Asia Times: Southeast Asia


	May 8, 2002	atimes.com

Southeast Asia

Myanmar: Now for the hard part
By Marwaan Macan-Markar
and Johanna Son

BANGKOK - Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's release on Monday from 19 months of house arrest breaks the political deadlock between her and Myanmar's military junta, but its real impact in prodding the country down the road to democracy remains will not be known for some time.

In short, the release of the Nobel laureate, whose party won the 1990 national polls, does not necessarily mean the generals are now turning to a democratic path. In her first public statement after her release, she said, "My release should not be looked at as a major breakthrough for democracy. For all people in Burma [Myanmar] to enjoy basic freedom - that would be the major breakthrough."

But, activists on Myanmar issues and academics and exiles interviewed by IPS say that it is certainly a confidence-building measure that can at least help create a more conducive environment in which real dialogue could take place. "Not everything is okay, but for sure this is a new chapter. I don't know how to describe what we feel," said one exiled journalist, one of thousands of Myanmese living in exile in Thailand.

"There are no restrictions to my movement, I can go anywhere I want," Suu Kyi said, mobbed by throngs of people as she emerged from her lakeside home in the capital Yangon.

The State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), as the government is known, indicated that she could resume her activities as the head of her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD) that the junta refused to turn over power to despite its victory after the 1990 poll. "We shall recommit ourselves to allowing all of our citizens to participate freely in the life of our political process, while giving priority to national unity, peace and stability of the country as well as the region," read the statement made public through government spokesman Colonel Hla Mi.

But despite Monday's heady events - one that many Myanmese oppositionists have been waiting for - there are worries about what lies ahead. Suu Kyi's release addresses the thorny issue of her freedom, but many are wondering about the bigger question of whether Yangon is ready to talk about democratic change.

"At the very least it's a public acknowledgement of her importance in the process, that she is indeed a political figure," Tin Maung Maung Than, a Myanmese researcher at the Singapore-based Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS), said in an interview on the sidelines of a conference on ethnic conflicts in Bangkok. Indeed, this is a far cry from the past, when military rulers refused to even acknowledge Suu Kyi and used to refer to her as the wife of her British professor-husband, whom they refused permission to visit her just before he died of cancer.

"It's a success in confidence-building - it creates a more democratic setting that acknowledges that people who disagree with the government do not need to be put in prison," Than added. "But one must not have unrealistic expectations."

"Her release is good news, but we have to wait and see what this translates to," said Debbie Stothard of the Bangkok-based Alternative ASEAN Network on Burma (ALTSEAN). "The international community has made it clear that Suu Kyi's release must be without conditions, and then there has to be more progress on the talks for political reform and the political prisoners freed," said Stothard, who added that the SPDC is worried that her freedom may "trigger the public to come out in large numbers to support her".

This is not the first time that the military rulers have freed Suu Kyi from house arrest. Her first confinement was from 1988 to 1995, but virtually no reforms followed her release from that. The SPDC placed her under house arrest a second time in September 2000 after she defied the junta's ban on her leaving Yangon. Many Myanmese exiles were keeping watch on what conditions are attached to Suu Kyi's release. She says that there are none and that could mean anything from there being no discussions apart from that about her own freedom, to discussions under way but being kept secret. For instance, there is the question of the relationship between Suu Kyi's release and what gains have been made in the talks ongoing between her and Yangon, in progress since October 2000 through the efforts of UN special envoy Razali Ismail.

On Monday, Suu Kyi declined to give details about the talks, or their direction from now on. But she said that the phase of confidence-building was over and "we look forward to moving ahead".

"In many ways," conceded another exiled Myanmese, "her release does not really solve anything." Although it sets the stage for both sides to continue to talk, the road ahead will not be easy, smooth or clear, activists say. For instance, there are several issues apart from democracy - such as the complex matter of Myanmar's ethnic unrest and resistance against the state - that goes beyond the issue of any dialogue between the NLD and Yangon.

Some dissidents have long felt ethnic organizations have been left out of the opposition movement in Myanmar and are now looking to see how Suu Kyi will navigate this issue, especially since she has not fully said how she proposes to deal with it. Suu Kyi once said that the time to tackle the ethnic issue is later, because the first task of the day was to get democratic political rule back in Myanmar. "Very few people in the opposition have really considered it," Than noted, but he added that Suu Kyi's secret dialogue with the junta had to make room for the ethnic groups' restiveness that experts have traced to past state policies.

"The first problem is the military and the lack of democracy," the exiled Myanmese journalist said. "The second is how to respond to the ethnic groups' aspirations." He said that ethnic groups knew that Suu Kyi would listen to them more than the SPDC. "All in all, the problem of ethnic relations confronting the ruling elite, the democratic opposition led by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the ethnic groups must be resolved before meaningful and lasting democracy can be installed in Myanmar," Than explained.

Myanmar has been ruled by the military for 40 years, following a coup in 1962. During this period the country has gained notoriety for its appalling human rights record.

The SPDC had shown little inclination toward letting the NLD commence its rightful role, said ALTSEAN's Stothard. "The military is not going to make easy concessions and to give up its grip on power easily."

Kyaw Yin Hlaing, also of ISEAS, says that perhaps time had allowed both the junta and Suu Kyi to find a way to genuinely talk in a way different from the hard-line positions that yield little results. Some say that Suu Kyi has "become more and more diplomatic and strategic, so maybe she will go for evolutionary change rather than an abrupt one", he said.

Others venture to guess that the military leaders were perhaps "looking into the future and looking for a graceful way to exit" rather than holding on to power indefinitely, Kyaw Yin Hlaing added. "We just have to be patient."

(Inter Press Service)