Features
The Day of the Generals
The ‘democratic icon’ of South-east Asia Aung San Suu Kyi would need to be best remembered by future generations of adherents to democracy for the following nugget of wisdom that came off her lips during an earlier long spell of house arrest: ‘ It is fear that corrupts and it is absolute fear that corrupts absolutely.’ This is a drastic amendment to the well known adage that,’Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.’
The early phases of Suu Kyi’s political career may seem to have borne out the truth of her pronouncement on corruption and its causes. She stood up courageously to the Myanmarese Generals after her return to Myanmar from abroad in the late eighties and provided resourceful leadership to pro-democracy protests that were sweeping the country at the time.
Intermittent but long spells of house arrest for the next 15 or more years constituted the huge price Suu Kyi had to pay for this leadership role. Thus, her mettle was amply tested in the stormy struggle for democracy in her country, resulting in her being bestowed the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991. This was just one of the many glowing international honours earned by her. If there was a ‘democratic icon’ in South-east Asia at the time it seemed to be Suu Kyi.
For most public officials, the minister’s word is law. Likewise, most Southern rulers consider it obligatory to carry out the wishes and dictates of the prime power centres of the world for fear of losing economic assistance and kindred benefits, for instance. Fear seems to be the key to ‘effective governance’ in most parts of the world.
However, Suu Kyi, while a major opposition figure in Myanmar, established to a considerable extent that she was not ruled by fear. This accounted for her iconic status.
While in power, though, Suu Kyi proved that she was not fundamentally different from most other Southern politicians. For instance, over the question of the Myanmarese minority Rohingya community, who are Muslim in religious identity, she played the notorious ‘majority card’. As is known, this ‘card’ or crafty ploy is played by the majority of Asian rulers. That is, they pander to the interests of their majority communities at the expense of minority groups.
Essentially, San Suu Kyi followed suit by failing to protect the Rohingyas against the repressive military of her country, who have ruled Myanmar, except for a few years since political independence. As a result of Suu Kyi failing to save the Rohingyas from persecution, Myanmar is being accused of genocide in the International Court of Justice and of Crimes Against Humanity in the International Criminal Court.
This amounts to a huge fall from grace. While it is beyond dispute that Suu Kyi took on the might of the Generals in Myanmar’s rocky return to democracy, she failed to take the democratic process to its logical conclusion by creating for Myanmar an inclusive, sharing state which every community could call its own. But the religious majority was pleased with Suu Kyi. Thus, the latter went the way of most Southern rulers by mindlessly pandering to majoritarianism.
However, it does not follow from the foregoing that the Myanmarese military is justified in seizing power in the country by incapacitating democratic, civilian rule, as they have just done. The power grab is condemned unreservedly by the democratic world and this is the way it should be. Military rule is the very anti-thesis of democratic governance and there is no way in which the adherents of democracy could condone rule by might, which is what military control of a country is all about. The challenge before the democratic world is to help restore democratic rule in Myanmar. As a first step, Suu Kyi and other civilian rulers must be brought out of detention. These obstacles to a return to democracy need to be cleared urgently.
However, the Generals may have bitten off more than they could chew. Today, it’s economics and not politics that drive the world. It is an open question whether the military could comprehend the full import of this reality. Generally, economic stability needs to be premised on political stability. The latter is what foreign investors look for in the main. However, from now on Myanmar would not be able to guarantee political stability, considering that pro-democracy forces in Myanmar cannot be expected to be dormant.
Moreover, the West and ASEAN are likely to stress political stability as an essential condition for continued economic interaction between them and Myanmar. It would be relevant to be cognizant of the fact that Singapore was the biggest foreign investor in Myanmar last year with 34 per cent of overall investments, followed by Hong Kong with 26 per cent. Needless to say, the latter states are chief drivers of South-east Asia’s prosperity and are key players in the ASEAN region. They are unlikely to deal with a Myanmar that is dogged by political instability.
Besides, the news from the World Bank for Myanmar is considerably dampening. For example, the economy is expected to grow by a woeful 2 per cent this year, while poverty rates are expected to grow from 22.4 per cent at the end of 2019 to 27 per cent this year. This is a daunting challenge for a country whose political future is uncertain.
It is not adequately recognized in the South in particular that economic and human rights are complementary. One could not be had without the other and this is the reason why military rule anywhere fails. For example, Pakistan’s economic fortunes picked up after she reverted to democratic, civilian rule. The same goes for Myanmar. During the first few decades after independence, which featured military rule, Myanmar’s economy was largely stagnant on account of the country opting for an isolationist foreign policy, which allowed limited international economic interaction. The present Myanmarese Generals would do well to draw the correct inferences.