NEWS - Junta Still Battles for Hear (r)

[ramyint@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Subject: Re: NEWS - Junta Still Battles for Hearts and Minds

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The junta is in trouble now more than ever and they know it. They can and they
will do what ever they want to do, such as build bridges, widen roads and
clean
up pagodas. These actions will not help because the problem is not, what
they do
or do not do the problem is "them". The people do not like them and the people
do not want them. The sooner they accept this and find a way to get themselves
out of the picture the better off they will be. If they are smart they will do
it soon and re-establish the military as defenders of the people and not its
oppressors.



Rangoon Post Co-Editor wrote:

> Junta Still Battles for Hearts and Minds
>
>                Inter Press Service
>                08-JUL-99
>
>                RANGOON, (Jul. 8) IPS - Burma's military regime, over a
>                period of just a week, announced the completion of a
> handful
>                of bridges, the inauguration of a dam and a hospital, the
>                opening of a highway and the renovation of its most
> famous
>                pagoda.
>
>                In billboards along Rangoon's wide, tree-lined avenues,
> the
>                junta proclaims the stability of the state and national
>                reconsolidation as among its political goals.
>
>                Daily, on the front page of its English newspaper, The
> New
>                Light of Myanmar, the state enumerates its political,
>                economic and social objectives in such clarity so that
> the
>                Burmese people will not forget them.
>
>                The military government, in power for more than 10 years
>                after crushing a popular uprising in 1988, is still
> working to
>                win the hearts and minds of its people.
>
>                "Oppose those relying on external elements, acting as
>                stooges, holding negative views," screams one slogan in
> one

>                of the inside pages of the newspaper.
>
>                "Crush all internal and external destructive elements as
> the
>                common enemy," and "Oppose foreign nations interfering in
>                internal affairs of the state," say two other slogans.
>
>                The junta, known as the State Peace and Development
>                Council (SPDC), urges the Burmese people to cooperate
>                with the government and the "tatmadaw" or the military.
> At
>                the same time, it exhorts them to oppose the "evil"
> designs of
>                foreign countries, the United States in particular.
>
>                In a half-page article in one of the newspaper's Sunday
>                editions last month, an author slammed opposition leader
>                Aung San Suu Kyi as a puppet of the United States and
>                Britain, which "are pushing the world into chaos".
>
>                The Burmese regime was given a semblance of legitimacy
>                when the Association of South-east Asian Nations (ASEAN)
>                admitted it as member in 1997 despite some reservations
>
> by
>                some members and strong opposition from Western
>                governments and human rights groups and activists in
> Asia.
>
>                But ASEAN's approach of non-interference and policy of
>                "constructive engagement" has failed to nudge the junta
> into
>                improving the human rights situation and allowing greater
>                freedom for its people.
>
>                The government has remained adamant in refusing to open
>                a dialogue with the opposition led by Suu Kyi to settle
> the
>                political stalemate in Burma.
>
>                Observers say the junta has in fact become more
> repressive,
>                harassing, arresting and jailing opposition leaders and
>                supporters.
>
>                Still a pariah state as far as the international
> community is
>                concerned, Burma's SPDC has focused its efforts
>                elsewhere.
>
>                It has gone instead on a construction binge, inviting
> foreign
>                investors to put up hotels, build roads and bridges and
> has
>                even spent a fortune to refurbish the Shwedagon pagoda,
> its
>                most famous tourist attraction in the heart of the
> capital.
>
>                Writing for the Thailand-based Irrawaddy magazine,
>                Burmese journalist Aung Zaw said the junta has launched
> an
>                intensive restoration of ancient pagodas and temples
> across
>                Burma.
>
>                "The generals pay daily visits to sacred shrines. But
> what is
>                the reason behind all this? Do the generals really
> believe
>                they can atone for their past in this way or are they
> simply
>                trying to whitewash their sins?" he asked.
>
>                Visitors to Rangoon find that most of the new hotels are
>                empty and tourists are few and far between.

>
>                Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace laureate who is Burma's symbol
> of
>                the struggle for democracy, belittles these signs of
>                "progress."
>
>                "They say there are more roads but of what use is that
> when
>                there are more people who are poorer?" she asked.
>
>                "Yes, there are more hotels, but they are empty. Yes,
> there
>                are more cars and more people who are living in bigger
> and
>                better houses but these are people who are connected to
>                this regime," she told a group of visiting women
> journalists
>                and activists from ASEAN countries in June.
>
>                "The general public has not benefited from the advent of
> all
>                these," she said, citing the fact that ordinary people
> still have
>                to fight their way into overcrowded buses, while the poor
>                have become poorer.
>
>                She added that a lot of the infrastructure projects the
> military
>                has been bragging about were in fact built with forced
> labor.
>
>                Like other Asian countries, Burma reeled from the
> economic
>                crisis in the region. Inflation shot up and growth slowed
>                down. As expected, it was the poor and the middle-class
>
> who
>                were hardest hit.
>
>                "Previously, the middle-class could afford two kinds of
> curry
>                with their rice," said one elderly woman from the
> opposition
>                National League for Democracy. "But now, it's a battle
> even
>                just to have one curry."
>
>                Sending children to school has also become an expensive
>                affair, she added.
>
>                "Bridges, apartment houses and even showy roads are not
>                essential to true development and certainly not traffic
> jams,"
>                said Suu Kyi. "What is essential is there should be
> better
>                standards of living which means better education and
> better
>                nutrition and better health care."
>
>                "In fact we are less nourished, less educated and less
>                healthy than we used to be. In fact we can say there has
>                been a recession, that we have in fact gone backwards and
>                not forward in development," she said.



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