COVER STORY
WORK HOPES STILL UP IN THE AIR
POLITICS:
U SHWE MANN REINVENTS HIMSELF
TRAVEL: A TASTE OF THE TEA CAPITAL
Cartoons
Features
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14 | Politics: From General to Politician
Once a junta insider, U Shwe Mann has had to recreate himself to match Myanmar’s new political realities
16 | Analysis: Were Blasts Spawned by an Uneasy Peace?
A spate of bombings in October underlines the uncertainties facing Myanmar as it seeks to end decades of conflict
18 | Society: Making Sense of the Census
20 | International Relations: Courting the Tatmadaw
The West wants to engage Myanmar’s military, but are the generals really ready to reform?
22 |
COVER Wanted: Work
With more than a third of the country’s workforce unemployed, the government has a big job on its hands
30 | Energy: Unlocking a ‘Sleeping Petroleum Giant’
Investment in Myanmar’s energy sector could unleash vast potential, but also carries significant risks
32 | Markets: Ways Old and New Clash in Myanmar’s Money Transfer Market
As Western Union and Money Gram make inroads, the informal hundi system more than holds its own
36 | Insurance: Private Insurance Industry Finds its Feet
Caution is the name of the game as private companies take their first steps into a market long controlled by a state monopoly
40 | Roundup: Indian Firms Spearhead Plans for Coal-fuelled Power Stations in Myanmar
42 | Thailand: With Digital TV, End Looms for Broadcasting Monopolies
The switch to digital could have a dramatic impact on the media landscape
Hailed by the international media as “Myanmar’s Mother Theresa,” Dr. Cynthia Maung is the founder of the Mae Tao Clinic, a health center in the Thai border town of Mae Sot that serves both Myanmar migrant workers living in Thailand and ethnic civilians displaced by conflict on the Myanmar side of the border.
Founded 24 years ago, in the wake of a sudden influx of students and other dissidents fleeing from the military crackdown on the 1988 pro-democracy uprising, the clinic provides free medical treatment to an average of 300 patients a day, and has set up schools to educate thousands of migrant children.
Dr. Cynthia—as she is generally known to her admirers—was among those who joined the protests in 1988. When the military seized power in a bloody coup, she fled her native Kayin State for the border, determined to continue fighting for freedom in her country.
Since then, she has won a total of 14 international awards, the most recent being the Sydney Peace Prize, which she received in September “for her dedication to multi-ethnic democracy, human rights and the dignity of the poor and dispossessed, and for establishing health services for victims of conflict.”
As the situation in Myanmar and along its borders changes, Dr. Cynthia sat down with The Irrawaddy’s Kyaw Kha to discuss the future plans of the Mae Tao Clinic.
I’ve heard that the Mae Tao Clinic will be relocating to another area. Why is that?
We’ve been planning to leave this rental area for the past five years. There are a number of reasons, including lack of space and occasional flooding. We will start construction at the new location in late 2013 and expect it to take four or five years to complete, so I think we will remain here for a few more years.
Apart from our clinic, there are local and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) working together with us in providing health services. The Thai government has supported our health activities along the border areas and in Thailand since long ago, especially by accepting patient referrals. For example, if we can’t cure patients in refugee camps, we have to refer them to Mae Sot General Hospital
or hospitals in other districts, such as Phop Phra, which always welcome our cooperation.
Have you ever been supported financially by the Thai government or Thai public services?
We haven’t received financial support from them, but we have received medicine and other kinds of support. For instance, we have received different types of vaccine from the Thai government. Also, because of their support, we can arrange anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs for 70 HIV patients per year. Besides this, we are also given discounts when we send our patients to hospitals in Thailand.
We’ve heard that international donors have cut their support. What is the clinic’s current funding situation?
The amount of financial assistance we received this year is the same as last
year. We hope to be provided with the same amount in 2014.
International organizations will make new contracts for our health activities after 2015, so I’m not sure how long we will be able to continue here after that. There will be consultations for the continuation of our services at the end of current contracts. I doubt all of the current health organizations on the border will continue after 2015, but I’m certain that some will remain.
We normally encounter shortages, sometimes caused by delays in transfers of money and medical materials due to changes in the governments that finance our donor organizations. In such cases, we adjust our expenses however we can, for example by reducing patients’ food ration from 20 baht (US $0.60) to 15 baht ($0.50) a day. Also, although we have allotted 800,000 baht ($26,700) for monthly patient referrals to Mae Sot General Hospital, we only send patients with emergency conditions whenever we face funding shortages. We check our expenses once every three months and readjust it in order to meet with our possible income. In some cases, we’ve even had to reduce the number of our employees.
How will you run the clinic if funding from donors decreases in the future?
We always have to observe the situation of our international donor organizations. At the same time, we have to look for possible new funding sources. In particular, instead of direct governmental assistance, we have to think about receiving regional funds for malaria and HIV. In some cases, we had to seek funding that we can spend on cross-border needs. For example, malaria is covered by regional funds, which means that we can use that money on both the Myanmar and Thai sides of the border.
Since more and more Western countries, especially from Europe, have shifted their funding to support activities inside Myanmar, financial assistance from those governments to the Myanmar-Thailand border has decreased significantly. However, some NGOs there have organized fundraisers to help us generate income. We have
also started targeting some Asian countries for fundraising too.
How have the political changes in Myanmar affected your programs?
Although some political reforms have been made in the country, we haven’t seen any change in working programs for health, education and protection sectors. The opening should create space and more opportunities for civil society organizations (CSOs) to better participate in the overall reform process. I am concerned that financial assistance from the international community to our country will not bring longterm benefits for our people if there is no good cooperation between international organizations, the government and CSOs like us.
Our programs—which cover health, education and protection—are running normally at the moment. However, we may face financial shortages in the future and it will be better if we can rely on improvements in the situation in our country then. For instance, instead of referring our patients to Mae Sot General Hospital, it would be better if we could arrange to send them to the hospital in Myawaddy, on the Myanmar side of the border.
It would be best if Myanmar people could receive proper treatment at home and children didn’t have to cross the border for schooling and could have access to education in their own country.
Has the number of patients from Myanmar decreased since the new quasi-civilian government took office in 2011?
The number of patients is still increasing, but not like in the past. It used to grow by about 10 percent annually, but these days it’s just three to five percent. However, there are still many people coming for major problems, such as severe cases of
malaria or women who need to have caesarian sections. In the rainy season, when there are outbreaks of malaria and diarrhea, we have around 250 to 300 people coming from inside Myanmar every day. Generally, our outpatients are evenly divided between those who come from inside Myanmar, and those from the Thai side of the border. However, around 70 percent of our inpatients are from inside Myanmar.
cooperate. The Mae Tao Clinic will not directly provide services to those hospitals and clinics, but will continue its material and technical support for them.
You have been praised for providing health services to all patients, regardless of ethnicity and religion.
What problems do you think you would face if you relocated inside Myanmar?
Through the Burma Medical Association (BMA), founded by Myanmar doctors living abroad and health organizations based on the border, we are already providing technical assistance to the health departments, hospitals and clinics of different ethnic groups [inside Myanmar]. What they need is continuous financial and technical assistance. This will largely depend on how soon the Myanmar government’s Department of Health and borderbased health organizations can
Non-discrimination should be the basis of all social activities, whether they’re related to health or education. This is very important for our country. I believe that if our education system is based on non-discrimination, it will have a positive impact on the long-term peace-building process. Likewise, since health is a basic human right for everyone, there is no room for discrimination in the health-care system.
We had and still have discrimination at different levels and sectors of our society. I know we can’t change it all right away, but we have to keep trying to eliminate all forms of discrimination.
Dr. Cynthia Maung of the Mae Tao Clinic: “Non-discrimination should be the basis for all social activities.”—U Tin
at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore, on Myanmar’s 2014 Asean chairmanship
Asean 2014: An Exercise in Hand-Holding
— Foreign Minister U Wunna Maung Lwin warning against those who “take advantage of political openness to instigate violence.” He was speaking at the annual meeting of the UN General Assembly in New York.
“There are always people who wish to rock the boat.”
“To get access to mobile services I think is almost like a human right.”
—Petter Furberg, chief executive officer-designate of Telenor Myanmar
“It won’t be perfect, but it won’t be a disaster.”
Maung Maung Than, senior fellow
passana Meditation Center in Yangon’s Bahan Township became the first of several centers to open in Myanmar.
Four days of attacks on Muslim homes in villages near Thandwe in southern Rakhine State left at least seven people dead and hun-
dreds homeless in the latest flare-up of communal violence to hit the strife-torn state. Five of the dead were Kaman Muslims, members
tion, which was drafted by Myanmar’s former military junta. Among the changes called for is the introduction of a federal political system that would better accommodate the country’s many ethnic minorities.
of an ethnic group recognized under Myanmar’s citizenship laws, while two other bodies found a week later were believed to belong to ethnic Rakhine Buddhists. Rakhine mobs started torching Kaman homes in seven villages starting on Sept. 29, eventually destroying a total of 110 houses. Tensions have been high between Buddhists and Muslims in Myanmar since June 2012, when a Rakhine woman was allegedly raped and murdered by three Rohingya men, members of a Muslim minority widely regarded as illegal immigrants from neighboring Bangladesh.
Myanmar’s ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) has warned of “serious danger” and “consequences beyond expectation” if lawmakers scrap the controversial 2008 Constitution. In a statement released on Oct. 5, the party appeared to be responding to an announcement made a week earlier by the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) that it would collaborate with ethnic parties to seek public opinion on whether to amend or totally scrap the current constitu-
Senior government officials met with an ethnic Wa rebel leader on Oct. 4 to discuss the peace process and the 2014 national census, state-run media reported. U Thein Zaw, vice-chairman of the Union Peace-making Working Committee and a member of the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party, Minister of Electric Power U Khin Maung Soe and Commerce Minister U Win Myint held talks with United Wa State Army ViceChairman Xiao Mingliang in Pangkham, the capital of Wa Special Region II in northern Shan State. The Myanmar government maintains a difficult relationship with
the powerful Wa rebels, who unilaterally declared an semiautonomous zone in 2009.
The ashes of renowned meditation instructor Satya Narayan Goenka were returned to his native Myanmar and scattered at three different locations along the Ayeyarwady River from Oct. 8 to 10, just over a week after his death in Mumbai, India, at the age of 89. Born in Mandalay in 1924, U Goenka left Myanmar to teach his first 10-day course in vipassana, or insight, meditation in India in 1969. Ten years later, he began his travels to other parts of the world, introducing vipassana to tens of thousands of people through hundreds of courses. Today, more than 100,000 people attend Goenka-inspired vipassana courses each year at more than 70 centers in 21 countries. In 1993, the Dhamma Joti Vi-
The UN human rights rapporteur for Myanmar Tomás Ojea Quintana welcomed the government’s decision to release 56 political prisoners on Oct. 8, but also raised concerns over the ongoing detention of political prisoners. “These releases are not only important for the victims and their families, but also for the ongoing process of democratic transition and national reconciliation,” Mr. Quintana said. He called, however, for the release of four aid workers who were “arbitrarily detained” in mid-2012 in Rakhine State and Rohingya Muslim human rights activists Dr. Tun Aung and U Kyaw Hla Aung, who have been detained since June 2012 and July 2013, respectively.
For the first time since joining the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in 1997, Myanmar was officially named chair of the regional grouping at the closing of the 23rd Asean Summit in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei, on Oct. 10. As chair, Myanmar will be expected to host 1,100 meetings—something some observers described as a huge challenge in a country where
three-quarters of the population lack electricity and many government institutions face shortages of skilled civil servants. However, Foreign Minister U Wunna Maung Lwin denied that the government was ill-prepared for its new role. “We’ve been preparing for this chairmanship for quite a while,” he said. “It will not be a struggle for us.”
Thai police reported on Oct. 13 that the bodies of 13 people believed to be migrants from Myanmar seeking work had been found off southern Thailand’s Andaman Sea coast. Lt-Col Nirat Chuayjit said that marine police in Ranong Province, 580 km south of Bangkok, had recovered the bodies of 12 men and one woman, whom they believe were on a boat that broke up in bad weather as they sought to travel illegally
to Thailand. He said it was unknown how many people from the boat might be missing or survived, but that such boats normally carry about 30 people. Survivors would be unlikely to contact Thai authorities for fear of the legal consequences of trying to enter the country illegally, he said.
tween the two countries, Chinese state-owned media reported. The Chinese leader was quoted as saying China “is willing to work with Myanmar to command the general direction of bilateral relations, and to carry out the agreed consensus to promote pragmatic cooperation.” SnrGen Min Aung Hlaing, who also met with senior Chinese military officials during a visit to China, said, “Myanmar’s military is ready to make unremitting efforts to deepen cooperation with China,” according to the report.
“We have still not heard about the new contract or whether the process is moving forward [with health and environmental impact assessments],” said Daw Khin San Hlaing, a lawmaker with the opposition National League for Democracy, whose leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, led the commission. Despite the report’s recommendation that the project be allowed to go ahead if it meets conditions for transparency, opposition among local people remains strong, with hundreds continuing to protest in October.
Myanmar’s
Chinese President Xi Jinping met with the commander-in-chief of Myanmar’s armed forced, Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing, on Oct. 16 and pledged to increase ties be-
The controversial Chinesebacked Letpadaung copper mine in Sagaing Region resumed operations in early October amid accusations that it had not met the requirements of a report released by a presidential commission earlier this year.
Three days of peace talks in the Kachin State capital Myitkyina ended on Oct. 10 with a preliminary agreement between the government and the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) pledging to reduce fighting, but stopping short of a full ceasefire. The seven-point deal called for the establishment of a joint team to monitor troops on the frontlines and the development of a plan for the voluntary return and resettlement of civilians displaced by the conflict. The Myanmar Peace Center, a government-associated organization, said in a statement that although no ceasefire agreement
was reached, the two sides “agreed to work together toward a Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement and lay a foundation for political dialogue.” That agreement, the statement said,
would “include the government and all non-state armed groups and would represent an end to fighting in Myanmar for the first time since independence in 1948.”
Some 384,000 people in Myanmar, out of a global total of 30 million, live under conditions of modern slavery, according to a report released on Oct. 17. The report, by Australian-based watchdog group Walk Free, said that nearly half of those worldwide who are deprived of their freedom live in India, while China, in second place, has an estimated 2.9 million slaves. Many of Thailand’s estimated 473,000 slaves are members of foreign migrant communities, including groups from Myanmar. The Global Slavery Index 2013 defines slavery as the possession or control of people to deny freedom and exploit them for profit or sex, usually through violence, coercion or deception. The definition includes indentured servitude, forced marriage and the abduction of children to serve in wars.
PHOTO: THE IRRAWADDY A delegation from the KIO signs a preliminary seven-point peace agreement in Myitkyina on Oct. 10. Migrant workers from Myanmar cross the border into Thailand at Three Pagodas Pass. Forced laborers clearing rocks after a landslide in Tedim Township in Chin State in May 2008. PHOTO: THE IRRAWADDY
Small-time prospectors search for jade in the rubble dumped by mining companies in Hpakant Township, Kachin State. Intensively-mined jade is one of Myanmar’s most lucrative industries. The military, crony tycoons and China, where most of the jade ends up, benefit the most.
Since achieving independence in 1948, Myanmar has experienced two military coups—one in 1962, and another in 1988. Both traumatized the country’s people and obliterated its political, social and economic systems. Today, more than two years into President U Thein Sein’s term, no one can guarantee that Myanmar will not face another military overthrow in the future. But to guard against a repeat of such a terrible experience, the country can take a concrete step: It can reform the military, known as the Tatmadaw, into a professional force.
By KYAW ZWA MOE
This would not be an easy task, but it is possible—and crucial. Only then can the military leave its current place in Parliament and the ministries and return to where it belongs—the barracks.
Myanmar’s military has never been fit to govern, but consecutive military leaders since the 1962 coup have strongly opposed any exit from the political arena. Indeed, for 53 years the country has been ruled by generals—Gen Ne Win led a caretaker government from 1958 until 1960, and after seizing power in 1962 his Revolutionary Council ran a socialist state until 1988. After the coup that year, the State Law and Order Restoration Council took control, changing its name later to the State Peace and Development Council. Even after the regime stepped aside for the current quasi-civilian government in 2011, with ex-general U Thein Sein now in power, former generals continue to run the government, while former high-ranking military officials dominate Parliament.
Since the formation in 1941 of the Burma Independence Army— the country’s first national army, which played a crucial role in the struggle against British colonialism— the military has been extremely influential in Myanmar. After achieving independence, people respected the armed forces founded by Bogyoke Aung San, the father of democracy icon Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. It was only after the 1962 coup that the military’s reputation dropped, going from bad to worse in 1988.
Myanmar’s generals need to learn that they can’t defend the country and try to rule it at the same time
Despite nationwide demand for change, it seems unlikely that the military will return to the barracks in the near future, even after the 2015 elections. The 2008 Constitution guarantees a solid position for the military above the democratic system—reserving 25 percent of seats in Parliament for unelected military representatives—and the generals will not let go easily of that entitlement.
Change will take time, but in the short term we can encourage military leaders to promote a more professional force. The military’s sole responsibility should be to protect the country, not to govern it from Naypyitaw.
In recent months, President U Thein Sein’s government has indicated a desire to resume military ties with Western countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia. During U Thein Sein’s trip to London in mid-July, Britain agreed to focus on human rights and accountability in its relations with Myanmar’s military.
“Reforming the Burmese military and pursuing a sustainable peace process will be key to Burma’s stability and prosperity,” British Defense Secretary Philip Hammond said in a statement, referring to Myanmar by its former name. “The focus of our defense engagement will be on developing democratic accountability in a modern armed forces, and we have offered training for the Burmese military to this end.”
More recently, in September, US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel met Myanmar’s Defense Minister Lt-Gen Wai Lwin on the sidelines of a regional conference in Brunei—the first ever bilateral meeting between the leaders of the two countries’ armed forces. The Obama administration seems to believe that military-to-military ties will help Myanmar work toward
justice and improve relations between civilians and the armed forces.
Of course, as critics have said, Western governments should be careful about collaborating with the Tatmadaw, which has committed grave human rights violations in the past and continues to face allegations of widespread rights abuses. Hopefully Western militaries will keep their objectives clear and maintain their promise to offer nonlethal training only.
political leadership.
As long as the military continues to do what it shouldn’t, Myanmar will likely face political problems, as it has for more than half a century.
It is high time to seriously reform the armed forces—current military leaders, including Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing, should examine just how low they have fallen in the eyes of the nation and the international community over the past five decades.
In that case, military-to-military relations could help Myanmar’s armed forces become more professional. But real success in this regard will depend completely on how Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing, commander-in-chief of Myanmar’s military, envisions the future. He and his generals certainly will not make any quick decisions to withdraw their officers from the political arena. Indeed, a basic principle of the Constitution’s first chapter says the country’s consistent objectives include enabling defense services to participate in national
If those leaders can turn their troops into a professional force, they can regain the respect that the military once earned under Gen Aung San.
Eventually, when the military returns to the barracks, Myanmar will return to genuine normalcy, and its government will truly move toward democracy—with no military leaders in disguise.
Kyaw Zwa Moe is the editor of the English-language edition of The Irrawaddy. PHOTO: REUTERSUShwe Mann was once one of Myanmar’s most powerful generals, ranking third in the hierarchy of the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), the military regime that ruled until 2011; today, he is the speaker of the Union Parliament, and a key player in the country’s ongoing political transition.
Until U Thein Sein was named president, U Shwe Mann was widely expected to fill that role in the new quasi-civilian government formed after the elections of November 2010. After all, he was the only one of the former top three generals (the other two being Snr-Gen Than Shwe and Vice Snr-Gen Maung Aye) who wasn’t planning to retire after the dissolution of the SPDC. When U Thein Sein—the former junta prime minister, and only the sixth most powerful general in the regime—was appointed head of state, it came as a serious blow to U Shwe Mann.
Today, however, he betrays little of the disappointment that he felt at the time (he was reportedly in tears when he’d heard about Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s choice of the more malleable, soft-spoken U Thein Sein for the top job, and immediately called two of his sons to explain the decision made by the former dictator). When I met him recently in Bangkok, he sounded much more like the politician he has become than the feared general he once was.
Unruffled and self-composed, he spoke of his relations with U Thein Sein and opposition leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, and his feelings about
the treatment of dissidents during Myanmar’s decades-long period of military rule. He also discussed the ongoing peace process—hinting that the self-interest of some of the parties involved, rather than fundamental ideological differences, were to blame for the slow pace of progress.
Although he was denied the opportunity to lead the executive branch of government (a position he still openly aspires to occupy after elections in 2015), he has succeeded in using his legislative powers to maximum effect. Some ethnic MPs describe him as a rational, independent person who knows how to get things done—precisely the kind of image that a would-be president needs to project.
When speaking about Nobel Peace Prize winner Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and other dissidents persecuted under the former regime, however, he tried to show another side of his personality. “After I met Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and many others in the democracy movement, I recalled the past with real empathy,” he said in a soft, measured voice.
He added that when he was still a top-ranking general, he kept his sympathy for the dissidents to himself, but knew in his own mind that he didn’t want to see them suffer undeserved punishment.
Regarding Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, he said: “I thought of her not just as a woman who had to endure hardship, but also as the daughter of our independence hero [Gen Aung San]. I was determined
to help her when I had the chance. And not just her—I wanted to see everyone treated fairly.”
These days, of course, he has no reason to hide his sense of justice—and good reason to find common cause with the woman once regarded as the nemesis of Myanmar’s generals. He expressed optimism that the country’s controversial 2008 Constitution could be amended, but agreed with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi (with whom he is, by all accounts, on good personal terms) that it is one of the world’s most difficult national charters to change.
On the subject of other reforms, he scoffed—politely—at the idea of calling anyone a “reformist.”
“What is a reformist? If someone just says the word, can you have democracy? We have to reform all the time,” he said, adding that what
Once a junta insider, U Shwe Mann has had to recreate himself to match Myanmar’s new political realities
the country really needs is a leader of vision.
But if there was any implicit criticism of U Thein Sein in his words, he was quick to dispel rumors of a power struggle. “I have always called him Ko Thein Sein, and he always addressed me as Ko Shwe Mann, or Bogyoke Gyi,” he said, dismissing talk of a rivalry between them as just a story used to sell newspapers. He added that U Thein Sein had given his word that he wouldn’t run for president in 2015.
Despite his insistence that he and U Thein Sein are not vying for power, U Shwe Mann has been openly critical of the president’s performance on a number of occasions. Last year he faulted the government for not moving forward with reforms quickly enough, and more recently, he warned that the
Myanmar Peace Center (MPC), a semiofficial body close to President’s Office Minister U Aung Min (the government’s chief peace negotiator with Myanmar’s ethnic armed groups, and a key ally of U Thein Sein) was overstepping its bounds.
“The MPC is not a decision-maker and cannot make political decisions,” said U Shwe Mann, expressing his displeasure with the government’s handling of the peace process.
Interestingly, some MPs told me that U Shwe Mann and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi appear to be on the same page on this issue—both are wary of the President’s Office and the MPC, which they see as trying to forge a hasty peace agreement without due consultation with the country’s lawmakers.
Asked what he thought about the president’s prediction (made
during a visit to Europe in July) that a nationwide ceasefire could soon be reached, U Shwe Mann said that if it was so easy to achieve peace, it would have been done by now.
“We have to be sincere if we want to achieve peace, but if you are just talking about peace and working for your own self-interest and organization, it won’t be so easy,” he said. He also insisted that the armed forces wants peace, but added that he wasn’t so sure about some of the ethnic armed groups, whose leaders might also be putting their own interests ahead of those of their people.
I asked him how he would lead if he held power, and he said, “I will do what I should do, and I will execute it firmly—for the country and for the benefit of the people.”
At the same time, however, he said one of the problems with the current administration was the tendency of “some people” (he didn’t say who) to think that they could do everything on their own. As for himself, he didn’t rule out the possibility of sharing power with Myanmar’s most famous political figure, but added that a future government would have to “coordinate and work with everyone, not just Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.”
In response to a question about how the business fortunes of his two sons, U Tone Naing Mann and U Aung Thet Mann, might affect his future political prospects, U Shwe Mann was adamant that his family did not benefit from his former position in the SPDC.
“I can guarantee that they did not enjoy any privileges because of my position,” he said, rejecting the widely held view that his sons—who are US-sanctioned businessmen involved in everything from palm oil production and the import and export of chemical fertilizers to construction and the telecoms industry—had unfair advantages.
Before we ended our one-hour conversation, he explained what motivated him as a politician—and why he felt the country needed a different kind of leadership.
“Whenever I go abroad, I always feel sad because our country has lagged so far behind. It is because of our failure to achieve ethnic unity and national reconciliation. Besides, there are many people who think they are the only ones who love the country and who can carry out tasks alone,” he said.
The first blast occurred on Oct. 11, killing two people at a guesthouse in Taungoo, Bago Region. Then there were more, including one three days later at Traders Hotel in Yangon that injured an American tourist. By Oct. 17, when two explosions went off in Namkhan, Shan State, three people were dead and at least 10 others injured.
At first, some suspected that the bombings were the work of Islamist radicals angered by mob attacks on Muslims in Myanmar since last year. But this soon gave way to suspicions that
military hardliners, eager to undermine President U Thein Sein’s ambitious goal of bringing all the country’s ethnic armed groups to the negotiating table, were behind the attacks.
To many, this seemed a very plausible explanation. After all, the blasts took place as the government and Kachin rebels were holding ceasefire talks in Myitkyina, capital of Kachin State, and the president was reiterating his plan to hold a nationwide ceasefire ceremony in the near future, to be witnessed by UN officials, diplomats and the media.
But when a number of ethnic Kayin men were arrested in connection with the bombings, attention quickly turned to the Karen National Union (KNU), an ethnic armed group with a long history of conflict with the government. The KNU acknowledged that the suspects had ties to the group, but denied that they were acting under orders from its central command.
Security forces gather outside Traders Hotel in Yangon after an American guest is injured by an explosion on Oct. 14, 2013.
Ironically, the government was also quick to deny that the KNU was involved in the bombings—something it would not have hesitated to accuse it of in the past. Clearly, after several highlevel meetings between KNU leaders and the president and commanderin-chief of Myanmar’s armed forces, Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing, Naypyitaw didn’t want to derail its détente with the Kayin rebels.
For their part, the police seem convinced that the whole episode was motivated by nothing more than a business dispute. At a press briefing on Oct. 18, police chief U Zaw Win said that eight suspects, all connected to a
mining business in Kayin State, had been rounded up. Their aim, he said, was to scare off tourists and investors.
Others, however, still believe that the situation reflects much deeper disagreements, between the KNU’s pragmatic leadership and other elements within the group dissatisfied with the failure of the peace process to bring real change on the ground. Specifically, they note that no ceasefire code of conduct has been implemented and that civilians remain vulnerable to the presence of government troops.
Meanwhile, members of some other ethnic armed groups have also hinted that they have no problem with
using “any means possible” to achieve their political ends. In August, at a meeting of ethnic leaders in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand, an ethnic Kachin leader said he encouraged ethnic armed groups to use whatever military or other tactics they had at their disposal.
“We need to fight, we need to launch our operations,” said this leader, who is a member of the United Nationalities Federal Council, an ethnic alliance.
He declined to specify what operations he had in mind, but left little doubt that at as long as a substantive peace agreement remains elusive, all options are on the table.
Next year, from March 30 to April 10, Myanmar will conduct its first census in more than three decades. To find out more about issues related to the national headcount, Irrawaddy reporter May Kha spoke to Minister of Immigration and Population U Khin Yi.
What are the latest developments regarding next year’s nationwide census?
Currently we are implementing census-related awareness-raising activities. [What we know now is that] there are about 60 million people and about 11 million households in Myanmar. We have 70 districts; 330 townships; 3,051 quarters; 13,620 village tracts and 64,346 villages in 14 regions and states. We also have a total of 135 ethnic groups.
Will Muslims living in Rakhine State be included?
Yes. Except for diplomats and people working for foreign missions abroad, everyone living within Myanmar’s borders at the time of the census will be listed, regardless of their religion or ethnic group.
How will you deal with refugees and illegal immigrants currently living in Thailand and Malaysia, many of whom are stateless?
After ceasefire agreements with different armed groups have been consolidated, there will be programs for landmine clearance and the resettlement of members of those groups and their relatives, including people in refugee camps. That means people in refugee camps who are in this category will be reconsidered Myanmar citizens.
As for migrant workers, many of them left the country illegally. So, to make their journey convenient,
the Ministry of Labor, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Immigration and Population (MIP) have coordinated and issued temporary passports for them. The MIP is responsible for verifying if they are Myanmar citizens.
What arrangements have you made to accept returning refugees?
We will facilitate them in attaining citizenship. In this effort, we have to consider four sections of the law. The first is related to dual citizenship. Section 13 of the law does not allow any Myanmar citizen to acquire citizenship of another country, so if someone wants to reapply for Myanmar citizenship, he or she needs to give up the other. Section 16 also states that, “A citizen who leaves the state permanently, or who acquires the citizenship of or registers himself as a citizen of another country, or who takes out a passport or a similar certificate of another country, ceases to be a citizen.”
Furthermore, Section 22 bars people from reapplying for citizenship status. However, according to Section 8(A), the government can offer citizenship status, as it says, “The council of state may, in the interest of the state, confer on any person citizenship or associate citizenship or naturalized citizenship.” In any case, no one can
acquire dual citizenship. So, there are things for those who want to be Myanmar citizens again to decide.
How will the permanent residence (PR) system for Myanmar people who are citizens of another country work?
The PR system aims to encourage national reconciliation—to rebuild the country with those who had to leave for various reasons. It was not easy to develop, though, as we had to link up with existing domestic laws. It was developed in consultation with, and with the approval of, the office of the attorney general. The government has also approved it. The initial length of stay permitted by this PR system is five years, and that can be extended.
Myanmar’s ID cards are made of paper and easy to duplicate. What can the government do about this?
We are now preparing to replace paper ID cards with “smart cards,” which have devices to protect against duplication. We have received offers from a number of countries to develop these cards. We are currently at a learning stage, but we will definitely replace the existing cards with smart ones.
How secure are Myanmar’s borders?
Myanmar borders five countries, and there are 16 official exit points along its borders. There may be many other unofficial ones, through which people can enter and exit. The MIP has proposed setting up a mechanized system to identify people going in and out of the country by their fingerprints. We also plan to set up a communications system to get in touch in a timely way between border areas and the central headquarters.
Alot has changed for Myanmar’s Tatmadaw, or armed forces, since it formally handed over power to a nominally civilian government in 2011, but there is little doubt in anybody’s mind that it remains a force to be reckoned with. That’s why foreign governments that once treated the country’s former junta as a pariah are now lining up to restore military ties after more than two decades.
What we still don’t know, however, is how far the Tatmadaw itself is willing to go to change its ways after half a century of almost total control over the country. This is a question that looms large not only for countries that hope to improve relations, but also for Myanmar’s people.
In August, the US ambassador to Myanmar, Derek Mitchell, acknowledged the continuing importance of the Tatmadaw when he appeared at a press conference alongside visiting US Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Ben Rhodes. “This is an absolutely critical institution in the country and has been for 50 years,” said the top US diplomat, explaining why his country wants to establish a regular dialogue with the Tatmadaw.
But simply going back to the days of providing military assistance and training, as the US did until the Tatmadaw crushed a pro-democracy uprising in 1988, is not enough, the ambassador added. “We need to get
new ideas into that institution because they have been operating on old ideas that haven’t seemed to work very well for the country,” he said.
One major obstacle facing any attempt to upgrade US-Myanmar military relations is the Tatmadaw’s recruitment of child soldiers, a problem that has existed for decades. Myanmar is one of five countries that will not receive US military assistance in 2014 under the Child Soldiers Prevention Act, which places restrictions on security assistance and commercial licensing of military equipment for
governments found to recruit underage soldiers.
Despite this issue, however, Mr. Mitchell (who once served in the Pentagon) and other high-ranking US officials have made a point of meeting with Tatmadaw leaders, including Commander-in-Chief Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing—no doubt mindful of the fact that Myanmar is strategically located between China and India, and therefore important to regional stability.
Some, however, are not happy with the West’s moves to engage the Tatmadaw, arguing that it is still too early to tell if Myanmar’s military is really serious about ending human
rights abuses, especially in ethnic areas where conflict with armed groups continues.
To counter such objections, the US government, which last year allowed Myanmar to send a team of observers to its Cobra Gold military exercise in Thailand, has said that its initial engagement with the Tatmadaw would focus on humanitarian issues, officer professionalization and human rights.
Meanwhile, the UK is said to be finalizing the details of military assistance that will see 30 high-ranking Tatmadaw officers receive specially tailored training, including instruction on how to operate within the rule of law, the head of a UK training center said.
During an official visit to London by President U Thein Sein in July, British Foreign Secretary William Hague said the country would begin engaging with the Tatmadaw. The aim of cooperation, Mr. Hague said at the time, was to try
to foster accountability and respect for human rights in Myanmar’s armed forces.
According to Dr. Laura Cleary, the head of the Centre of International Security and Resilience at England’s Cranfield University and the person in charge of the course, the request for the training came from none other than Myanmar opposition leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.
On March 27, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi attended the Armed Forces Day parade in Naypyitaw for the first time, signaling a thaw in her relationship with the Tatmadaw, which was founded by her father, independence hero Gen Aung San. According to military sources, she has also expressed a desire to meet with Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing and other senior military leaders to discuss ways to “help” the armed forces.
What this means is not exactly clear, but it is probably related to her oft-expressed desire to rehabilitate the
Tatmadaw in the eyes of Myanmar’s people, who have long regarded the military as an oppressive, rather than defensive, force.
While international engagement alone will likely do little to restore faith in Myanmar’s men in uniform, Dr. Cleary believes that the generals can be taught to earn the respect that they have long since lost through their often brutal mistreatment of the civilian population.
“The purpose of this engagement is to encourage the [Myanmar] military to normalize their role within society to improve respect for human rights and enhance the governance of those security forces,” she said.
“It’s not tactical. It’s strategic, it’s political. We are not teaching people how to fire a rifle or drive a tank. We are seeking to help them better understand when military force is appropriate and when it is absolutely not appropriate.”
A Tatmadaw vehicle sits parked in front of a sign promoting an end to the recruitment of child soldiers in Myanmar—one of the key conditions for improved military relations with the West.“This is an absolutely critical institution and has been for 50 years.”
—US Ambassador to Myanmar Derek Mitchell
With more than a third of the country’s workforce unemployed, the government has a big job on its hands
By SIMON ROUGHNEEN / PANTANAW AND YANGON
UThan Zaw shook his head as he stared across the waterlogged fields. “Over there, that’s where my land is,” he said, swinging a tattooed arm out through the bamboo frame of a waterside hut.
We were standing just off the road linking Yangon, Myanmar’s heaving commercial capital, with Pantanaw, a flood-prone farming township in Ayeyarwady Region, famous as the birthplace of former UN Secretary General U Thant.
In 2002, an army officer commandeered 60 acres of land belonging to U Than Zaw and several other local farmers—one of thousands of landgrab cases that have come to light since Myanmar’s glasnost began in 2011.
U Than Zaw has written to officials about the stolen land, but to no avail. He’s afraid to protest without a permit as three of the other dispossessed locals are in jail for doing just that.
He received the six-acre plot in 1995, but seven years later learned the hard way that that which gives can just as easily take away, and with little or no redress. U Than Zaw was handed a take-it-or-leave-it 6,500 kyat per acre for his land by the acquisitive army man.
From being a relatively prosperous smallholder in the 1990s, U Than Zaw has been reduced to planting a single acre of betel-nut trees. “Only enough to pay for food,” he said, lamenting that he cannot afford to send all three of his children to school. Asked his thoughts about Myanmar’s reforms and whether the country’s embryonic openingup can bring jobs and economic opportunity, he sneered. “We don’t see
much change in these places,” he said.
Change on the ground for Myanmar’s rural population is not just a matter of justice, but also something that will determine the country’s ability to provide work for millions of its people. The country’s unemployment rate is a hefty 37 percent, according to research by a parliamentary committee published earlier this year.
Of the 63 percent that are employed, an estimated 52 percent are working in agriculture. The overall number of Myanmar’s farm workers—15 million or so—is likely to remain more or less unchanged even if the country’s economy lifts off over the coming two decades, according to a detailed report on Myanmar published by the McKinsey Global Institute in June.
On his old farm, U Than Zaw grew matpe, one of several bean and pulse varieties grown by around 10 million farmers in Myanmar, mostly for export to India, according to the main Myanmar beans and pulses exchange in Yangon. Along with rice, such cash crops are a mainstay of the rural economy, and could be far more productive—and possibly provide more work—if they had more backing. “We would like to see some financial support from the government, and from the donor countries, especially for seed purchase,” U Myint Oo, an executive committee member of the beans exchange, told The Irrawaddy.
But growth along the lines projected by McKinsey—a quadrupling of Myanmar’s economy by 2030—will mean other sectors of the economy rising relative to agriculture, potentially producing millions of manufacturing and services jobs.
Already there are some new jobs being created, though precise overall figures are hard to come by. U Aung Naing Oo, head of Myanmar’s Directorate of Investment and Company Administration, said in September
that 20,000 new jobs in garmentmaking had been created since April, seemingly basing his numbers on the establishment of 20 new factories that should, he contended, see around 1,000 jobs created in each.
Workers remove feathers from chickens at the biggest chicken market in Yangon. More low-skilled jobs are needed to stem the exodus of workers from Myanmar, but this is unlikely to happen anytime soon.
According to Heang Chhor, a senior partner at McKinsey & Company and one of the authors of the McKinsey Global report, the latest data on foreign investment in Myanmar is a step in the right direction. “Much of the investment has been concentrated in the manufacturing sector, whereas in the past, it was primarily directed toward the energy sector,” he told The Irrawaddy.
Other observers have noted that businesspeople, especially in Yangon, are upbeat about the prospects for an economic takeoff and are acting accordingly. “People are investing in their businesses and buying new machines. There is a sense of overall optimism that is spurring some new hiring and new spending,” said Yangonbased economist Jared Bissinger.
Indeed, manufacturing is likely to be the main locus of new jobs in Myanmar in the near future, with investors attracted by low wages, but
also hindered by Myanmar’s gutted education system, which means a dearth of skilled and trained workers. As a consequence, “it is natural that the garment industry, which requires lower skilled labor and is less capital intensive, is one of the first to benefit from [foreign direct investment],” said Heang Chhor.
In recent decades, rural villages such as Pantanaw have been emptied of their youth, many of whom have gone to Thailand and Malaysia in search of manual jobs, and to Singapore, where the small number of educated and skilled Myanmar nationals are drawn.
If low-skill manufacturing jobs come about in big numbers, it could mean a slowdown in the emigration of millions of young Myanmar citizens, particularly women, who could find garment jobs in Yangon or in one of the proposed new special economic zones such as Thilawa, where Japanese manufacturers hope for an
From left to right: A man works on a ship at the Thilawa port outside Yangon; a woman carries gravel for thirty kyat, or three cents, a basket; hopeful job applicants receive forms to fill out.
PHOTO: REUTERS
infrastructure-laden oasis—a refuge from the power shortages and slow Internet speeds elsewhere in Myanmar.
But even if low-wage, low-skill farming or manufacturing jobs come to Myanmar, the exodus of workers is not likely to reverse direction anytime soon.
Eva Daw Moe Thi Da, the manager of Golden Dragon, a Myanmar-oriented recruitment agency based in Singapore, said that despite many of her city state-based compatriots expressing a yen to go home, repatriation just isn’t happening yet. “I do not see many going back to Myanmar to find jobs. We do not have any other choice for the time being,” she told The Irrawaddy.
Myanmar’s brain drain means a shortage of educated workers and makes hiring a challenge. ACE Insurance, one of the world’s leading companies in the sector, opened an office in Yangon in May. That move came on the back of new licenses being granted after four decades of just one state-owned
insurance provider in Myanmar. This history means that “there is not a lot of insurance experience and expertise in the market,” as an ACE spokesperson told The Irrawaddy.
But ACE believes that Myanmar’s reforms and a young population “make Myanmar a very attractive market for the future.” And reviving Myanmar’s education system should mean, in time, more people with more opportunities to find better-paying, less labor-intensive jobs, and in turn will enable Myanmar to attract higher-tier investment than is the case at present, or is likely to be the case for the foreseeable future.
Khin Sanda Hal Myint, a business student at Myanmar Imperial College, a private school in Yangon, said that there is a sense that her generation will have more opportunities than those who came before as Myanmar’s economy opens up. But she’s aware that such breaks might not come to everyone, unless Myanmar’s education
Even if lowwage, lowskill jobs come to Myanmar, the exodus of workers is not likely to reverse direction soon.PHOTO: JPAING / THE IRRAWADDY
system is reformed. “I have a lot of opportunities and a better chance than the majority,” she told The Irrawaddy.
In response to the country’s immediate needs, opposition leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has called for more vocational training as a practical way to make Myanmar’s younger generation more employable and to provide local and foreign businesses with the personnel they need.
It seems the government agrees that this emphasis on hands-on training is the way to go, at least for now. U Chan Nyein, the chairman of the Lower House (Pyithyu Hluttaw) Education Upgrading Committee, said the forthcoming draft national education law will
be down to earth. “It will feature formal, non-formal and informal education, and we will emphasize vocational training,” he told The Irrawaddy.
In the meantime, several other new laws have been passed that, along with the revision of older codes, could lay the bedrock for some economic growth and, in turn, some job creation. A case in point is the 2012 foreign investment law and associated rules that have paved the way for the jump in garment sector investment, though this uptick has also been prompted by an easing of Western sanctions. Minus sanctions, Myanmar’s low wages mean that garment makers can set up shop now to sell to buyers
Vocational training is seen as the most practical way to make youth more employable.
in Europe and North America. “New export markets are opening and buyers are coming looking for new orders,” said Mr. Bissinger, the economist. And new orders, he added, mean more jobs.
But there is only so much that lawmaking can do to kick-start the economy and in turn boost employment. Widespread job creation in Myanmar, in other words, is contingent on modernization of its wider economy.
Ong Chao Choon, the managing director for Myanmar of PricewaterhouseCoopers, the London-based multinational professional services firm, has warned that little economic development will take place in the
country unless it improves its electricity supply—which most estimates gauge as reaching no more than a quarter of the population—and its banking system. “Bank lending is expensive (at 12 percent interest per annum) and the banks currently do not have the balance sheets or the banking products to support the economic and infrastructure growth,” he said.
Addressing such infrastructure time warps would do much more for business—and hence job creation—than any leg up offered by new legislation, says Lex Rieffel, a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “If the government could provide these to
the private sector, the government could just sit back and watch the economy grow,” said Mr. Rieffel, author of several reports on Myanmar.
Back in Pantanaw, Daw Tin Hlaing said something similar. Unlike U Than Zaw, her land was not confiscated and she still grows matpe. She said, however, that her scope for increasing her yield—which could mean hiring additional farm help—is curtailed by factors outside her control. “We have no access to the bank for finance, so we cannot buy better seeds or some machinery, and the roads are so bad it costs too much to hire a truck to bring beans to Yangon,” she said.
Potential investors at a hotel conference room in Yangon in September were invited to salivate over Myanmar’s geology. By all accounts, the maps and cross-section graphics on display indicate that the country is sitting on vast energy wealth.
Although the exact quantities of hydrocarbons are unknown, “it can be envisaged as a sleeping petroleum giant in the Southeast Asia region,” said one slide presented by China’s North PetroChem Corporation (Myanmar) Ltd.
Investors were shown historic images of oil being pulled out of the ground by hand, hinting at just how easy the business could be here. The government hopes foreign investors will help unlock energy to fuel Myanmar’s development and provide big state revenues.
Many of those watching were from—or hope to link up with—the 61 local and international firms named as prequalified to bid for 11 shallow-water blocks and 19 deepwater blocks—more than 2,000 feet deep—off the coast. The offshore bidders must submit their proposals by Nov. 15.
Some 20 trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves have already been proven offshore,
and another 80 trillion cubic feet of “probable and possible” reserves had been identified before proper exploration of the deep-water areas has even begun, according to the North Petro-Chem Corp. presentation.
“[The] deep-water area has a better chance than shallow water to discover world-class commercial oil and gas reserves,” the presentation said.
As an indication of how valuable these reserves could be, the Shwe gas field—which began producing gas this year and justified the building of a US $3.7 billion gas pipeline from the Bay of Bengal, across Myanmar, to China—has reserves of up to 9.1 trillion cubic feet.
U Aung Kyaw Htoo, deputy director of the Ministry of Energy’s production planning section, told investors he was
confident the unknown reserves were “giant.”
“The offshore blocks are good incentive for the investors,” he said. “Especially the deep-water blocks— they are untapped, they have never been touched before.”
The offshore blocks are set to be awarded early next year, shortly after 18 onshore blocks, which are expected to go to the highest bidders before the end of 2013.
The tenders run alongside the rapid development of the Shwe gas field and accompanying pipeline, a separate oil pipeline connecting Kyaukphyu in Rakhine State with China, and onshore oil and gas developments, meaning a veritable boom in the extraction and transportation of fossil fuels could be about to break.
While deep-water drilling has opened up vast reserves of oil and gas worldwide that could not be reached before, there are dangers. In 2010, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, which was operating at a depth of more than 4,000 feet, blew out, causing the deaths of 11 crewmen, and initiating the largest oil spill in US history.
U Aung Kyaw Htoo said ministry officials had spoken with the US State Department for “advice” on how to make sure such an incident didn’t happen in Myanmar’s waters.
Paul Donowitz, campaign director at conservation group Earth Rights International, said he was concerned about the government’s readiness to deal with multiple offshore drilling projects, as well as “significant quantities” of crude oil on vessels docking in Kyaukphyu to send oil to China.
“The ability to respond to an incident is completely untested,” he said.
The government has made public no information about emergency management and how it intends to ensure companies have in place comprehensive plans for incidents, he said. Even a small spill
could do huge damage to Myanmar’s mangrove-lined coastal habitats, Mr. Donowitz added.
“The question is whether the government has the capacity to regulate the industry,” Mr. Donowitz said. “I just don’t think it is clear and the government has yet to demonstrate the capacity to oversee the industry. This industry is likely going to be effectively self-regulating.”
One way of balancing that risk is to bring in large companies who have experience drilling in deep seas and can make the necessary investments.
Among the firms allowed to bid for the offshore blocks are major international firms like Total of France, Chevron and ExxonMobil of the United States and Norway’s Statoil. The China National Petroleum Corporation, which is the developer of the Shwe gas pipeline, is also on the list alongside state-owned Korean and Japanese companies.
The Ministry of Energy has told companies, contrary to initial indications, that it will negotiate on the amount of profits from oil and gas projects they will share with companies. The move appeared to be a sweetener for entering a joint venture with the state, which on Myanmar’s preferred terms give the government more than 80 percent of the takings of an oil or gas project.
Economist and long-time Myanmarwatcher Sean Turnell said that while there will certainly be interest in the bidding from the major companies from the West, they may not be able to outbid regional firms, many of which have state backing.
“I think we will find the blocks are picked up by Chinese, Thai, Korean and other firms familiar from the past few years,” Mr. Turnell said in an email.
Mr. Turnell also said the large revenues the government could be in for pose their own risks, since “such revenues kept the old regime afloat, and allowed its unhelpful policies.”
Myanmar is trying to join the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, which Mr. Turnell said was a necessary step, but would not have an impact on the way government spends oil and gas revenues.
“In short, good policymaking remains the issue, and resource rents pose dangers to this to the extent they allow poor decisions to be made,” he said.
Nine months after it started operations in Myanmar, global money transfer giant Western Union says people in 107 countries have sent money to the previously sanctioned Southeast Asian country.
With eight local banks on board as in-country partners, the company has 280 agents across Myanmar, covering all of the country’s states and regions, bar the hard-to-access Chin State in the northwest. There is even an online money transfer option, emblazoned
with a smiling, thanaka-adorned young woman atop the web page.
MoneyGram is a more recent arrival to Myanmar, announcing in late August that its services would be provided through partnerships with three Myanmar banks: Asia Green Development Bank (AGD)— run by U Tay Za, a long black-listed businessman—Myanmar Citizens Bank and Tun Foundation Bank.
And though Western Union and its main global rival MoneyGram are hoping that the influx of visitors to Myanmar for the tourism high season will see more people using their services in the country, their success here depends, for now, on tapping into the millions of Myanmar citizens living and working abroad, in Asia, the West and parts of the Middle East, and remitting unknown millions of kyats home every year.
Malaysia and Thailand alone are host to around one million and three million Myanmar nationals, respectively. Their remittances, sent to hard-pressed relatives living in poverty
back home, are an important source of income in Myanmar, especially in the countryside, where job opportunities remain scarce and manual-labor farming is how most people make a living.
But getting a piece of this action will not be easy for companies that rely on established partners on the ground to carry out transactions. Trust in Myanmar’s formal banking system—never strong, thanks to the erratic policies of the former military government—dried up almost completely after a 2003 bank run rattled the Central Bank and reinforced perceptions that private financial institutions in the country were not built on solid ground.
hundi—a cash- and trust-based wordof-mouth chain linking senders abroad to recipients in Myanmar.
Still, there are hopes that this could change, as banks open new branches around the country.
“We are trying to coax Myanmar migrants into using the formal, legal way,” said U Than Lwin, the vice chairman of Kanbawza (KBZ) Bank, which provides Western Union services. He added that the bank currently has 120 branches across Myanmar and plans to double that number within the next year.
In the meantime, Western Union does a respectable amount of business in Myanmar’s cities, which are already reasonably well-served by local banks.
beating the usual 5 percent cut that hundi agents take. MoneyGram, which charges 480 baht ($15) for a transfer of 4,000 baht ($128) or less, is far less competitive, requiring customers to send the equivalent of more than $1,000 just to match the hundi rate.
For now, however, the hundi agents don’t have much to fear from either company, owing largely to the unique circumstances of their customer base. Perhaps several hundred thousand Myanmar migrants in Malaysia and upwards of a million in Thailand are not legally registered to work in these countries, and many don’t have any form of official ID, making it impossible for them to use the formal money transfer outlets.
Communication is also a problem. “Many Myanmar people cannot speak English, or read and write it. That means it is difficult for them to do formal transfers,” a hundi agent in Kuala Lumpur, going by the name Thu Ya, told The Irrawaddy.
Over the past two years, however, the government has taken baby steps to normalize Myanmar’s financial system and restore confidence. In April of last year, Naypyitaw decided to float the kyat, allowing it to trade at close to its real market value, instead of at the farcical official rate of roughly 6 kyat to the dollar. Even earlier, in October 2011, it allowed private banks to open foreign exchange counters. And most importantly, perhaps, it has undertaken a series of political and economic reforms over the past two years that have resulted in the steady lifting of US sanctions, including a decision in February of this year to allow US companies to do business with four local banks—among them U Tay Za’s AGD Bank.
All of this has helped to facilitate Western Union and MoneyGram’s entry into the Myanmar market, but so far it hasn’t done much to extend their reach into the countryside, where even the largest local banks have little or no presence. This has meant that most Myanmar migrants continue to rely on the informal transfer system known as
According to Ma Thiri Myat, an official working at the Western Union counter at a branch of First Private Bank in Yangon, the bank receives an average of 60 to 70 Western Union transactions a day.
This bodes well for future business, even in areas where companies like Western Union and MoneyGram are still almost completely unknown.
Lairam Vapual, a native of Chin State currently living in Malaysia, told The Irrawaddy that he believes in time “people will use Western Union and MoneyGram as they are safer and less expensive.” He noted that while it costs 10 ringgit (US $3.10) to send 100,000 kyat ($103) via the hundi system, Western Union charges just 14 ringgit ($4.30) to send 4,000 ringgit ($1,240). In percentage terms, that’s around 3 percent for the services of a hundi, versus O.35 percent to send via Western Union.
Western Union is also working hard to erode hundi agents’ hold over their clients in Thailand, offering them a special flat rate of 160 baht ($5) to send any amount of money to Myanmar,
Perhaps the most important factor, however, is simply the familiarity and convenience of the hundi system. Myanmar nationals living abroad are generally more comfortable handing their money over to compatriots, knowing that it will go directly to their hometowns rather than into banks in big cities. Even officials acknowledge that on this score, the formal money transfer services can’t compete. “Formal channels cannot deliver to the door where most receive it,” said an advisor to the Myanmar government on financial matters, speaking on condition of anonymity.
For now, then, the banks seem to realize that they still face a formidable informal competitor, forcing them to find some way to fit in with a system that they one day hope to replace. “We are working with some of the more respectable hundi traders in Malaysia and Thailand,” admitted U Than Lwin of KBZ Bank.
In the end, however, the global giants are confident that they will prevail, as customers become better acquainted with what they have to offer.
“Informal systems including hundi do not provide the type of service that an international money transfer service provider like Western Union does,” said company spokesperson Connie Yip, explaining why she thought Western Union would eventually win over Myanmar consumers.
“Many Myanmar people cannot speak English, or read and write it. That means it is difficult for them to do formal transfers.”
—a hundi agent in Kuala Lumpur
Private insurance in Myanmar is still in its infancy and will need time to fully develop after more than half a century of domination by a government-owned company, say some of those now hoping to transform the industry.
Earlier this year, Myanma Insurance, the sole insurer in the country since 1952, took the dramatic step of ending its monopoly by allowing private companies to enter the market. Since then, 12 companies have been authorized to sell insurance, including some owned by the country’s biggest
banks and conglomerates.
Under the new rules, which are due to be enacted as legislation later in the year, private companies can offer nine categories of life and general insurance, out of 48 categories recognized by the government. These include life insurance policies for athletes and victims of snake bite, and general insurance covering fire damage to property and comprehensive vehicle insurance.
Insurers are also required to show six billion kyat (US $6.2 million) in capital before they are allowed to
offer life insurance policies and 40 billion kyat ($41.5 million) if they want to provide general insurance. In effect, this means that only the largest companies in the country are able to enter the industry.
AIA, Asia’s third-largest insurer, is the only international company to establish a presence in Myanmar so far, although others are expected to follow. However, Mark Tucker, the company’s chief executive, said in February that AIA’s operations in the country wouldn’t be allowed to conduct business until 2015, and wouldn’t
“become material for at least five to 15 years.”
So far, three of the 12 newly formed insurance companies—IKBZ Insurance Public Company (owned by Kanbawza Bank), Grand Guardian Insurance Public Company (owned by the Shwe Taung Group of Companies), and Citizen Business Company (owned by the Co-Operative Bank)—have taken the lead in promoting their services through advertising campaigns that started in June.
Most agree, however, that attracting customers will be an uphill battle.
“There hasn’t been private insurance in Myanmar for more than 50 years, so most people have no idea of what its advantages are. That’s why interest is still very low,” said a spokesperson for Grand Guardian who asked not to be identified.
Even the former general manager of Myanma Insurance, Deputy Finance Minister Dr. Maung Mg Thein, has acknowledged that few people in the country have any understanding of how insurance works. Many, he said, are
averse to it because they believe that it will invite ill fortune.
But superstition aside, many in the industry believe that it has a real future as the economy grows and more people begin to feel a greater need to protect themselves and their assets.
So far, the strongest demand in Yangon has been for fire insurance— reflecting, perhaps, fears about the shoddy electrical wiring in many of the city’s buildings. Comprehensive vehicle insurance has also shown steady growth, as the number of cars on the road continues to climb since import licenses were made easier to get two years ago.
Even as demand looks set to expand, however, other market forces remain constrained by the government’s continuing role in the industry. According to U Aung Soe Oo, the general manager of IKBZ, premium, commission and compensation rates are all set by Myanma Insurance.
“For example for a snake-bite insurance, we can only charge 500 kyat per policy, and if the policyholder dies
of a snake bite, we have to pay 500,000 kyat in compensation,” he said, adding that the government appeared intent on preventing competition among private insurers.
Meanwhile, other rules seem designed to ensure that Myanma Insurance retains its competitive edge. Unlike the private insurers, which will only be allowed to issue kyatdenominated policies, the state-run insurance company will be allowed to sell policies that provide compensation in foreign currencies to investors from overseas.
Far from feeling that this would give the state insurer an unfair advantage, U Aung Soe accepted the measure as necessary until the private companies were ready to play in the big leagues. “I think that the government can be allowed to take the foreign-currency business while the private insurance sector has a chance to grow,” he said.
Other private insurers appeared to share this sentiment, accepting restrictions as the price that had to be paid for stable growth of the industry. “By following the regulations, we will be able to improve our industry instead of fighting each other,” said the Grand Guardian spokesperson.
While acknowledging that many challenges lie ahead—not the least being that few people in Myanmar can afford insurance—he added that the future still holds immense promise.
“I believe that the private insurance companies can be very optimistic about our long-term prospects, but for now we have to be patient and give the industry time to develop,” he said.
“There hasn’t been private insurance in Myanmar for more than 50 years, so most people have no idea of its advantages. That’s why interest is still very low.”
— a spokesperson for Grand Guardian InsuranceAbove, from left to right: Fires like this one at the Mingalar Zay market complex in Yangon in 2010 help to explain the strong demand for fire insurance; protection against snake bites and life insurance for athletes are also on offer. PHOTO: REUTERS
From the finest raw materials to innovative recipes, we transform local food into international cuisine.
The managers said the new fee would be postponed indefinitely because new facilities were not yet completed, it said.
“However, it is very likely that the board deferred the decision in response to criticism by the travel trade and even some government officials who are concerned about individual historical sites adding their own fees to cash in on a tourism boom,” said TTR Weekly.
Tourism is one of Myanmar’s most rapidly growing sources of income as more foreigners hurry to visit the country, but there have been many complaints about rip-off prices, especially for accommodation.
Indian companies are reportedly leading plans to build two large coal-fuelled power stations in Myanmar.
The New Delhi-based Orange Powergen is the lead partner in a consortium to develop a 500-megawatt plant at Kyauktan in the Yangon area, said various reports citing official sources in Myanmar.
Meanwhile, the major Indian energy company Tata Power is carrying out a feasibility study for another coal-fuelled plant at Bassein, according to The Hindu newspaper.
The report said a Tata plant would use “clean coal technology” using fuel imported from Indonesia. However, this would necessitate coal being shipped via Singapore and the Strait of Malacca at the southern tip of Malaysia.
Orange Powergen, which describes itself as specializing in renewable energy and not fossil fuels, will be partnered by Global Advisor Limited of Singapore and domestic firm Diamond Palace Services Company, said the Chinese news agency Xinhua. No timetable for development of a power plant at Kyauktan has been announced.
Numerous plans for new electricity-generating projects have been announced in the last year, but little progress has been made on any of them.
The long-delayed US $800 million nickel mining project north of Mandalay to be financed by Chinese state enterprises is moving closer to a start-up, according to reports.
The Ministry of Mines said in a statement on Oct. 16 that its main partner, the China Non-ferrous Metal Mining Company (CNMC), was already carrying out tests in the Tagaung area of Sagaing Region.
The project, which will scar pristine rain forests and disrupt numerous villages, aims to eventually produce 85,000 tonnes of ferronickel per year.
nearly 500 kg of the precious metal this year—double the 2012 production, said a government official.
The increase is due to higher output at Yamaethin in Mandalay Region and Kalaw in Shan State, said U Aye Zaw, a director at the Ministry of Mining, adding that production would be much higher if fighting in Kachin and Kayin states had not forced the closure of almost 350 mines.
He said 190 mines had shut in Kachin State and nearly 150 in Kayin State.
China’s renegade offshoot Taiwan is sending a major business delegation to Myanmar to explore trade and investment opportunities. The visit will focus on Myanmar’s rice industry.
A business team led by Taiwan’s International Economic Cooperation Association chief, Wang Chung-yu, will visit Yangon in November, the Taipei Times reported.
The team will include businesspeople “in steel, cement and medical devices industries to explore business opportunities,” the newspaper said.
But foremost in Taiwan’s visit will be proposals to aid Myanmar’s rice industry, it said.
Foreign tour operators have complained about “extra fees” being added to various popular tourist attractions in Myanmar which are angering visitors, the travel
industry magazine TTR Weekly reported.
The issue was highlighted after managers of the Mandalay Hill sightseeing attraction suddenly cancelled plans to charge the equivalent of US $2 for access to the hill, said the paper.
The 20-year project has been under discussion since 2004 and will involve construction of a smelter most likely fuelled by coal or coke to separate the nickel from mined ore rock.
Myanmar’s partially shutdown gold-mining industry is still expected to deliver
“Although the growth of rice yield has been highly uneven in Myanmar, it has a large potential to produce more rice. We will work with Myanmar to develop rice varieties that can boost its food supplies under its climate conditions,” International Cooperation and Development Fund Secretary-General Tao Wenlung told the paper.
— WILLIAM BOOT
By MARWAAN MACAN-MARKAR / BANGKOK
Under the watchful gaze of Peerawat Chottitommo, a veteran broadcaster, a team of young Thais monitors programs unfolding on a bank of 12 television screens on the wall of a new studio. In a nearby room, a reporting team with two cameras in hand prepares to go out to cover an event.
But the programs being produced within this rundown two-story building that once housed a popular disco will not go on air. Rather, the 250-strong staff under Mr. Peerawat’s wing is going through the motions of a typical news reporting and production day in this northern Bangkok television studio. Such dry runs are in readiness for the launch of a new free-to-air, nationwide broadcaster.
This entrant is a venture of Triple V Broadcast, a company affiliated with Thai Rath, Thailand’s largest locallanguage daily. The latter already enjoys an impressive one million circulation and has a reputation for shaping the national agenda as a leader of Thailand’s famously sensationalistic and free-wheeling newspaper industry. And now it wants to capitalize on its recognized news brand by setting its sights on the world of digital television.
“Digital TV is our next most important venture,” said Vachara
Vacharaphol, a ponytail-sporting 32-year-old whose grandfather founded Thai Rath five decades ago. “When people hear the name Thai Rath they will link it to the news territory, and that is a strength for us going into this area now.”
Other media houses have similar ambitions. Over a period of three days in September, industry leaders wasted no time in applying for new licenses up for grabs in a bid to capitalize on this ground-breaking moment in local broadcasting. Among those leading the charge were Channel Three and Channel Seven, at present the most watched of the country’s five free-to-air broadcasters; TrueVisions, Thailand’s largest cable-television provider; and GMM Grammy, a leading satellite television operator.
Thailand’s two English-language newspaper houses, The Bangkok Post and The Nation, also made plays to be part of a new wave of media expansion that some industry analysts estimate will require multi-billion baht investments. Thai Rath, for instance, has earmarked the start-up costs for its digital television venture to hit five billion baht (US $160 million).
The National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) described the three-day sale of the documents to bid for the planned
digital television stations as “the hottest auction in Thailand’s broadcasting history.” The NBTC, a Parliamentapproved regulator, saw 33 companies snap up 49 application packages, each one costing 1.07 million baht ($34,000).
The buzz in the media world conveys what is at stake: The age of the free-to-air television broadcast monopolized by five conservative and pro-establishment stations is over. It will be replaced, starting next year, by 24 independently-run digital television broadcasters with a national reach. The stations, which will be available in both standard definition (SD) and high definition (HD), will offer content ranging from news and documentaries to children- and family-friendly programs and variety entertainment.
“This will result in dramatic change in the television industry,” Supinya Klangnarong, one of the 11 commissioners of the NBTC, explained in an interview. “It will be a challenge to the status quo, since TV in Thailand has been monopolized for the past 60 years. That is not just the monopoly of the market, but a monopoly of thought and content that is directed at the Thai people.”
The sentiment is understandable. After all, television in Thailand has for the most part been under the sway of the Thai military. It was this powerful institution, infamous for launching 18 successful coups and ruling the country through juntas for most of its years since 1932, when Thailand became a constitutional monarchy, which introduced television as a propaganda tool in the 1950s. The military currently owns two television stations and 200 radio stations.
The tone set by the generals was followed by government agencies when the television landscape broadened in the 1980s. Then semi-commercial stations emerged after getting television concessions from either the military or the state. These five free-to-air national broadcasters currently reach 22 million households in a country of 67 million people. Nearly six million of them are in urban areas.
The shift toward digital television stations will see the prevailing concessions-based regime give way to a transparent, competitive environment based on buying the licenses to broadcast. “They will have to compete for audiences and for advertising
to support their productions,” said Ms. Supinya. “The only restrictions [the new stations will face] are those governed in the license contract about the proportion of contents, such as the percentage for news or for variety and entertainment.”
According to the NBTC, at least 50 percent of television users should have access to this plethora of digital content by next year. The following years will see progressive increases, with coverage expected to hit 90 percent in four years.
For Thai banks, this liberalization of the television industry is a moneyspinner. After all, the starting price to bid for the licenses being auctioned has been set at 140 million baht ($4.5 million) for a children’s channel, 220 million baht ($7 million) for a news channel and 380 million baht (12.2 million) for an SD variety channel. The NBTC estimates the initial licensing and airtime rental cost for the transmission networks to hit 50 billion baht ($1.6 billion).
“Many banks would be interested to jump in since these are projects with opportunities that could be implemented soon,” noted Vasin Vanichvoranum, executive vice president of Kasikornbank. “The change to digital TV will spur new investments in many areas.”
Preliminary research by Kasikornbank estimates that the economic value of this digital transformation will reach 100 billion baht ($3.2 billion). That figure is based on calculations for the production of new digital television monitors, related equipment to receive transmissions, and the costs for licenses, airtime rental and producing content.
Analysts are flagging the buoyant advertising market as the barometer to gauge the impact digital television will have following its 2014 launch. Thailand’s total advertising budget for 2011 was estimated at $3.2 billion, Credit Suisse revealed in a report. More than half of that figure--$1.8 billion— went into television advertising.
“It remains to be seen if the advertising pie will remain the same to be fought over by many more players, or if new advertising money will pour in,” said Laurent Malespine, managing director of Don’t Blink, the Thailand representative for Singapore’s Media Corp Studios. “The print media could take a hit.”
A cosmic dance of life and death unfolds at a Hindu temple in the heart of Yangon
By VIRGINIA HENDERSON
An extraordinary sensory experience, a dynamic collage of rainbow colors and evocative aromas, full of sound and fury— that’s the Shri Kali Temple in downtown Yangon. Yet miraculously, it’s also a soothing space, a place to be free and at ease with your maker.
Offerings of bananas, oranges, coconuts and lemons are bundled onto trays with garlands of roses, orchids, jasmine, marigolds, chrysanthemums, incense sticks and betel leaf to be solemnized before fire. Devotees with arms outstretched, palms upward, pressed, pay respect, bowing down to the power of the universe. The tilaka, a red dot of sandalwood paste or red kumkuma powder applied on the forehead to express devotion, is a reminder to see things not only with our eyes but also with the third eye, the mind’s eye, urging spiritual insight. Lighting oil lamps symbolizes the dispelling of ignorance and awakening of our divine light.
Temple assistants Parman Shiva, a 53-year old Tamil, and Tula Shi, 28, from Nepal, with sacred strings slung sideways over their bare torsos, give blessings and help to smash burning puja coconuts onto the tiles, representing the shattering of the ego to reveal the sweet fruit inside.
Kali is praised as the greatest of all deities, the fundamental power, raw energy, the ultimate reality. She is the mysterious, powerful goddess of transformation, time and change, representing the wholeness of life, a spectrum of opposites—light and dark, life and death, beauty and ugliness, motherliness and destructiveness. Supreme mistress of the universe, she is associated with the five elements. In union with Lord Shiva, Kali creates and destroys worlds. She is Shiva’s creative power. They must dance together.
A fierce aspect of goddess Durga (Parvati), Kali is pictured as multi-armed, naked or with a skirt of human arms and a garland of human heads. She is shown enraged with disheveled hair, bloodshot eyes, an open mouth with tongue poking out, holding a sword, a severed head (representing the ego), a cup to capture the blood, and standing on Lord Shiva’s body. This represents courage and acceptance of the way things are. Death cannot exist without life, so life cannot exist without death. Kali is also portrayed as the most loving of the Hindu goddesses, mother of the whole universe.
Built by Tamil migrants in 1871, this Hindu temple underwent a major restoration during 201112. Every day is celebrated, with special emphasis during the famous Diwali festival of lights on Nov. 3 -7.
Shri Kali Temple, Anawrahta St, Yangon; open 6 am-11 am, 4 pm-9 pm
Above: Devotees and temple assistants perform devotional rites inside the Shri Kali Temple.
Above: The road to Namhsan, Myanmar’s “tea capital,” winds through the highlands of Shan State.
By YAN PAI
Ihad always wanted to visit Namhsan, the ancient “tea capital” of Shan State, and earlier this year, I finally got my chance.
In late July, some friends and I set out from Mandalay on a four-hour ride by public bus to Kyaukme, a major trading center for tea since before British colonial times, located on the Mandalay-Lashio road.
After spending the night in Kyaukme, we resumed our journey early the next morning in a hired car. When we left at 5:30, the town was still asleep, except for a few people on motorcycles bringing fresh produce to the nearest market. The air was chilly and the surrounding mountain ranges were pitch-dark under the fog.
Our next stop was Hsipaw, about 35 km away. We reached it at around 7 am, with the weather still cool and breezy. As the local market started to open, we grabbed some Shan noodles and tea and noticed another early visitor, a foreign woman wearing a Shan bag slung across her shoulders.
Yangon Mandalay Naypyitaw INDIA CHINAAfter a quick breakfast, we set off again, leaving the Mandalay-Lashio road to head north for Namhsan. On the way, we passed Infantry Battalion No. 23, which was stationed just outside of Hsipaw—a reminder that despite a recent ceasefire between the government army and Shan rebels, this area was still not entirely peaceful.
On both sides of the HsipawNamhsan road, cornfields stretched far into the distance. We were told that this was “CP corn,” a lucrative crop named after Charoen Pokphand, a major Thai agribusiness company.
After about 29 km, we came to the Panglong junction. From this point onwards, the road became narrow and rough, covered with stones and potholes. Clinging to mountain ridges, and sometimes perched precariously over ravines, the road was flanked by dense bamboo and coniferous forest. We also saw natural springs running down the mountainsides.
As we approached Lilu, a village at the entrance of Namhsan Township, I saw a small truck coming from the opposite direction, full of foreign tourists. But as we continued the steady 35-km climb from Lilu to the town of Namhsan, along a narrow road that was partially blocked in places because of landslides, there were few travelers to be seen.
In fact, the higher we went, the harder it was to see anything. The fog grew so thick that it felt like we were driving through the clouds.
Looking back, however, we could catch a glimpse of the famed tea plantations that we had come so far to see. Dressed in raincoats, people from the surrounding Palaung villages were collecting the tea leaves that were the main source of income in this remote area.
Despite the feeling that we had somehow risen above the cares of the world below, I knew that this was no Shan Shangri-La. In recent years, the local tea industry has been hard hit by concerns about the safety of pickled tea leaves, a Myanmar staple, because of reports about the use of illegal dyes. This—and the fact that armed groups had been coming into Palaung areas to collect taxes and recruit soldiers—put pressure on many to leave for China in search of work in the tea plantations there.
Still, as we approached the huge fig tree that stood at the entrance to the village of Sakhantha, shrouded in a beautiful mist, we couldn’t help but feel that we had entered another world.
Right after Sakhantha, we met two more foreigners, this time riding on motorbikes, wearing raincoats and smiles. They had travelled to
Namhsan on their own even though it was temporarily off limits due to recent clashes.
Locals told me that some foreigners said this area reminded them of Switzerland, for its mountains and cool, clean air. Unfortunately, however, efforts to develop the local tourism industry have been slow to take off, largely due to the reluctance of the authorities to issue licenses for tourist accommodation.
Finally, after a long, winding journey, we reached our destination: Namhsan, nestled high in the Shan Hills, 1,625 meters (5,332 feet) above sea level.
Although it was once the capital of the Palaung sub-state of Tawngpeng, today Namhsan is little more than a large village, with one main street of mostly one- and two-story wooden buildings. Clean and quiet, with little traffic, it has a handful of teashops and a few other small businesses, some run by Chinese.
The people of Namhsan are mainly from the Ka-tur (Samlong) sub-branch of the Palaung, but there are also residents belonging to Kayin, Lisu and Shan ethnic tribal groups, as well as ethnic Indians and Chinese. While some inhabitants still wear traditional costumes, most dress in jeans and modern clothing these days.
The Palaungs here are often referred to as the Shwe, or Golden,
Palaung because of the color of the belts they traditionally wore. In the Shwe language (which is distinct from other Paluang languages), Namhsan means “trembling water,” which is believed to be a reference to the fact that the town lies in a marshy area that regularly floods during heavy rains.
In the early part of the 20th century, Namhsan prospered not only as a teagrowing area, but also as the center of the local silver-mining industry. These days, however, the local economy relies almost entirely on its production of high-quality green tea and pickled tea leaves. Besides traditional homebased tea businesses, the town has two factories for black tea production—one belonging to the government army, and the other privately owned—and one private factory for green tea production.
The tea is harvested from April to November, but the best quality leaves are those collected between late March and mid-April. Yields are significantly lower than in tea-producing areas of Sri Lanka and India, and have been declining year by year.
Although tea will likely always be the mainstay of Namhsan, my brief visit made me realize that this area also has real potential as a tourist destination— as the steady trickle of foreign visitors who have already discovered it attests. For my part, I felt well-rewarded by my decision to explore this little known corner of Myanmar.
It took less than a week—and just one major public appearance— to turn Myanmar’s first Miss Universe contestant in more than 50 years into one of the country’s least liked people.
It was a surprising turn of events, considering the strong support that other local beauty queens, such as Ma Nang Khin Zay Yar and Ma Khin Wint Wah, have enjoyed since Myanmar’s models returned to the international beauty pageant circuit last year.
The vitriol prompted by Ma Moe Set Wine, the 25-year-old winner of the Miss Universe Myanmar title, has
shed light on some strongly held views in Myanmar today—most notably, a hatred of the military junta that ruled until two years ago and a resentment of the former regime’s key patron, China.
Crowned on Oct. 3, Ma Moe Set Wine made her first public appearance just days later at an opening ceremony of the Universities Champions League football competition. What should have been a proud moment turned bitter after photographs of her being greeted at the event by Ko Nay Shwe Thway Aung, the grandson of Myanmar’s former dictator Snr-Gen Than Shwe, became the talk of the town.
Through scorching comments, Myanmar Facebook users showed their anger with Ma Moe Set Wine— who will represent the country at the international Miss Universe contest in Moscow on Nov. 9—for associating with the general’s grandson. Some even urged her to give up the crown.
Ko Nay Shwe Thway Aung, who is the president of the league, quickly came to Ma Moe Set Wine’s defense, denying that they are personally acquainted.
But before she could distance herself from one unpopular association, another suddenly reared its head. Reporting on her victory, Chinese media noted that Ma Moe Set Wine has Chinese ancestry. Then an archive photo was shared showing her wearing a red traditional Chinese dress and it emerged she had finished first runnerup in a “Miss China-Myanmar” contest in 2009.
Social network users jumped to the conclusion that Ma Moe Set Wine, who has also been identified by the Chinese name Yang Xinrong, might not even be a Myanmar national—something that a spokesman for Hello Madam Media group, the organizer of Myanmar’s Miss Universe contest, categorically denied.
“She is not Chinese. She was born in Yangon and holds a Myanmar national identity card,” the spokesman, U Chan Lin Thu, told The Irrawaddy, adding that her parents are from northern Shan State and are of Shan and Burman ethnicity.
Despite the reams of angry comments directed at her, many also took to Ma Moe Set Wine’s Facebook page to offer their support.
“I greatly appreciate your love and support, especially during these difficult times. I am very glad to have you guys,” she wrote in a short message to her Facebook followers.
Meanwhile, an alternative contest has been set up online—under the name “Beauty Pageant Grand Slam”—to elect the “people’s choice” for Myanmar’s Miss Universe 2013. Ma Moe Set Wine is currently ranking 12th out of 82 candidates, behind many other wellknown models, including the popular Ma Nang Khin Zeyar, the winner of Miss Myanmar 2012.
Ma Moe Set Wine has divided opinion and become a focus for historic animosities. And although the pageant organizers appear to be sticking to their controversial choice, she is looking at a tough reign ahead.
in the past two years, after the quasicivilian government came to power and allowed freer expression. But after decades of strict censorship and international isolation, contemporary art still lags behind. The country’s few diploma schools for the arts—all state-run—are conservative, with the National University of Arts and Culture in Yangon offering bachelor’s degrees only in traditional Myanmar arts. “Some teachers want to teach new methods, but the government is afraid,” Aye Ko says. “I need to promote the young generation.”
By SAMANTHA MICHAELS / YANGONIn a sleek white suit, a ponytailed Myanmar man carries a metal cage with a dove inside as he enters a performance space in France. In his other hand, an open umbrella is inscribed on top with words like “peace,” “war” and “power”. He sets both items on the ground and removes a hand-held radio from his pocket to listen, waiting for news, but he hears nothing.
The audience is in for a surprise. The man begins wrapping bandages around his head and pulls out a tube of bright red lipstick, which he uses to paint roughly over the bandages now covering his lips. Then he kisses his onlookers, one by one, before returning to the discarded umbrella, which he burns, and the cage, which he opens to free the bird.
This is Aye Ko, a 50-year-old artist with a reputation in Myanmar for breaking the rules. A renowned performance artist in the long-isolated
Southeast Asian country, he spent years criticizing the military regime through his body-based performances, which took him around the world—from Thailand to Indonesia, the United States and France, where he kissed the unsuspecting onlookers in 2011 as a commentary on his country’s prospects for peace.
But now, the artist from the Ayeyarwady River port city of Pathein is taking a temporary hiatus from performing until 2015, when Myanmar will hold its national elections and he hopes the political situation— which informs his performances—will become more clear. In the meantime, in addition to working on his paintings and installation art, he’s focusing on another task: training a new generation of younger artists who can continue testing the limits after his career is over, in a country where the arts have long been heavily censored and thus largely limited to the traditional.
“Museums here aren’t interested in contemporary art,” says the artist, who learned impressionist and realist painting in the mid1980s and transitioned to performance art after spending time in prison for participating in the 1988 student-led protests. Confined to his cell, he lacked a canvas but realized he could still create art through his body. “It was the best way to express myself,” he says.
In Yangon, a number of galleries have sprung up
To fill the gap, he runs a variety of free art education programs at his New Zero Art Space, near the ParkRoyal Hotel in Yangon. The space, which also serves as a gallery and includes an art library, offers summer art classes for children; a six-month painting course for young adults; and an artist-inresidence program for visiting foreign artists. Last year, a yearlong program covered topics such as documentary art, performance art, installation art, curatorship and gallery management.
Among Aye Ko’s students is 26-year-old Yadanar Win, a Yangon native who has studied at New Zero since 2009. “This is the first place I learned about art,” she says, skimming a fat manual about a major contemporary art event in Singapore. “I liked art when I was younger but we
A renowned Myanmar performance artist helps a younger generation free itself from the strictures of traditional art
didn’t have proper art schools. I went to government schools. I just drew as my hobby.”
In addition to painting, she picked up performance art three years ago. In a show last September, she dressed in white and approached men in the audience, painting their nails with red
polish in a commentary on restrictive gender roles.
Aye Ko says performance art is a rather underground movement in Myanmar, and during the days of the former regime, it was a risky endeavor. Artists who performed did so illegally, and many were imprisoned. Today their work is safer, but still not easy. “As the only artist in my family and my environment, I’m struggling, especially with performance art, to gain acceptance,” says Yadanar Win. “My mom tries to understand, but the others aren’t interested—they think it’s weird.”
Hayy Mann Oo, 24, says her family has been more welcoming of her artistic endeavors. She joined New Zero’s curator training last year with seven other students and has since become a proud gallery manager at the space. “To manage New Zero is to manage the contemporary art scene here,” she says.
Options for art curators are limited in the country, she adds. At the National
Museum in Yangon—the main museum for Myanmar art, history and culture— visitors can view folk art and 10 traditional arts, along with Buddhist statues and impressionist paintings. “It’s really traditional,” she says. “They never allow contemporary artists to exhibit.”
This is part of the reason why New Zero has gained so much respect among local artists. “As a privately run contemporary art school, New Zero is the only place in [Yangon] for young people,” says U Aung Soe Min, co-founder of the popular Pansodan Gallery in Yangon. “New Zero is what we really need here.”
And students who study at the space are paying it forward. Yadanar Win teaches drawing and painting to 5- to 15-year-olds in New Zero’s summer program, and she offers private lessons during the year at children’s homes. “There’s big demand, but I don’t charge much,” she says. “I really just want to share art with people.”
Much is made of the fact that Myanmar is a multiethnic nation, with 135 “national races.” But this cultural diversity barely begins to compare with the rich variety of plant and animal species that also call this country home.
“Dancing with Wings,” a book that describes itself as a “portfolio of birds in Myanmar,” introduces just a small handful of the avian species that live here. According to Avibase, an authoritative online database of birds from around the world, Myanmar has a total of 1,081 bird species, or roughly 10 percent of all known species.
But what it lacks in exhaustiveness, “Dancing with Wings” more than makes up for in the obvious delight that its author, Kyaw Myo Naing, takes in documenting some of Myanmar’s feathered treasures. This is the work of someone who knows the country well, and who wants others to appreciate its often unseen riches.
Most of the birds included here still have healthy populations in Myanmar, although several—the spot-billed pelican, the black-headed ibis, the painted stork and the oriental darter— are listed as near-endangered. Only one, the green peafowl (spotted at the Hlawga National Park, in Yangon’s Mingaladon Township), is considered endangered.
This is comforting, because it means that despite all its other problems, Myanmar is still a place where our fellow creatures can cohabit with us in relative peace. But as Daw Aung San Suu Kyi writes in her foreword, this is not something that can be taken for granted: “We must preserve the health and beauty of our environment … to ensure that our earth is a safe haven for our children and grandchildren and our skies a pure firmament for our birds.”
Kyaw Myo Naing is himself almost as intriguing as his subjects. Wellknown among nature photographers in Myanmar for the quality of his work, he is a dedicated amateur rather than a professional. Prior to his retirement in 2005, he had a very different occupation, as a general in the country’s armed forces.
This past is referred to in a brief biographical note, where it is stated that he joined the military in 1967, at the age of 22. “While serving in the army, he liked hunting and aimed mostly for moving targets,” it adds, rather darkly.
This isn’t what you expect to read in a book about birds, but it is a useful reminder that conflict has been a large part of this country’s experience for far too long. Perhaps as Myanmar moves toward a more peaceful future, the true value of its diversity—human and natural—will become much easier for all to appreciate.
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You wouldn’t know it from its long history of ethnic conflict, but Myanmar is a country that takes real pride in the richness of its cultural tapestry.
One of the blessings of this cultural mix is the many gastronomic opportunities that it gives us. From the remote highlands to the central plains, and from the Andaman Sea to the Bay of Bengal, Myanmar has many distinct cuisines, each one the product of a unique culture.
Sadly, however, volatility in some hill-tribe regions and government restrictions on travel to certain parts of the country make it difficult for gourmets to venture out to those areas to taste local foods.
That’s why visitors and residents alike can be grateful for the Taing Yin Thar Restaurant in Yangon, which offers the many flavors of
multiethnic Myanmar all in one convenient location. Situated at the northern end of Inya Lake, this semi-open-air eatery is Yangon’s answer to those who want to know how the rest of the country eats.
“There’s no other restaurant like it in the whole country,” said U Yamin Aung, one the establishment’s owners. “We simply want the world to know our country’s food diversity.”
Established in 2011, the twostory restaurant’s menu boasts more than 100 items representing the country’s eight major national ethnic races. An English menu divided into seven categories— appetizer, salad, soup, main course, vegetable, side dishes and special menu—is available to help foreign visitors navigate through the restaurant’s unfamiliar culinary terrain.
Most ingredients are sourced from the regions where the different dishes originate, ensuring an authentic dining experience. Flavors vary, from mild-tasting fried sausages from southeastern Myanmar’s Kayah State to moderately spicy grilled fish served up boneless and marinated in pepper and chili in the Shan style. Both go well with khaung yay, a kind of liquor made from fermented rice that’s popular in hilly regions of the country.
For those who aren’t afraid to try the fiery food of Myanmar’s westernmost state, the Rakhine pickle salad is sure to be a real eye opener. Or if you want to take the intensity down a few notches, just order the Chin-style pork-rib soup, served with sweet corn, bean, pumpkin and other vegetables, with green chili added for a sweet and mildly spicy taste.
Besides the food (which is made to order, so freshness is guaranteed), the restaurant has a spacious dining area and attentive staff. Apart from traditional liquor, Western beverages are also available on request. There is also a parking lot.
Taing Yin Thar is conveniently located about half-way between downtown and the airport, so if you want one last chance to savor something slightly less mainstream before you leave the country, it’s well worth the detour.
Until recently, Saw Phoe Zwar, a well-known reggae musician in Yangon, rarely performed at public concerts. But as Myanmar opens up, the 45-year-old ethnic Kayin man has begun to appear at events that aim to promote peace in the strife-torn country. In July of this year, he was invited to attend Myanmar’s firstever peace festival concert at Yangon’s Thuwana National Stadium, where he performed before an audience of thousands. As an advocate for peace, freedom and equality, he believes his music can help further those ends. He recently spoke to The Irrawaddy’s reporters Saw Yan Naing and Lawi Weng about his music and his philosophy.
Can you tell us why you are involved in peacerelated activities?
I believe in peace, freedom and equality. And as an ordinary person, I try to think of what I can do for peace. I used to spurn public appearances in the past and avoided attending big events where other well-known singers performed because I didn’t want to be used. But the Myanmar government is now negotiating with ethnic minority [armed] groups to end decades of civil war, so I feel I also have a part to play for peace.
What I believe is that we can only build peace with real love and kindness. What’s happening in our country now is that we lack love for each other. That’s why we now face nationalism and religious problems. I want to give the message to the people about the reason for the conflicts we are facing now. I plan to hold another free concert with the theme of peace in January 2014 in Yangon.
Why did you choose to become a reggae musician?
I first heard reggae music when I
was 17. A friend of mine gave me a Bob Marley CD. After listening to it, I recognized a kindred spirit in the Jamaican singer and songwriter. I love reggae because, to me, reggae is full of freedom. It has the ideology of equality and oneness. Whether you see a reggae singer in Chiang Mai [Thailand] or in
Paris, or you look at me here in Yangon dressed in reggae style, you will see the same thing. We all believe in oneness and equality. All human beings must be treated equally.
When we talk about reggae, we immediately think of Bob Marley, who was an inspiration to his many fans. So is he also your idol?
Of course, Bob Marley. I like the taste of freedom. His reggae is full of freedom. When I watched the way he sang, I became addicted to reggae. His mood is full of freedom. I was moved by this reggae music. It motivated me. I wanted to listen to it until I died. Now, reggae is my life.
Are you proud to be an ethnic Kayin?
When I was young, I was proud of being an ethnic Kayin. I used to put my nationality first. But one day, I was really ashamed when I looked at myself. I was ashamed of having such a mindset and ideology. I changed myself. It was also because of Bob Marley. He didn’t side with white or black people. He sided with human beings because he was a human being. Our grandparents, parents guided us in the wrong way sometimes. They left us many bad legacies. They said, “Don’t trust Burman people. They are bad people.” This is what our elders used to teach us.
What is your opinion on the current ethnic conflicts in Myanmar?
Hatred, ethnic pride and a lack of love for one another are the leading causes of the religious violence and decadeslong armed conflicts between ethnic groups in Myanmar. It was ethnic pride, which is passed off by some as “patriotism,” and disdain for other ethnicities, that has led to decades of conflict in Myanmar. In one of my Kayin songs, I ask a question: By killing and destroying Burman people, is this how we love our Kayin people? By defeating other nationalities, is that a patriotic mindset?
