Tag: Myanmar

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Photography Politics & government Society Travels

[2720] Aung San Suu Kyi and cultish reverence

As a libertarian, I have a strong dislike for the cultish reverence towards a person, where one puts a picture of a political leader everywhere almost to the point of worshiping them. It is not the excessive putting of portraits really. It is the attitude of revering too much. It is the worldview that that person is a god’s representative on this earth (even that, on its own, is against everything that I believe in).

That happens in Malaysia in government buildings and sometimes elsewhere too. Recently, the Malaysian education ministry sent out circulars to display portraits of Malaysian government leaders (read Barisan Nasional leaders) in classroom to encourage patriotism. We all know what that means. Starting them young is the best way to manufacture obedient robots. And it is not limited to Barisan Nasional either. And the picture of the Agong is another thing although the practice of rotating the seat every five years among so many of Malaysian sultans, rajas and a Yamtuan Besar does make it less ominous.

Thailand has too many pictures of their king. When I was in Bangkok, I was told I was not supposed to put banknotes in my wallet, because I would sit on my wallet. I do not if that was a make-believe but that is to me, cultish. I have never been to North Korea but through my readings, I would think the North Korean government would like their citizens to worship Kim Jong-un. To some extent, I do have trouble with teenagers worshiping some popstars but let us not get there.

One person that keeps popping in my travels in Burma was Aung San Suu Kyi. I completely understand why she stands out. In a country where the military rules without democratic legitimacy, she is the symbol of opposition to that dictatorship.

When I was buying a book in the streets of Rangoon, the shopkeeper pointed his finger to the wall  and said, “That’s Aung San Suu Kyi, our leader. Do you know her?”

At that point I really had no problem with her popularity. After all, she has done so much and for that, she deserves the respect.

So, things get a little bit disturbing for me when I spotted this calendar somewhere 20-30 minutes south of Mandalay:

Aung San Suu Kyi as a calendar model

The calendar, is somewhere to me, a sign of, in my own neologism, cultish reverence.

I have that skepticism because I always fear power and in a democratic society, popularity and power come in the same sentence. A person with so much power, especially in a illiberal democracy where the liberal safeguards are weak or simply does not exist, that popularity means the popular leader can do no wrong to the eyes of the majority. That means tyranny of the majority.

But this is Burma under military dictatorship and she has only limited power within the limited and guided democracy that the country has. Maybe I should cut her some slack.

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Photography Travels

[2719] Bogyoke Market, Rangoon

This is right in the middle of Rangoon. The market is formerly called Scott’s Market but like all good post-colonial governments, they renamed it to get rid of the colonial legacy. Bogyoke Aung San, the person which the market is named after, was responsible for the independence of Burma. He was also the father of Aung San Suu Kyi

Bogyoke Market

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Photography Society Travels

[2718] The train to Mandalay

I spent about 3 weeks in Burma recently, traveling roughly 2,000 km in Burma by trains, buses, cars, trucks and bikes. I began in Rangoon, went up north to Mandalay, west to Bagan, east to Inle and then back to Rangoon for the new year’s eve celebration. I love Burma. The people there are nice. You can just feel it all around you.

There are so many things to write, but I will just leave this picture here for now. It was somewhere north of Rangoon and far south from Naypyidaw, Burma’s own Putrajaya. It was about 2 or 3 hours into the journey to Mandalay.

Or maybe, I should share this as well: Burma does not appear to be a poor country. Neither does it appear to be a country under economic sanction or under military dictatorship. There is poverty and I saw it in many places, but it does appear Burma is farther along the development curve than, say, Cambodia. I had expected Burma to be as poor as Cambodia but I was wrong. To me, Rangoon specifically, felt modern. There were many new cars on the roads and the streets were paved and smooth. Not as modern as Kuala Lumpur but Rangoon is not a capital of a too poor a country. Upon landing in Rangoon and leaving the airport behind, those facts immediately struck me. My expectation of Rangoon was quite simply off-target.

Maybe what I saw was only the superficial stuff. After all, a foreigner, maybe, would be impressed with Malaysia but if you peeled the onion layers one by one, something would not feel right. The same with Burma I’d suppose. One has to live there, and more importantly, study the Burmese society to know its nuance. And as a foreigner, I may have had certain freedom that the locals may not have.

But maybe, all the modern looks are the liberalization dividend. Several years ago, I was told, things were very different. And there was definitely fewer tourists.

And Aung San Suu Kyi is popular there. No doubt about that. I bought a book from one of the sidewalks in Rangoon and the shopkeeper pointed his finger to a picture of Aung San Suu Kyi on the wall of his makeshift store. He said, “that is our leader.”

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ASEAN Liberty

[2056] Of not much of an incentive

Trivia: How does Southeast Asia treat its first and only winner of the Nobel Prize?

Answer: The home country throws her into prison (okay, it was commuted to home arrest…) and others in the region do nothing.

BANGKOK — Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese pro-democracy leader, was sentenced Tuesday to three years of hard labor for violating the terms of her house arrest, but her sentence was quickly commuted to a new term of house arrest of up to 18 months. [Pro-Democracy Leader in Myanmar Is Convicted. Seth Mydans. New York Times. August 11 2009]

Not much of an incentive to win a Nobel Prize, eh?

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ASEAN Conflict & disaster Economics

[1669] Of no cash aid for Myanmar

Money may not be the only thing in this world but it does make a lot of people happy, including the junta of Myanmar. But keeping the junta happy is not what I have in mind when I want to help the people of Myanmar.

We may have forgotten that Cyclone Nargis took tens of thousand of lives in the Irrawaddy Delta just weeks ago. With the season finale of American Idol, Akademi Fantasi and the loss of sovereignty over a rock or two to Singapore a few days ago, who can blame us? There are far more important things going on with our lives than anything that happens in the delta.

But if we actually cared a little about the victims of Nargis, we would remember that the junta placed restrictions on foreign aid. The junta even refused aid from relief groups, stating that they preferred government-to-government transactions.

The junta of Myanmar must be the luckiest government in the world because it can afford to become a chooser in a time when it really should be a beggar. Unbelievably, it took some coaxing by governments of other countries before the junta actually relented. Even then, aid workers were barred from entering the country. To think that other governments cared more about a person than the person’s government really reflects badly on a government.

Aid eventually crept in but as the blankets, medicine, food and cash got into Myanmar, there were reports that the junta repackaged the aid as if it were provided by the junta. But I suppose, if the aid gets to the victims, it does not matter. Black cat, white cat: whichever catches the mouse is a good cat.[1]

There were also reports that some of the aid was redirected away from the victims of the cyclone.[2] The French had foreseen this by initially offering a small amount of aid and said they did not believe the junta had the trustworthiness to manage the aid. I share the skepticism of the French government.

In many cases, money transfer is a superior method of giving aid when compared to transfer in kind. Money transfer has the potential of improving the receivers’ welfare much more than what material goods can ever do. This is especially so when the receivers know exactly what they need while donors are unfamiliar with the local environment.

Money, after all, is the most generally accepted medium of exchange. It is usually harder for a person to barter blanket for food because the double coincidence of wants has to occur first before that transaction can take place. This is true for many situations, including the one involving fuel subsidy in Malaysia. Money transferred to those the authority wishes to help is a better policy in enhancing welfare than material transfer.

Money or cash transfer, however, does suffer from a problem called moral hazard. In the case of Myanmar, the donors may want to help cyclone victims buy food, blanket and rebuild their livelihood. But with little ability to oversee how it is actually spent, the victims may use the money to buy cigarettes or something less useful in improving their welfare.

Money transfer may also not be as useful in Myanmar as in other places in peaceful times. Disasters, especially the major ones, tend to push prices up as distribution channels suffer damage, causing supply problems. Add to the increased demand, prices will rocket, hence reducing its purchasing power.

Prices shot up in Florida in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and it surely is happening in the Irrawaddy. Some people derisively called it scalping but I call it economics. Regardless, donation in kind overcomes the problem of weaker purchasing power that any money donation under that scenario suffers.

Thirdly, just as how the French had expressed their skepticism, the junta cannot be trusted with money.

Now, there are caring Malaysian organizations out there that seek to alleviate the suffering of those in Myanmar by sending money over directly. Noble but their actions could prove unhelpful.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

[1] — YANGON, Burma — Burma’s military regime distributed international aid Saturday but plastered the boxes with the names of top generals in an apparent effort to turn the relief effort for last week’s devastating cyclone into a propaganda exercise. [Burma Junta Turns International Aid Into Form of Propaganda. Associated Press via FoxNews. May 11 2008]

[2] — The British ambassador to the United Nations, John Sawers, said Britain had also received unconfirmed reports that aid was being redirected away from disaster victims. [Myanmar Government Still Blocking Relief. New York Times. May 14 2008]

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

p/s — a version of this article was first published at The Malaysian Insider.