Extortion and corruption over football match in Ye township

August 19, 2009

HURFOM: On July first week, members of the Township Peace and Development Council (TPDC) and United Solidarity Development Association (USDA) began collecting money by force from Ye residents to hold a football match in Ye township, Mon State.

According to Ye residents, every household in Ye town was been forced to give 500 to 1,000 kyat by members of the TPDC and USDA. Ye town has 16 wards and about 7,000 house holds. Most villagers did not want to give money to the organizations. However for households that refused, pressure was applied by the group, with USDA members coming to visit those homes two or three- time a day until the household made the donation.

The USDA is a civilian organization controlled by the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC). Created in 1993 to carry out civilian and social welfare projects, the group is more readily known, according to many human rights watchdog groups, for its involvement in political intimidation and violence.

Residents were warned that if they declined to donate the demanded amount of money, they would have to explain their choice to the village headman.

“I really didn’t want to give them money but I don’t want to have problems with them so I gave them 500 kyat,” said 30 year-old Ye resident. “But some daily workers face a big problem because they live hand to mouth – 500 kyat is not much, but for them it’s a large amount of money since they can only earn 3,000 [kyat] a day.”

A resident close to a member of the USDA, told HURFOM that around 50,000,000 kyat was collected from residents. Over a week teams composed of villagers from the area competed for prizes of money taken by the TPDC and USDA. The awards for the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place teams was 300,000 kyat,200,000 kyat and 100,000 kyat. According to the source, only half that money was used in preparation and awards for the football match – the rest has disappeared.

“In my point of view the USDA and TPDC only wanted to make more money for themselves,” said a 25 year-old Ye resident who was involved with one of the football teams. “It’s a case of, ‘showing the monkey to ask for money’. They just held a match to collect money for their income.”

Written by HURFOM · Filed Under News