*** DEBUG START ***
*** DEBUG END ***

Myanmar’s crisis is deepening

by
21 January 2022

Why is a nation with a rich and nuanced history in such turmoil, asks Chris Mabey

Alamy

Protesters in Parliament Square, London, in November, call for the release of imprisoned political leaders in Myanmar

Protesters in Parliament Square, London, in November, call for the release of imprisoned political leaders in Myanmar

IT SEEMED that Myanmar was inching toward a more democratic regime. In the November 2020 elections, there was yet another landslide vote for the National League for Democracy (NLD) party (News, 20 November 2020). But the military junta that rules Myanmar was unable to contemplate more power-sharing. Referring to election fraud on 1 February last year, it declared a year-long state of emergency (News, 12 February 2021). The patience of the normally peace-loving people snapped, and fury was unleashed.

Soldiers gunned down unarmed students, teachers, and even medical workers. More than 1300 civilians have been killed by security forces, among them two journalists and two Save the Children aid workers (News, 31 December). A further 8000 have been detained or imprisoned.

To compound the misery, the latest wave of Covid has run rampant through the country. Few are vaccinated. Almost one third of public hospitals have been closed. Relatives, friends, and health workers risk being shot or detained as they queue to try to get oxygen cylinders to the sick under curfew.

Why is this secretive nation in such turmoil, and what can we do to help our brothers and sisters in Myanmar?

 

AS A British teenager, I met a beautiful Burmese girl, April, on the school bus. She and her family self-exiled in 1964, soon after Ne Win’s military coup, to start a new life in England. I was blown away by the affections of April, and by the warm hospitality of her parents.

But this misty-eyed romanticism about Burma was largely untested until April and I made an extended visit in 1995-96, together with our four teenage daughters. For April, not much had changed since her family’s hurried departure. For me, it was an arresting reality check.

How did this country, with such a regal past, swathed in natural beauty and populated by a people of unmistakable serenity, slide into repression and obscurity? How could the upbeat memories of April’s parents be reconciled with Myanmar’s current malaise? I started to record the oral history and reminiscences of April’s Burmese family, who were eyewitnesses to momentous events in mid-20th-century Burma.

Then, between 2010 and 2018, April and I made seven successive visits to help teach at a small Bible college on the outskirts of Yangon, run by a couple from the Chin ethnic group. We took the opportunity to travel widely and talk to a range of young people. I began to unpeel the nation’s history, the mix of Buddhist faith and spirit worship, the warring interests of ethnic peoples, the decimated education system, the unequal distribution of wealth, and the hidden human-rights abuses labelled by Amnesty International as among the worst in the world.

What emerged was a far more nuanced picture of Burma (renamed Myanmar by the military in 1997) than the media stereotype. We discovered that there was a close tie between ethnic identity and religion. Theravada Buddhism has infused pacifism and compassion into the Burmese mind-set for centuries, and about 90 per cent of the population are Buddhists. Yet, in stark contrast, there is an influential group of nationalistic Buddhists in government who issue hate speech and death threats against Christians and Muslims. Violations of freedom of belief have always been part of the story for Burmese Christians, who are prominent among the Chin, Karen, and Kachin people groups.

 

THE UK has taken unilateral action in response to the coup. This includes imposing sanctions on senior military figures, as well as on key commercial and economic interests. We can press our leaders to go further. Key individuals within the junta have ordered or been complicit in crimes against humanity, war crimes, and genocide. For these, they need to be brought to account.

Currently, the people of Myanmar are subject to discriminatory laws that restrict freedom of religion or belief, and freedom of peaceful assembly. I have written to my MP to urge him to do all he can to push for reforms. In addition, the Myanmar education system and curriculum need to be overhauled. A Burmese doctor in neuro-science tells me: “There are only four clinical psychologists at doctorate level in Yangon. Sixty years of dictatorship and trauma, and that’s all there are. I aim to go back and be the fifth.”

Her studies in the United States were possible thanks only to a scholarship from the London-based charity Prospect Burma. Over 30 years, it has helped 2400 alumni in this way. Students are awarded scholarships to undertake tertiary education outside Myanmar. Once qualified, they return to influence their professional fields of law, health, education, human rights, media, and technology. This builds pressure from the bottom up, as people get a taste for more egalitarian values. “The junta have taken our country, but no one can take my education from me,” one nurse who is working tirelessly in the Chin state says.

Of course, all this depends on the cessation of violence and on constructive dialogue. In recent months, the political crisis has deepened. Now, many of the indigenous leaders who previously had political influence have been forced into hiding in the Karen hills and across the borders of India and Thailand. But, ever resolute, the National Unity Government, formed of politicians ousted by the military coup in February, is preparing itself for the day when regime change comes.

Finally, matters shift in the heavenly realms when people pray. My reading of the scriptures tells me that God not only sees and cares about oppressed peoples, but also — in his time — will call evildoers to account and sweep them aside.


Chris Mabey is a chartered psychologist and Emeritus Professor at Middlesex University Business School. His latest book,
Whispers of Hope: A family memoir of Myanmar, is published by Penguin Random House at £29.99 (Church Times Bookshop £26.99); 9-7898-1-495425-9. chrismabey.co.uk

Listen to an interview with Chris Mabey on the Church Times Podcast

Browse Church and Charity jobs on the Church Times jobsite

Letters to the editor

Letters for publication should be sent to letters@churchtimes.co.uk.

Letters should be exclusive to the Church Times, and include a full postal address. Your name and address will appear below your letter unless requested otherwise.

Forthcoming Events

Women Mystics: Female Theologians through Christian History

13 January - 19 May 2025

An online evening lecture series, run jointly by Sarum College and The Church Times

tickets available

 

Festival of Faith and Literature

28 February - 2 March 2025

tickets available

 

Visit our Events page for upcoming and past events 

The Church Times Archive

Read reports from issues stretching back to 1863, search for your parish or see if any of the clergy you know get a mention.

FREE for Church Times subscribers.

Explore the archive

Welcome to the Church Times

 

To explore the Church Times website fully, please sign in or subscribe.

Non-subscribers can read four articles for free each month. (You will need to register.)