02 July 2008 : Burma News Late Extra
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Burma’s Sham Referendum
Building Burma's digital front line
Reporting on post-cyclone Burma
Recent Burma News (02-07-08)
Democratic Alliance of Burma
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Burma’s Sham Referendum
By Sean Asbley
Simon Fraser University
No.01-7/2008
2 July 2008
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The following article appeared in Mekong Today, June issue. It talks about widespread irregularities that took place during the constitutional referendum.
This is the opinion and analysis forum for our readers. Opinions expressed here are those of the authors. To contributors, please attach a short account of yourselves at the end of your articles. SHAN will respect the authors right to use pseudonyms.
While the world sat fixated on the destruction caused by cyclone Nargis, the Burmese junta pushed ahead with a national referendum to approve their new constitution. The vote was held on May 10 across two thirds of the country and was delayed for two weeks in the areas devastated by the storm. The delay mattered little, as the junta announced that 97 percent of ballots cast on May 10 approved the constitution. This was enough to make the results from the other one third of the country irrelevant. When people in the cyclone affected region voted on May 24, the junta announced that there was a 93 percent turnout at the polls, with 92.93 percent voting “yes.”
The new constitution was drafted over a 14 year period by 1,000 hand-picked delegates who formed the National Convention. The National League for Democracy (NLD), Aung San Suu Kyi’s party who won the 1990 general elections, boycotted the convention, arguing that the process was undemocratic and did not reflect the wishes of the people. Critics have argued that the new constitution will enshrine the dictatorship forever, as it gives 25 percent of the seats in parliament to the military and stipulates that the president hand over power to the army in case of a national emergency.
I visited Shan State during the May 10 referendum and spoke with a number of people there about what was happening on the ground. In one township I was shown numbered ballots which had been distributed by local authorities so that the government would know which way people voted. There was some talk in this particular township about boycotting the referendum, but in the end locals opposed to the constitution decided to push ahead with their illegal ‘no’ vote campaign. The government made any criticism of the constitution illegal, including any campaigning against its passage. The junta’s own ‘education’ campaign was limited to explaining how to vote yes. Posters around town showed how a proper check-mark was made, and warned the public against ‘evil external influences’ who were threatening the nation’s march towards democracy. The fact that an ‘X’ was needed to register a ‘no’ vote was not mentioned, so an underground education campaign was conducted, spearheaded by members of the NLD.
Besides propaganda and knowledge suppression there was also a lot of intimidation at the polls. On referendum day the streets of most townships were full of soldiers. Heavily armed men stood by the voting booths making sure that people voted ‘yes.’ In some townships it was reported that people had their ballots ripped out their hands and a ‘yes’ vote marked on it by polling station officials.
Burma’s Sham Referendum.
Given the widespread ambivalence and outright disgust with the new constitution it is highly unlikely that over 90 percent of the population voted yes, even in the face of intimidation and vote marking. State reports that 93 percent of people in the cyclone affected areas turned out to vote, and overwhelmingly vote ‘yes,’ makes the whole process laughable, if it wasn’t so incredibly sad.
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Building Burma's digital front line
BBC News
Tuesday, 1 July 2008
Two months after Cyclone Nargis devastated Burma aid is slowly continuing to reach the affected people.
Helping coordinate the relief effort are a small team of emergency telecoms specialists.
John Bursa of the UN's World Food Programme is one of the few who have worked in the affected region.
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“It is difficult to appreciate the scale of the disaster in Burma until you see it with your own eyes.
Whole villages had been washed away, rice paddies were inundated with salt water and the entire infrastructure of the Delta region had either been damaged or destroyed.
In total, more than 90,000 people were killed, while more than 56,000 are still missing.
Of the 1.5 million survivors who are in need of aid, many have been left with nothing; in some cases they barely even have clothes on their back.
When confronted by situations like this it is difficult to see a way forward for the affected population.
This was the scene that met us when we arrived to begin the relief effort, some weeks after the cyclone struck.
It is our role to build and coordinate the emergency telecommunications infrastructure.
Although this may not sound like a priority - perhaps compared to food, water and medicine - it is vital.
Without communication it is nearly impossible to co-ordinate the relief effort over such a large and logistically complex area.
Charities, NGOs and government need to be able to talk in order to plan, avoid duplication and ensure that life-saving activities and distribution of aid are as effective as possible.
Network failure
But in the case of the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis, just getting to the affected region proved to be a challenge.
It took time for us to be granted visas and clearance to enter the delta, holding up the response.
And, even when we did get the necessary permissions, we found even moving around was difficult.
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Damage to the roads meant a usual 2 to 3 hour vehicle trip had doubled, with some routes impassable. Even within towns, roads were either flooded or simply washed away.
The lack of bridges and the poor state of others meant that larger equipment had to be dispatched over a number of days in separate vehicles, rather than by one truck.
And when we finally reached the region we found the wrath of Nargis had also struck at the heart of the telecommunications infrastructure.
Cellular towers had been toppled, while the public telephone network was either damaged or totally destroyed, rendering post-disaster communications defunct.
But within the first week of aid workers arriving, we had the beginnings of a network with voice and data facilities in the main co-ordination hubs of Laputta and Bogale.
These relied on small, portable satellite links called "BGans", a key part of our rapid deployment kits. These bags of equipment are kept on permanent standby, ready to be deployed within 24 hours of an emergency.
Although the satellite units provide a much-needed link when nothing else will do, they are expensive to use.
So, within days the team had started to put in place larger, more permanent and cost- effective satellite dishes.
This turned out to be no easy task.
'Vital links'
The Monsoon rains were unrelenting, soaking staff and equipment. Any break, no matter how brief, had to be capitalised upon.
A short dry spell would be followed by bursts of frenetic activity, whether during the day or at 4 o'clock in the morning. In between, tired staff would retreat to cramped offices to snatch an hour or two of sleep.
But the work paid off. In the end we were able to install large capacity satellite dishes in five humanitarian centres across the Delta: Laputta, Bogale, Pyapon, Mawlamgyun and Pathein.
These VSAT units provided a critical boost to the bandwidth, allowing the increasing numbers of humanitarian workers reaching the area to transmit key data and statistics on the needs of the struggling villagers who survived the disaster.
Indeed, the World Food Programme's Director in Burma believes these vital links helped facilitate the delivery of thousands of tons of food aid to the worst affected areas.
Statistics like this show the importance of a fast and reliable emergency telecom response.
Along with partners from the United Nations Foundation and Vodafone Group Foundation, we had already in place a programme to train IT specialists. (Coincidentally, the second such training course was underway soon after the Burma cyclone.)
The intensive two-week course is designed to improve cooperation between different aid groups and ensure that telecoms specialists are ready to be deployed as fast and effectively as possible.
We can't prevent natural disasters from happening, but training means that when one does occur, the humanitarian community can deliver life-saving assistance as fast as possible.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7481914.stm
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Reporting on post-cyclone Burma
BBC News
Tuesday, 1 July 2008
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“As long as you keep moving, you stand a better chance of not getting caught” |
“All along the way, people that we met were extremely helpful and definitely wanted their story to get out” |
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It is exactly two months since Cyclone Nargis hit Burma, causing widespread death and devastation.
In a country that has been under military rule since 1962 and controls almost all aspects of the media, it was a huge challenge to report on the aftermath of this disaster.
BBC journalists who managed to get into Burma either had to enter secretly, or pretend to be tourists and report undercover.
They shared their experiences of reporting in such difficult conditions for the BBC World Service's Assignment programme.
PAUL DANAHAR
The BBC's Paul Danahar was one of the first journalists to enter the country, arriving three days after the cyclone hit.
"We had our visas because there was supposed to be a referendum on the Saturday after the cyclone, so we had applied for tourist visas," he said.
"We had to go through the rigmarole of travelling around the region finding embassies that were less aware that journalists were trying to get themselves in. We made up fake business cards to present to the visa offices.
"We had some kit that we stashed somewhere inside Burma after the demonstrations that happened the previous year, so we knew what we had to work with when we got in.
Paul and his crew had to remove anything that identified them as BBC and travel with hand luggage so that they could get past immigration controls more easily.
They also found it was most effective to keep moving, as foreigners quickly attract the attention of the security apparatus.
"The one thing the Burmese government doesn't have is a huge amount of communications infrastructure - so as long as you keep moving, you stand a better chance of not getting caught.
"Where that doesn't really work is the hotels in the capital city and that's where you have to be more careful."
Paul decided to not to hide his identity when he reported, and ended up being deported.
ANONYMOUS REPORTER
The next BBC reporter to arrive in Burma - a week after the cyclone - worked anonymously for the 10 days that he was there.
He retains his anonymity even now, to give him a better chance of returning to the country.
"One of the dramatic things that we encountered, having been in Burma before and seen how reticent and afraid people are to speak up against the government, was just how this cyclone had made people angry enough and brave enough to come up to strangers with microphones and cameras and vent their anger against the Burmese government," he said.
NATALIA ANTELAVA
Natalia Antelava was the next BBC journalist to arrive from her base in central Asia.
She landed in Rangoon 10 days after the cyclone, at a time when journalists and aid workers were trying to get into the worst-hit areas.
"Although the Irrawaddy Delta was blocked off, we were actually very lucky to get in," she said.
"We drove and it took about 13 hours to get to one of the furthest towns in the delta, called Laputta. Along the bumpy road, past the checkpoints - for most of the time, I was the only foreigner in the car.
"The soldiers never actually saw me because I was hiding under the back seat," she added.
"All along the way, people that we met were extremely helpful and definitely wanted their story to get out, and that's what helped us more than anything else."
Natalia met a young boy in the town of Laputta who lost all his family in the cyclone.
"He managed to cling on to a tree for almost 14 hours and was eventually saved by a local fisherman who got him out.
"I remember sitting in a boat across from him as we were going towards his village and passing all the bodies and destruction on the way and trying to imagine what could possibly be going on in his mind.
"Around 400 people once lived in the village that we visited and we only found about 20 survivors," said Natalia Antelava.
LAURA TREVELYAN
As the days wore on, the news coming from Burma was of people stranded, bodies left uncollected and very little disaster relief by the authorities.
International frustration was growing and pressure was mounting on the General Than Shwe to meet UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. He finally he agreed almost two weeks after the cyclone.
Laura Trevelyan, the BBC's UN correspondent, managed to get a place on Mr Ban's plane out of New York.
"What was really fascinating about being part of Ban Ki-moon's official delegation, yet also being a journalist, was that there were absolutely no restrictions at all on what I was able to do."
She had a portable satellite to allow her send her reports back. This equipment was shown to the Burmese authorities and just waved through.
The Burmese government organised a helicopter trip for the UN General Secretary and his delegation to the Irrawaddy Delta.
"We didn't see people suffering. We saw from the air the devastation that the cyclone had caused, but the helicopter landed at what one UN official described furiously as a 'show camp'.
"There were very few people in this camp and the people looked in really reasonably good condition, the camp was completely spick and span."
MATT PRODGER
The BBC's Matt Prodger went to Burma almost a month after the cyclone hit.
A ring of steel surrounded the capital, preventing both aid workers and journalists getting to the disaster areas.
"Although it was very difficult to get to the affected areas, we were able to find out what was happening because on the streets of Rangoon there were pirate DVD stores selling amateur footage from the affected areas.
"There was very little evidence on those DVDs of any organised distribution of aid by the Burmese military or other authorities."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7475059.stm
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Democratic Alliance of Burma
DAB "Democratic Alliance of Burma is an Alliance of 25 member organiztions working for democratization of Burma and struggling aggainst the Military regime in Burma. DAB urges for peaceful trasition towords democracy and federal Union in Burma".
Background History of DAB
Democratic Alliance of Burma is an alliance which consists of various kinds of members’ organizations, which are struggling against the military dictator, such as different ethnic armed organizations, pro-democracy political parties, civil society groups and new blood of 8888 democratic movement.
After the military regime brutally crashed down the peaceful people movement of 8888 uprising, different ethnic armed groups and pro-democracy had distinguished their common goal as eradicating totalitarian military regime and establishing a genuine democratic federal union.
Therefore, different ethnic armed groups, pro-democracy political parties, civil society groups and new blood of 8888 democratic movement founded the Democratic Alliance of Burma in 18 November 1988 at Kawthoolae (Karen librated area). It is the first alliance in which both non-Burma ethnic and Democratic groups join together under the basic common principle.
Under the leaderships of DAB, ethnic armed groups and pro democracy groups could collaborate to remove the military regime from its power by armed resistance movement, mass mobilization and diplomatic approach.
DAB had initiated do draw a Federal Constitution in 1988-92, which could bring all of the different ethnic groups and people to establish a genuine federal union for Burma. Also, DAB provided strong support to from the National Coalition Government Union of Burma NCGUB in 1990 and the National Council of Union of Burma NCUB in 1992.
In 10-12 September 2007, the 5th Congress of DAB unanimously adopted three immediate action programs, as follows;
To implement political action, military action etc. for demolishing the SPDC's Road Map;
To aid the current movement of the people to the stage of a general uprising and, at the same time, to put in place measures for combining mass movement and armed resistance;
To organize and call for ranks as officers of the SPDC armed forces to stand on the side of the people.
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