Broken Communities: Just what the junta wants

September 25, 2008

I was born in Mon State, but recently traveled to Rangoon. I went to get a passport, but the moment I walked into the immigration office, I became afraid I would not succeed. Hundreds of people were crowded around – so many people it seemed as if a wealthy person was making a rice donation to the people.

The office is small and so crowded I felt as if I could not breath. A government official said that three hundred people apply for a passport every day; every person I talked to said they were trying to leave Burma.

That I met many people trying to leave the country did not really surprise me. In Mon communities, it seems like there are only children and grandparents. Every one else is gone, working in Thailand. I see children playing games, pretending they are journeying to Thailand and saving money to make their families rich.

Many people in Mon State are poor. At the same time, people who are wealthy have more money than rich people in times past. Money made in Thailand dwarfs money made in Burma, and people rely on what is sent to them from abroad.

Even though some people are making more money, the community overall is more poor, and especially poorly educated. Fewer people get an education – why should they? Even with a university degree, it is difficult to find work. People put everything they have in getting a degree, and than they struggle just as much as everyone else. Or they leave. So families stop investing in education for their children.

The regime is powerful. It has a large army and plenty of money from selling Burma’s natural resources. But it is more powerful because it divides the people. For decades, it was powerful because it fought many small groups – ethnic groups, mainstream pro-democracy groups fighting by themselves, communists, mostly fought by themselves, and sometimes fought each other.

Now, the people are even more divided and communities are broken. People are poor, people are rich, but people don’t bother to help each other. They care only about making money. This is what the junta wants – a populace that does not work together, and watches as its best and brightest are forced to leave – and as long as the SPDC has what it wants, things will never change for the better.

Written by HURFOM · Filed Under Feature