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Rhododendron News: Chin Human Right



Subject: Rhododendron News: Chin Human Rights Organization

              
                   ==========================             
                   RHODODENDRON NEWS BULLETIN
                   ==========================
                 CHIN HUMAN RIGHTS ORGANIZATION
           50 Bell Street, N #2, Ottawa, ON K1R 7C7,Canada            
          Ph/FX : 613 234 2485.Email : chokhlei@xxxxxxxxxx          
          _________________________________________________    
          Volume II No.3                         March 1999
          _________________________________________________
                              
           LAND CONFISCATION USING RACIAL DISCRIMINATION
           =============================================          
  
(The  following interview  is conducted  on Jan.9.1999  in New Delhi,
India)

        
        
        
            Name                    :   Thangkhanpau ( name changed )
            Age                     :   48
            Sex                     :   Male
            Nationality             :   Chin
            Religion                :   Christian
            Marital Status          :   Married with 8 children aged  
                                        between 23 and 6
            Occupation              :   Farmer
            Political affiliation   :   NLD organiser for Pyin GoneGyi 
                                        Village Tract, Kaleymyo 
                                        township 
                                                                 
I  am a farmer.   I used to have  some land in  Pyin Gone Gyi village
[near Kaleymyo],  but I sold it in 1994,  because it was too far from
our  house,  about 8 miles,  and also because all my children were at
school, so they could not help in the farm work.

Then in December 1996,  I left Pyin Gone Gyi because I no longer felt
safe  as an NLD organiser. I moved to Aung Chan Tha, a remote village
along  the road between Kalewa and Monywa.  Aung Chan Tha is a Burman
village  in Kalewa township  [Kalewa township is  mostly Burman].  It
has  about 160 houses,   and is located  in a malaria-infested jungle
about  24 miles from Kalewa.  Back in 1995,  my eldest son had stayed
with  the headman in that village,  and  found some land to clear for
cultivation.   I paid 50,000 Kyats for over 20 acres.  This was quite
cheap.  Of course, the area had no irrigation system, and the harvest
would  depend on the  rains.  I moved  in Aung Chan  Tha with 8 other
Chin  families.  We created a new ward in the village and cleared the

land.

Q. To whom did you pay that money?    
A.  To the villagers who owned that land.  In Burma the land belonged
to  the government,  but  people can registered it  and used it.  The
previous  owners had registered that land,   and it was recognised by
the  village  head,   who is  the  Village Tract  PDC  Chairman.  The
transaction  was signed  in front of  the headman  [a perfectly legal
transaction].

However,   we could only get one harvest of paddy.  On 2.8.1997,  the
SLORC  Township Secretary, Major Khin Maung Than, came to the village
for  the school opening ceremony. Without inspection, he called the 9
Chin  families,  including mine.   Immigration and Forestry officials
came  along with him.  He requested us to sit in one line in front of
him.  He took photographs of us,  and ordered: "You, Chin people, you
must go back to your native land in the Chin Hills!  This is not your
land!" He ordered us to leave by the end of December 1997.  I pleaded
him:   "We have already planted our paddy.  Please let us harvest it,
and  allow us  to stay until  the month  of March!" In  the end,  the
Major  forced us to sign a document  that we agreed to leave the land
before  the end of February 1998.  The Major then returned to Kalewa,
and  never reappeared  after that.   We went  to Kaleymyo  and left a
letter  of complaints to  the District PDC  [Kalewa Township is under
Kaleymyo District].

We  broke the agreement,  and in April 1998,  we were still using our
land.  Then,  during the first week of May,  the head of the Forestry
Department from Kalewa Township,  U Tun Than Oo,  came to order us to
vacate  the land and  leave the village  immediately.  He ordered the
village  head to call 'volunteer labourers' [forced labour] from each
family,   and plant  teak seedlings on  our land.  Even  in our house
compound.   They didn't  order us  to demolish  our house,   but they
ordered  the villagers to destroy our vegetable garden and plant teak
saplings  in it. Even to put saplings under our house! My sugar canes
besides  my house were cut down,  and left lying there.  We were even
ordered  to  participate in  this  labour on  our  own land,   but we
refused.  They never took action for that.  The other villagers had a
lot of pity on us.

Q. Did the order come from the Forest Department?
A.  Yes,  but Tun Than Oo was given all authority by Major Khin Maung
Than, the Secretary of the Kalewa Township PDC.

Q. What happened after they confiscated your land?
A.   We had no money to move back  to Pyin Gone Gyi.  One family left
for  the Chin hills,  and we finally  managed to go back to Pyin Gone
Gyi  in September 1998.   At that time,   the political situation was
very  tense in Kaleymyo, and many NLD members were arrested. My party
advised  me not  to go back  to Pyin  Gone Gyi village  with my large
family and no money,  but rather leave the country.  I borrowed money
for  the transportation  costs and  I arrived  in Mizoram  in October
1998 with my whole family.

Q.   You said Aung Chan Tha is a Burman village.  Was there any local
tension when the 9 Chin families moved there?

A.   Not  at  all.  We  had  absolutely  no problem  with  the Burman
villagers.   My son was even  chosen as a Village  PDC Chairman for a
while.   Our 9 Chin families being all Christian decided to build one
church  in our ward. The Burman  villagers, all Buddhist, even helped
us  to build our Church  and lend us their  bullock cart to carry the
building  material.  At the  church opening ceremony,   a pastor from
Kalewa  was invited,  and all the Burman villagers came.  We shared a
meal  together.  We never had any problems with the Burman villagers.
It  was  all  created by  the  SPDC  authorities.  Tun  Than  Oo also
complained  about the  Church because  it was  not registered  at the
Ministry, but our headman had recognised it. 


                INTERVIEW  WITH  A  COLLEGE  STUDENT  
                =====================================
                    (Source:  Chin Student Union) 

It was since during the Ne win's regimethat  Burma  had claimed  
total primary  literacy  in its  45 million
population.  However,  its subsequent enlistment in the world's least
developed counry had proved totally different.  Again in the areas of
SLORC/SPDC  which succeeded the Ne Win's regime,  it had claimed that
Burma  has been  improved and  developed in  its every  espects,  the
education  system and prevailing closure of colleges and universities
proved  the same to what was  decades ago.  During the ten-years rule
of  SPDC,  formerly SLORC,  schools and colleges have been kept close
most  of the time  in fear of  unrests.  In 1996  it was again closed
after  a massive crack  down on students  demonstrators demanding the
right  to reformation of Students Union and the end to military rule,
which  was known to be the largest students uprising next to the 1998
pro-democracy  movement brutally  suppressed by the  same rulers.  

In  August 1998,   after two years  of continuous  closing,  the SPDC
reopened  the schools  and forced the  students to  sit exams without
learnings.    Shortly  afterwards,   demonstrations  broke  out  from
engineering  students  amidsts  government's  precaution.   The  best
solution for the junta was exactly that of the 1998 and 96. Crackdown
and  arrest.   College students  have to  take  their exams  at their
nearest high schools. 

The  following interview  was conducted by  Chin Student  Union on 29
October,   1998 at  the Indo-Burma  border with  a Chin  student who 
had  sit  the   recent  exams  in  Kalaymyo.





            Name        :   Salai Thangliana(name changed)
            Age         :   23 yrs.
            Address     :   Kalaymyo, Sagaing Division
            Education   :   2nd yr (Geog)
            Nationality :   Chin
            Religion    :   Christian


Q. when did the college reopen and when did you take your exam after 
it was annouced?
A.   We  were  informed  one  month  prior  to  the  exam  about  the
possibility.   But students who took ordinary subject like me did not
get  preparatory  learning since  we  sat our  exams  on the  day the
schols  were annouced reopened while engineering and medical students
have  two weeks before they did theirs.We also have to sign before we

took our exams that we will not cause any unrest.

Q. Why the exams held at local high schools not at the college?
A.   I think this  is a precaution for  the authorities that students
might  gather and cause unrest if we were allowed to sit at colleges.
However,   medical  and engineering  students were  allowed to  do at
their previous colleges in Rangoon and Mandalay.

Q. Then, were high schools closed during your exams?
A.   Yes!  students from primary  to high school had  to rest for two
weeks during the exam.

Q. Can you please brief us how the exam was about?
A. Classes were classified according to our subject and the exam just 
went on the basis of one subject per day through a fortnight.

Q.   Since  you sit  the exam  without learning,   did you  then 
haveanything to write or answer?
A. We scarcely used our brains. We just copy off what we had written 
during the two months period in 1996.

Q. How about the security condition during the exams hour?
A.  It was quite well, we did not see any police nor soldiers wearing
uniforms.   But  we beleived  there were  pretty numbers  of Military
Intelligence  with civilian dress.  We  just saw some firemen roaming
around  the entrance of the gate.   During the examination hour,  the
rector,   Township Education Officers who were the rank of Major woud
frequent  us and would warn  us that we ( the  students ) are the one
who would suffer if anything happens.

Q. So, was there anything happened during the exams?
A.   No,  there weren't any.  But on  the the second day of the exams
five  students  were  arrested  for  allegedly  sticking  posters  in
support  of  the  NLD's  movement.  We  also  heard  that  20 persons
including  students  were  arrested  for  the  same  incident  on the
following night.

Q. Do you know what were on the posters?
A.   As far as I remember,  it included about an appeal to the people
to  support  the NLD's  call to  convene Parliament  and the  SPDC to
implement  the NLD's  demands,  failure  of which  would result  in a
massive unrest.

Q. How do you (students) think this education system, i.e sitting the 
exams without learning?
A.    We  did  not  regard  it  as  examination  but  as  a  copy-off
competition.   There is no reason we  took our exams without learning
anyhting.   There were  even some who  did not sit  because they felt
nothing about it. Some would sit in substitution.

Q. When is the result expected to be out?
A.  There were rumors that it would likely happen the following month
and schools will be reopened in November.




                DEFORESTATION IN CHINLAND 
                ========================== 

Since  1990,   the Burmese  military junta  has rapidly  extended its
control  over  Burma's  north-west  region  in  Chinland  and Sagaing
Division. This expansion program has resulted in the establishment of
over  20  new  battalions  of  soldiers  throughout  this  remote and
mountainous  areas.  The principal outcomes of the increased military
presence   have   been  persecution   and  impoverishment   of  local
population.


The  North-Western command issued an order  to its army battalions to
collect food and anything they want from Chin civilians whenever they
are  in need.  A villager said," It  is very difficult for us to feed
thousands of these soldiers while we are beeing forced to be porters,
laborers and treated like prisoners of war or slaves. We have no time
to  work for our own  living.  We have no  reqular income or earning.
Moreover the soldier frequently collect forced contribution money for
building  pagodas,  porters  fees,  any  kind of  festivals etc.,  or
impose  a fine for making  up reasons.  In the  past decades we never
lock  the door  at night.   We could  leave our  house without beeing
locked.   We never  lost our  possessions.  But  today our belongings
disappear  within  our twingkling  eyes.   I think,   people  will do
anything to make money.  If you don't have money to pay the soldiers,
you would be punished.  No one wants ill-treatment".  The Chin people
who  have no  alternative to make  money are doing  hunting animals (
Tiger  and Bear )  and seeking wild  orchids in the  forest which for
them  is the only and an easiest way to make money.  The existance of
wild  orchids in  the forest is  beeing pushed to  extinction and the
forest  itself  is rapidly  deteriorated.   China's demand  of forest
products  and wild  animals is threatening  the Chin  forest and wild
life. 

CHRO  interviewed  Pu  Ralkap  (  name  changed  ),aged  20,   from  
Leitak  village,  Thantlang  township on December  3,  1998 regarding
forestry bleakness caused by seeking wild orchids.

Q.   In Chinland people  are saying deforestation  in recent year has
been  increased  because  of  seeking wild  orchids.   Is  there such
happening  in  your areas?   If  so,  when  did  you begin  seeking ?
A. Yes! it started since 1993, till today. 

Q. How did you collect them?
A.  We climb up in the tree and pull them off which we can reach.  If
there are some which we can not reach,  we cut the tree down and trim
the  branches off and collect the orchids.  Where there are plenty of
orchids,   all  the trees  are smashed  like elephants  went through.

Q. Do the forest department prohibit doing this?
A.   Yes!  They prohibit  only cutting trees.   But it is  not a very
serious  prohibition.   How could  we  get them  without  cutting the
trees!   Since there is no Forest  Department in our village,  no one
gets   trouble  with   this  Forest   Law  and   Regulation  so  far.

Q. How do you sell them?
A.  There are people who buy these orchids in Thantlang and Haka.  So
we  carry them there and sell them  to those buyers.  The buyers then
transported  them  to the  merchants (smugglers  ) in  Mandalay.  And
those  merchants smuggled them to China.  Probably,  it is not useful
in  our own country.  In 1993 it  is worth Kyats 40 per 1-viss( about
1.5  kg ).  and went up about kyats 600 per viss in 1995.  And now it
is  worth kyats 2,000 per viss.  Ofcourse the price vary depending on
the  color of  the orchids.   Generally there  are two  kinds:  white
orchids  and red  orchids.  They  pay kyats1,700  per viss  for white

orchids and kyats 2,000 for red orchids.

Q. How much money you could make in a day by collecting these 
orchids?
A. We could make from kyats 400 to kyats 3,000 in a day. 

Q. Is there any one hurt or died from searching these orchids in the 
forest? 
A.   Yes!  there  are not  only hurt but  also died  from falling the
tree.   We heard that many people from different villages get injury.

Q.   Do you  mean other villages  also doing the  same,  seeking wild
orchids?.
A.   Yes!  people from  different villages are  doing collecting wild
orchids.   Some  people even  take  risk to  go  to Kalaymyo  area in
seeking  wild orchids. Before the price went up, we could go anywhere
and  collect them.   But after  the price  went up  we are  no longer
allowed  to go  to another  place.  The  village elders  forbid us to
go  to  another  village areas  .   We  can do  only  within  our own
village area.

Q. Why do the elders prohibit it?
A. They know that our forest is going to be destroyed.

Q. Of  what seasons these wild orchids are obtainable?
A.   They have  a very  short life.  From  November until  the end of
January.  The buyers want to buy only those that are from this period
of time.

Q. Do you have any concern about  caused by seeking wild orchids?
A.  Yes! I am really concerned about it because I have seen destroyed
and  smashed the forest in  our area.  The forest  is now turned into
desolation.    Soil  erosion  has  also   taken  place  which  causes
frighteningly the decreased of crops production .  And it also raises
environmental  concern.  No  rain.  Rivers  and streams  have almost
dried up.

Q. Do you see any advantage?
A.  There is an advantage in some way for the poor people like us. We
have  no earning  or earning  access.  We could  pay for  some of the
forced  contribution money  to the  army and  escape from punishment.
But  not all the time.  And also we could buy some salt,  cooking oil
and  medicine  (  basic necessities  )  with  the money  we  get from
selling wild orchids.


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