore, first a federal con situation should be framed, which must then be put for approval by people through a national referendum. The constitution thus approved should be the basis of fresh elections after which only power should be transferred to the elected representatives, OTHER reasons of raising the flag of federalism is to erode the political base of DAB, because the DAB has many wider platforms of various ethnic armies, against which the Junta is fighting a relentless war. Various other SLORC’ s campaign to secure political legitimacy and divide the ranks of its democratic opposition, is being led by the dreaded Directorate of Defence Services Intelligence, headed by New Win’s son-in-law Gen. Khin Nyunt. An additional strategy that SLORC has been adopting, to wean away the social discontent which provided mass support to the democracy movement, is to improve economic conditions in Burma. Already, the Junta’s policy of economic liberalisation is giving open and free contract to foreign firms. Thailand was the first to reap the benefit of this policy by exploiting the timber resources of eastern Burma. Potentially tempting petroleum reserves have already been offered to Japan and China for exploitation. All in all, the Western countries like Germany, US and Sweden, that had withdrawn economically from Burma, are coming in again. Eventually, the internal economic situation has improved and the lost moral and political support has been regained. And the fact, that sympathy and support that NLD and alliances had gathered in 1990, when Gen. New Win refused to transfer the power, is slowly vanishing or steadily losing interest in the fate of democracy and the people in Burma. However, the ‘Tatmadaw’s’ (the armed forces) bloody suppression and ‘Lou Hein’s’ (riot police) firing on demonstration, cannot and must not be forgotten easily by the victims of coup detat. In 1962-when the BSPP (Burmese Socialist Program Party, SLORC’ s previous nomenclature) killed hundreds of student protesters and shut the independent press; the mid seventies, when the ‘Tatinadaw’ broke up demonstration by workers and students protesting the deteriorating economy and the lack of basic civil rights; and the last one in September 1988, are a kind of perpetual suppression, the democrats in Burma and the refugees around, cannot afford to take lightly. The military power in Burma has always kept itself aloof from external interferences, and never gave a damn. But how far it is fair and ethical for a neighbour of 4000 km common border to consider whether the principle of non-interference should be stretched so far as to sanities AIR broadcasts in Burmese. Recently, India has debarred Than Than Nu, the daughter of former Burmese President U Nu, from broadcasting her political com mentaries in the daily 90-minute Burmese language programme on All India Radio. These commentaries reflecting of pro- democracy views, had become increasingly popular with the audience across the border. The SLORC had even threatened to close down the Indian embassy in Rangoon if the broadcasts were not stopped. The Indian authorities, at last, complied. Also, while the Indian government had been stressing that it stood by the democratic opposition in the neighbouring country, it had of late been rubbing shoulders with the military Junta. Furthermore, there has not been any opposition from India to the readmission of the SLORC to the Non-alignment Movement at its recent summit in Djakarta. Burma is only a new addition to a long list of bungling of Indian merry muddle diplomacy. HERE in India, General Anug Sen had won Gandhi’ s and Nehru’s admiration. U Nu, the former Prime Minister, was a respected friend of Nehru. When General New  Win insisted on exiling U Nu, he came to India and lived for years in Madhya Pradesh. Aung Sen Suu Kyi came to India at the age of 15 and spent several years in Delhi with her mother who was the Burmese ambassador. She did her schooling from Jesus and Mary and was a college student at the Lady Sri Ram College. She still believes that, “what we want is India’s moral support, most of all, India’s voice”. Ironically, the domestic developments in Burma silenced the voice of India which the Burmese people used to await every evening through AIR. That is not all. To  date, four Indian Prime Ministers have officially visited Rangoon. Jawaharlal Nehru went on an official visit in 1954 followed by Lal Bahadur Shastri in 1965. Indira Gandhi visited the hermit nation in 1969 and Mr. Rajeev Gandhi followed suit after a gap of 18 years, visiting that country in December 1987. And officially, U No had visited India many times. In 1947, to represent his country at the Asian Relation Conference. As a Prime Minister, in 1949 to organize support for Indonesia’s freedom from Dutch rule. Apart from that K. R. Narayanan, the present Vice-President of India, had been Indian ambassador in Burma and his wife is a Burmese national. But none of these facts have influenced India to raise her voice for the democracy in Burma and the refugees in India. How relevant it is today to recall P. V. Narasimha Rao’ s address as an External Affairs Minister in October 1988, to the UN General Assembly, “India had watched with growing concern the trials and tribulations faced by the people of Burma with whom the people of India are bound by close ties of history and culture.” THESE are some of India’s I. past achievements of which we must feel proud. By the same reckoning, however, both decision makers and opinion makers in this country ought to feel ashamed of themselves because of the astonishingly scant attention they have been paying changes in Burma, which undoubtedly are of profound concern to India. Such Indian attitudes have created resentment among Burmese Opposition activists in India. In spite of the Indian Government’s lukewarm attitude towards the rebels and the Burmese cause, the refugees, mostly students, are getting a warm sup- port of the people. Here, it becomes apparent, that “support. And solidarity” at the government level is too weak and at the people’s level quite accommodating and hospitable. Moreover, our support to Burmese democratic movement need not be viewed as philanthropic act. It may very much happen to be in the interest of strengthening our. Own democratic process  and forces.  It’s now time to watch and see, whether a number of seminars and exhibitions, where most of. The people have unequivocally expressed their total support for the democratic movements in Burma; end off in flashy rhetoric’s or whether some positive solidarity emerges. It can only be hoped that the Burmese refugees are not helped in the same way as the Tibetan refugees were helped. Or, is Delhi going to have another ‘Majnu Ka Teela”