Subtle changes beneath SLORC stalemate with Suu Kyi
Subtle changes beneath SLORC stalemate with Suu Kyi
David I. Steinberg examines the political situation in
Myanmar.
SINGAPORE: "It is as if a large truck were rushing headlong
into a small Volkswagen", as one anonymous observer in Yangon
recently described the political situation in Myanmar, comparing
the ruling SLORC (State Law and Order Restoration Council) to
opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for
Democracy (NLD).
But is that confrontation inevitable and is it so one-sided?
The NLD would not agree to that characterization of its meager
strength, citing its overwhelming popularity in the 1990 election
that SLORC ignored and continuing evidence of anti-military
feeling, and in spite of the determined effort by the SLORC to
whittle down its leadership and destroy its organization. The
SLORC might also demur, claiming it is simply upholding the laws
that it has enacted.
These views may not express the subtlety of the situation, but
rather a polarization of opinion reflecting internal
institutional views that are incessantly externally promulgated.
Stasis may seem evident, but there are changes that are apparent
beneath the stalemate of surface confrontation and beyond the
rhetoric. Understanding reality may require more nuanced views.
The SLORC seems at the moment to be in a position of enhanced
power; it is most internally secure since its coup of Sept. 18,
1988. The population at present seems disinclined to repeat the
attempted revolution of 1988 that the coup repressed. Fifteen
rebellions have ended through cease-fires that, however ephemeral
they may eventually prove to be, have freed the military for
broader deployment and control. The last major organized
resistance, the oldest ethnic rebellion of the Karen, has had its
major bases near the Thai border destroyed, and its leadership is
talking through intermediaries with the SLORC about a cease-fire
that some of its commanders, although not perhaps its top
leadership, desire.
The SLORC is reinforced by its admission into ASEAN, which may
mean little at home but does carry some external weight. Although
the sanctions on new investments imposed by the United States
convey considerable moral force at least internally within the
U.S., their economic effects on Myanmar will be minimal; even
their moral influence is diminished by the selective imposition
of such an action against Myanmar, only one of many repressive
regimes in the world. But as one Congressman, who believed
sanctions would not be effective but who planned to vote for
them, remarked, "It is difficult to vote in favor of the SLORC."
The economy in much of the country is vibrant and has
evidently grown in the past few years, but whether its apparent
growth, albeit unevenly distributed, can be maintained without
more basic reforms is questionable.
The SLORC has not addressed the fundamental economic problems
that virtually all foreign observers recognize as required if
economic growth is to continue.
These include a comprehensive devaluation of a currency over
30 times its official value, control of the money supply to
inhibit an annual inflation of some 30 percent, rationalization
of inefficient public sector industries now put at even more risk
by foreign competition, development of a competent and autonomous
financial sector, and payment of public sector officials'
salaries that will combat the cancer of corruption that is
evident, ubiquitous, and even necessary for survival. The most
difficult and basic task for any Burmese regime is freeing the
economy from political influence without which economic
rationality will not prevail.
Chinese goods and influence are so apparent as to create
concerns that should the SLORC falter economically it will be the
Chinese, the most obvious of the newly rich, who will be the
scapegoats for SLORC errors. Rumors are rife that drug money has
been laundered into legitimate construction and other businesses.
There are also rumors that the SLORC itself is divided and in
danger of disintegrating into two factions reflecting the line
military (led by General Maung Aye) and the support, specifically
intelligence, wing (led by General Khin Nyunt). Veteran observers
too describe the internal jealousies and rivalries, but comment
that these two groups need each other and the SLORC needs both,
so that overt splits that would threaten the stability of
military rule at this juncture seem unlikely.
The NLD may feel that it is becoming marginalized with
restrictions on its activities and those of Aung San Suu Kyi. It
walked out of, and then was expelled from, the National
Convention in 1995, that hand-picked body that was designed to do
SLORC's bidding in writing a new, heavily scripted constitution.
The NLD now seems to want to return because, even if the results
are predetermined to ensure perpetual military control, it is at
least a forum for internal discussion, if not public debate.
The military has taken two interlocking steps that will, it
believes, ensure its control over the society into the future. It
has, through the National Convention and based on an Indonesian
model, sought to ensure the military's domination of the
leadership and the administrative mechanisms of the state through
a constitution in which it will play the legal, leading roles at
all levels and in all branches of the government.
It has, in tandem to writing a new constitution, created a
mass base of support for the military and its policies through
the formation and leadership of the Union Solidarity and
Development Association (USDA), which now has over five million
members.
The pattern is reminiscent of the military's strategy in its
Burma Socialist Program Party incarnation in the early 1970s,
when it expanded the party in preparation for the constitution of
1974. The USDA concentration on youth indicates the SLORC's
intent for long-range control.
Splits in the foreign community's reaction to the SLORC regime
and recalcitrance in engaging in meaningful dialogue with Aung
San Suu Kyi and the NLD are becoming more apparent as the SLORC
consolidates its power. Entry into ASEAN puts the U.S. at odds
with that important body, as well as with China, SLORC's major
military and moral supporter.
Japan, which has been reluctant to break with the U.S. on
Myanmar in spite of strong internal pressures from its business
community, has now expressed willingness to restart its most
important foreign aid program should the SLORC show even some
modest (probably ineffective) signs of dialogue. Korea, with no
such scruples, has a major economic role, with Daewoo Corporation
being the most obvious of Korean conglomerates.
The military's role in the economy is likely to remain
powerful through its Myanmar Holdings Corporation Ltd., a wholly
owned military venture, as well as through its direct management
of numerous factories far beyond the immediate needs of military
procurement, and at a local level through USDA-owned businesses
designed to provide support to those local branches of that
ubiquitous organization.
Similarly, there may be a movement to a multi-party political
system as the military forms a constitution at some indefinite
date, even though elections do not a democracy make. Some very
modest local autonomy given under the new constitution to a
variety of ethnic groups, along a Chinese model, will not grant
them national power or influence, but it may placate some local
concerns as will some controlled electoral process. The U.S. call
for SLORC honoring the 1990 elections won by the NLD becomes more
anachronistic over time.
There is ferment, not stasis, in Myanmar as events unfold. The
SLORC at first may not have planned to remain in such an obvious
position of power for so long, but it was evidently shocked by
the 1990 election and anti-military attitudes, which it has been
assiduously trying to change. It may continue in power until it
feels its future (and that of the state in its terms) is assured.
But the likely overall direction does indicate continuing
military control in mufti and in uniform. The immediate future
seems stable, but the longer-range problems remain unaddressed,
let alone answered, and these will likely erode the enforced
tranquility of the present.
Dr. David I. Steinberg is Representative of The Asia
Foundation in Korea. He was formerly a professor at Georgetown
University, Washington DC, U.S.A. He has long been a Myanmar
watcher.