Villagers are spread thin after meeting uncompensated labor demands

May 15, 2009

HURFOM:Villagers are being forced to work for their headman and local battalions without pay, and face a monthly tax of 1,000 kyat. This disturbance poses a significant problem to villagers who make a living working in the fields.

Since April villages throughout Alaesakhan, Kyaukadin Kyauktalin Kaleinaung Sub-township, Yebyu Township, Tenasserim Division have been forced to provide daily workers, for both the town headman and soldiers from Light Infantry Battalions (LIB). No. 282 and No. 273.

Operating on a daily rotation, a villager is expected to arrive at the headman’s house at 6am, and to remain there until 6am the next day when another villager arrives. The villager carries out daily chores for the headman, from collecting firewood, to carrying water from the well to the house, to posting letters to other villages, to buying liquor, and acting as a sentry outside headman’s house. No payment or compensation is offered, and villagers are expected to cover their own costs, like meals.

According to a villager from Kyauktalin, this is the time when villagers must go and work on their farms to improve the land for coming rice crop. If a villager from the rotation does not show up to work at the headman’s house, they either must find a replacement amongst the other villagers, or pay a fine of 4,000 for the missed duty. The Battalion appoints the headmen of every village.

“We are now like their slaves – we have to do everything they want, and sometimes we are kicked and punched if the headman is disappointed in us” said a 35 year old villager from Kyauktalin.

Additionally, the headmen come and collect 1,000 Kyat every month from every household. When the headmen collect the money from villagers, they explains that all money they collect will be spent on the local high ranking commanders of LIB No. 282 and No. 273 if they come to visit the village, Accordion to a Kyaukadin villager.

Based on their needs, soldiers from both LIB No. 282 & No. 273 go to the village headmen to collect villagers to work as porters or perform manual labor. On these occasions villagers will sometimes be required to work as porters for over a week.

“At this point I just want to leave home and move away, because I have no time to farm or do any other work that will provide an income,” said a 35 year old Kyaukatlin villager, “I’m only working for the headman and the battalions. Now I have no food for my family, and yet still have to pay this tax every month. I am going crazy!”

Soldiers will also order villagers not to leave or work outside the village for a month citing concerns over a Mon rebel group, known as Chen Dein, operating out in the area. For many of the villagers who farm, such an order is catastrophic as their farms lie outside the village limits, and in the surrounding hillside. The villages’ fall in what is described as a ‘black area’ by the military, meaning it is not yet fully secured, and that there continues to be rebel group activity in the area. As a result villagers are expected to pay an additional yearly tax of support, one to the Chen Dein group and one to LIB’s No. 282 and No. 273 Battalions.

Written by HURFOM · Filed Under News