Narinjara news
UNHCR OFFICIAL FINDS FORCED LABOUR
EXTENSIVELY PRACTISED IN RAKHINE STATE
Maungdaw, 21st January 02: Reports on forced
labour being practised extensively across Rakhine State, the western member of Myanmar, have started
to pour in to us through traders coming to this border town, reports our
correspondent at Maungdaw.
On December 20, 2001, a
group of Japanese officials of BAJ (an NGO) and Myanmarese
government executive engineer, U Aye Win, were supervising the roads and
bridges constructed in the northern part of Maungdaw township. At that time the Assistant Planning Officer
of UNHCR, U Min Thu, followed them and discovered a group of about thirty
Muslims were walking to the Nasaka Area 2. On asking where they were going, the
Muslims replied that, they were from Tamantha village
and they were going on 'porter rounds'. On further questioning about the
wages, they replied that, they were not paid anything for their work besides
they had to bring their own food and sometimes had to work for late into the
night without any food. They did not have clean drinking water, too. U
Min Thu hearing the report went to the Nasaka Areas
#1 and #2 headquarters where he had a heated exchange with the border security
forces officials, and asked them to pay wages to the forced labourers.
He also assured that he would later pay the Nasaka
from the UNHCR fund. But the Nasaka officials
never bothered to pay the forced labourers and they
assured again and again that, these 'workers' were 'voluntary employees' of the
government. It is worth mentioning here that, the forced labourers are now called as 'voluntary employees' or 'wunthan' in Burmese as a new measure to cheat the public
eye according to the higher official commands.
A Nasaka constable in the area told our correspondent
that, the forced labourers
had to carry 29 cement bags to Ma-ji village
from Mingalanyunt and Minkhamong
police stations, then 55 cement bags from Tamantha
village to Ma-ji village. They also had to
carry 7,500 cubic feet of bricks and 7 cement bags to Nasaka
Area No. 2.
Even in Maungdaw and Buthidaung
townships where there are a number of UN and International NGOs, the practice
of forced labour is rampant. In such circumstances the extant of the use
of forced labour in other parts of Rakhine State
where there are hardly any international NGOs or UN bodies for monitoring, can
easily be imagined. A renowned businessman from Sittwe
who recently came to Maungdaw told our correspondent
that, villagers all over Rakhine State have to go for
'voluntary service' to work for the military, cutting firewood,
collecting bamboo, constructing army barracks, roads and bridges, and work in
the confiscated lands and shrimp farms and fruit orchards. #