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Military rule, not sanctions, cause of hardship: Survey
Irrawaddy - February 15, 2011
Rangoon – Many Rangoon residents who spoke to The Irrawaddy as part of a recent survey said that Burma's military regime has used the debate over economic sanctions to disunite opposition groups, while most said that the junta's misrule was responsible for the country's economic troubles.
The survey showed that the disagreement between Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) and other political parties over economic sanctions has grown and that people are disappointed with the regime's attacks via state-controlled newspapers on Suu Kyi and her party regarding this issue.
The Irrawaddy interviewed 100 people from different walks of life, including 10 low-income laborers, 20 university students, 12 company employees, 10 reporters, two retired government servants, one economist, five politicians not affiliated with any political party, two retired army personnel and a senior government official, about whether the current economic sanctions imposed on Burma should be lifted. Most of the interviewees said that getting rid of the existing administrative structure dominated by former generals was more important than lifting sanctions.
"Before the election, opposition groups were split into two factions. One faction wanted to contest the election but the other didn't. Now they are split into two factions again over the sanctions issue. We can say that the junta's divide-and-rule policy has been successful," said one senior journalist, who added: "I don't think it is important now to debate whether to keep sanctions or lift them. It is time to topple the dictatorial system and get rid of a sham democracy."
The economist who participated in The Irrawaddy survey said that while it is generally true that economic sanctions can hinder foreign investment, in Burma this is not the case. Other issues, such as the absence of rule of law, rampant cronyism and the lack of guarantees for foreign investments, are the main reasons that most foreign investors do not want to enter the country, he said.
"Economic sanctions are not the only thing blocking foreign investment. The existence of the rule of law and guarantees for those investments are important. No matter what sanctions are imposed on a country, foreign investors will still come as long as that country is stable, peaceful and has conditions conducive to doing business. From an economic point of view, it is more important to create such conditions than to remove sanctions," said the economist.
Not everyone agrees with this point of view, however. In a joint statement issued on Feb. 12, Burma's Union Day, 11 of the country's political parties said that US economic sanctions on Burma were having a negative impact on both countries. According to the statement, the United States is losing US $15-19 billion annually because of the sanctions, including more than $1 billion in wages for its workers. The statement also claimed that Burma loses billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of job opportunities because of the sanctions.
The political parties that are calling for economic sanctions on Burma to be dropped include the National Democratic Front, the Democratic Party (Myanmar), the Union Democratic Party, the Union Kayin League, the Chin National Party, the Peace and Democracy Party, the Shan Nationalities Democratic Party, the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party, the Wonthanu NLD (Union of Myanmar), the Union of Myanmar Federation of National Politics and the Phalon Sawaw Democratic Party.
One respondent to The Irrawaddy's survey – a deputy director from the regime's Ministry of Commerce (MOC) – concurred that US and EU sanctions are having a significant impact on the country's economy, at least from the standpoint of government planning.
"Economic sanctions have really affected the country's economy. Whenever we discuss ways to improve the economy, we have to take sanctions into consideration. We have to think of ways to get our exports to Western markets by hiding the name of our country. We have to find ways to bypass barriers to our exports," said the MOC deputy director.
However, an independent candidate in last year's November election denied that economic sanctions were seriously affecting the lives of ordinary citizens.
He noted that when companies like Eddie Bauer and Pepsi left the country some years ago as a result of the sanctions, products made in Burma or Thailand soon replaced them. He said that the regime is also not seriously concerned about sanctions because it has income from selling the country's natural resources and economic cooperation with China and India.
For the regime, he said, the sanctions issue was just something to be used to attack opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
But one former major currently working as the manager of government-owned sugar factory said that members of the military are far from indifferent to the issue of Burma's persistent economic weakness, which he said was largely responsible for widespread corruption.
"Let's put the issue of economic sanctions aside. If you look at how officers in active service live, you'll find that most will do anything for their survival and their children's health and education. To be perfectly frank, they have to steal. Family comes first and they can't think of other things. And they are not alone – all the top-ranking officers are doing the same thing."
Most of the students from Rangoon's Dagon University who spoke with The Irrawaddy took the view that this corrupt, military-dominated system is itself the chief cause of the many hardships that ordinary Burmese faced in their day-to-day lives. They said that people needed to unite to change the current system, instead of arguing over the issue of sanctions.
"I don't think it was economic sanctions that made the country's education and health sectors so poor. Where does the regime spend the money it earns from selling natural gas and other resources? Who are the wealthiest people even when the country is under sanctions? Everything is caused because of this military system, so we have to fight against it," said one third-year student.
Most of those who barely subsist on their daily wages said they don't really understand the issue of economic sanctions and are only interested in earning enough money to support their families. One 30-year-old reporter from a Rangoon-based journal said that the Burmese regime is just using the sanctions issue as an excuse for its failure to improve the lives of ordinary Burmese.
"This regime doesn't care about economic sanctions at all. They are satisfied with the way things are right now. They are happy as long as they are in power and their families enjoy comfortable lives. They even killed monks to cling on power. Blaming the country's economic situation on sanctions is just an excuse," said the reporter.
In a statement issued on Feb. 8, Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) rejected the argument that sanctions have adversely affected the lives of ordinary citizens. It noted that the regime has never paid serious attention to the health and education needs of the country's people, despite earning billions of dollars from selling natural gas and other resources.
It is this neglect, and not the policies of Western governments towards Burma, that put the country at the bottom of the United Nations Development Program's 2011 human development index, below Cambodia and Laos.
On Feb. 13, Burma's state-run newspapers ran an article titled "Sanctions, Suu Kyi and the NLD," which criticized Suu Kyi and her party for continuing to call for sanctions.
Since 1993, the US, the EU and other Western countries have imposed economic sanctions on Burma for the regime's widespread human rights violations, including rape and the use of child soldiers.
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