November/December 2004

Aung San Suu Kyi: The Lady of Burma

by Krishna Mallick

On October 14, 1991, Aung San Suu Kyi of Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her nonviolent struggle on behalf of democracy and human rights. Being under house arrest, she was unable to accept the award in person. Her sons accepted it on their mother’s behalf.

As a child, Suu Kyi conquered a fear of the dark by standing alone at night in her family’s rambling lakeside home. Now 58, she has spent the best part of fifteen years confined to it. She battles her isolation with the same single-mindedness, sustained by her faith—she is a devout Buddhist—and by what a friend from her days at Oxford University, Ann Pasternak Slater,recognized as “her rooted reluctance to accept defeat.” 1 Nine years ago, when the restrictions on her movement were briefly lifted, she claimed that house arrest had made her “spiritually stronger.”

Since Suu Kyi received the world’s highest accolade, many events have taken place within Burma. One fact stands out. As she said on July 11, 1995, four months into her brief interlude of freedom, “Nothing has changed since my release….Let the world know that we are still prisoners within our own country.” 2

Roots of the struggle

The political history of the country now known as Myanmar can be traced back to the fifth century of the common era. The nation entered the twentieth century as a British colony under the name of Burma. Following a Japanese occupation during World War II, nationalists led by Aung San, father of Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma’s most famous and revered leader, demanded independence from Britain. On January 4, 1948, after nearly 150 years of colonial domination, the Union of Burma was declared. Aung San was assassinated in 1947, just before independence was achieved. Burmese democracy lasted for only fourteen years.

In 1961, U Nu’s government appointed Aung San Suu Kyi’s mother, Daw Khin Kyi, as Burma’s ambassador to India. Suu Kyi, then fifteen, accompanied her mother to New Delhi. Khin Kyi’s assignment ended in 1967, five years after a military coup by General Ne Win. Khin Kyi returned to Burma; Suu Kyi went to school in England.

After seizing power, Ne Win’s Revolutionary Council suspended the constitution and immediately sealed off the country from all outside scrutiny. Promoting an isolationist policy that he called the Burmese Way to Socialism, Ne Win expelled foreign journalists, nationalized most industrial and economic institutions, shut off the press, and established a police state based on fear, repression, and torture.

In March 1988, small groups of Burmese students took to the streets of Rangoon (nowYangon) demanding radical political change. There was a brutal response: in one incident alone, forty-one wounded students suffocated to death in a police van. These cruelties served only to invigorate the determination and commitment of the students’ movement, which progressively gained momentum.

At the end of March 1988, Aung San Suu Kyi, who was residing in Oxford with her husband Dr. Michael Aris, a British scholar, and their sons Alexander and Kim, received a fateful telephone call. Her mother had suffered a severe stroke. Within days, Suu Kyi, who had made regular visits home to Burma during her twenty-three years’ residence abroad, was back again in Rangoon at the bedside of her dying mother.

On July 23, 1988, the public was astonished when Ne Win, in a televised address, announced his resignation from his party and called for a referendum on Burma’s political future. After almost three decades of iron-fisted rule, the people were very pleased by the unimaginable decision. But hopes of a quick transfer of power from a dictatorship to an authentic democracy were obstructed as Ne Win’s party members immediately opposed his request. This outraged the people, and in a magnificent display of protest, millions of citizens marched peacefully in every city and town throughout the country, calling for an interim civilian government, a democratic multi-party system with free and fair elections, and a restoration of basic civil liberties.

As these demonstrations gathered momentum, military commanders loyal to Ne Win responded by sending out thousands of crack infantry troops with orders to kill. This led to the “Massacre of 8-8-88” in which several thousand unarmed demonstrators were killed and hundreds more injured. In the aftermath, thousands more were imprisoned.

Out of the horror of this massacre came a sign of hope: a new leader emerged. On August, 26, 1988 Aung San Suu Kyi announced her decision to enter the struggle for democracy. The announcement took place at a rally attended by an estimated 500,000 people who had gathered on the grounds near the Shwedagon Pagoda in Rangoon.

The movement began to gather enormous support. Suu Kyi’s essential message of self-responsibility, rooted in Buddhism and permeated by Gandhian philosophy, developed into a high-minded political ideology that she still calls Burma’s “revolution of the spirit.”

On September18, 1988, as democratic changes seemed imminent, the “retired” dictator Ne Win manipulated the army from behind the scenes to take over the country in a staged coup. He turned over the rule of Burma to a twenty-one-member group of military commanders known as the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC). SLORC reinstated martial law. Gatherings of more than four people were punishable by imprisonment; a night curfew was imposed, and military tribunals replaced the civil courts. Many thousands were arrested.

To alleviate the outrage of the public, SLORC announced that “free and fair multi-party elections” would be held in the spring of 1990. Within three months, over 200 parties had registered with the SLORC election committee. By far the strongest and most popular of these was the National League for Democracy (NLD), co-founded by Aung San Suu Kyi and several of her closest colleagues.

Democratic leaders soon realized that SLORC was not interested in democracy. In 1989 and 1990, the New York Times reported, over 500,000 Burmese citizens were forcibly herded from major urban centers into disease-ridden “satellite towns.” The areas evacuated by SLORC were known to be strongholds of the democracy movement and home to supporters of Aung San Suu Kyi. On July 20, 1989, Aung San Suu Kyi herself was put under house arrest. Other party leaders were incarcerated.

Ten months later, on May 27, 1990, the promised elections were held. Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD party won a landslide victory, taking 392 of the 485 seats contested—more than eighty percent of the constituencies.

Instead of transferring power to the elected representatives as promised, SLORC instigated a nationwide crackdown, imprisoning many elected MPs. Some fled the country into exile. Others were silenced in different ways. From house arrest, Aung San Suu Kyi continued to lead. And in 1991, she was awarded the Nobel Prize.

Since the Nobel

Since Aung San Suu Kyi attracted the world’s attention, the military government has felt some pressure. And it has made sporadic efforts to look better.

First, in 1997, Burma was admitted to the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). The State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) was renamed the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC).

Then in April/May, 2002, authorities in Myanmar again lifted Aung San Suu Kyi’s house arrest. Her long dialogue with Myanmar’s military party finally seemed to be bearing some fruit. 3

In September 2002, after having spent years denying that forced labor even existed in Myanmar, the government allowed the International Labor Organization (ILO) to set up an office in Yangon to monitor its efforts to eradicate the practice. Hong-Trang Perret-Nguyen, the new ILO representative, says that the civil administration in the central part of the country no longer relies on forced labor to build canals, airports and railroads, as it did in the 1990s. But in the border regions, she says, the military still obliges farmers to carry their supplies, clean their barracks, and build roads without pay. The junta’s grand plan to solve the problem, she observes, consists of translating decrees against forced labor into the languages of the minority groups living along Myanmar’s frontiers.

Observers view with similar cynicism the generals’ decision in January 2003 to admit a delegation from Amnesty International for the first time ever. The delegates did conclude that the conditions in Myanmar’s jails had improved significantly. But they also pointed out that more than 1,200 political prisoners were still being held in them. Indeed, two days after Amnesty’s team departed, in early February last year, the police arrested twelve more political activists, including seven NLD members, for “anti-government activities.” 4

In the meantime, pressure continues to come from outside Myanmar. Attitudes vary. The European Union refuses to give visas to senior SLORC/SPDC officials. The US has banned firms from investing in Myanmar, and Congress has long threatened further punitive action if the human rights situation deteriorates, while signs of progress earn some reward. Japan and Australia stress doing business with Myanmar, whereas China and other Asian nations display very few qualms about dealing with the country’s dictators. The situation is changing at present, and will continue to change.

Since May of 2003, Aung San Suu Kyi has again been placed under “protective custody.” Sources say she was injured during clashes between her supporters and the military’s. Two months later, SLORC/SPDC claimed it had uncovered a plot to “sabotage” the government and assassinate several of its leading members.

A Gandhian popular movement

Philip Kraeger 5says that it is Aung San Suu Kyi’s recognition of the relevance and singular importance of Gandhi’s teachings to Burma that distinguishes her contribution, and which represents a major step beyond the position of her father. Although Suu Kyi is not faced with rule by a foreign power, she has been able to convince the majority of the Burmese people that she is continuing with the struggle for freedom in Burma in the same way her father did.Yet the method she has arrived at is in close accord with Gandhi’s.

Her essay comparing Burma and India is well known in the history of national movements in South Asia (and elsewhere). In both countries, an admiration for European culture ran up against the brute facts of British political and military domination, leading to an attempt by local thinkers to formulate fundamentally Burmese and Indian national identities and ideologies that would nonetheless be able to draw selectively on the best aspects of European experience.

Aung San Suu Kyi lays particular stress on the village basis of Burmese democracy, on the Burmese attitude to education as a moral activity embracing all aspects of person and nation, and on the relatively short period that Burmese leadership has had to mature. Her treatment of these themes helps us understand how she came to see a nonviolent approach to democracy as the historically legitimate–and realistic–course of action in Burma.

Some people believe that historically it has meant little to the peasantry whether a government calls itself democratic or not, as long as its weight is not felt too much and there are benefits to be desired from its security. Yet Aung San Suu Kyi has captured the loyalty of the masses. She has the traditional characteristics of respectability, wisdom, and personal appeal associated with the ideal ruler. By her self-sacrifice and gentleness she also exhibits key qualities of virtue and grace. Despite repeated attempts by the military regime to defame and insult her, she retains vast popularity and respect. And although her active NLD supporters are exposed to arbitrary arrest and indefinite detention and she is virtually confined to her house, her cause and the respect for her person are embraced by millions.

Buddhist inspiration

Under house arrest, Suu Kyi meditates and memorizes Buddhist sutras. Her speeches and essays include frequent references to Buddhist principles. In “In Quest of Democracy” she disproves the SLORC’s assertions that democracy and human rights are “un-Burmese.” 6 Buddhism has always taught that “the legitimacy of government is founded on the consent of the people,” she says. 6

For Aung San Suu Kyi, Buddhism and dictatorship are in fundamental contradiction. At issue is the nature of humanity. Buddhism, she argues, places the highest value on the human being, who alone has the ability to attain the supreme state of Buddhahood. But under despotic rule, humanity is valued least, as a “faceless, mindless—and helpless—mass to be manipulated at will.” 7

The idea of law and order, she writes, is frequently misused as an excuse for oppression. In Burmese, the idea is officially expressed as nyein-wut-pi-pyar (“quiet–crouched–crushed–flattened”). Suu Kyi, on the other hand, equates law with justice, order with the discipline of a people satisfied that justice has been done. Drawing on Buddhist precepts, she affirms that the concept of law is based on dhamma, righteousness or virtue, not on the power to impose harsh and inflexible rules on a defenseless people.

According to Josef Silverstein, Suu Kyi has been able to convince the Burmese people that Buddhist principles of human freedom can be linked to sociopolitical ideas of freedom that originated in Western thought. 8 She has summed up her blend of the two traditions by saying that “in their quest of democracy the people of Burma explore not only the political theories and practices of the world outside their country, but also the spiritual and intellectual values that have given shape to their own environment.” 9

Moral exemplar

Aung San Suu Kyi has already made some of the toughest decisions imaginable. At any time since her house arrest she could have taken the easy way out and left Burma to live in England. Instead she has made a painful personal sacrifice, placing her belief in freedom and her love of her country first. Her husband died in 1999 without her beside him: she refused the conditions the junta placed on her requested visit. Her sons are growing up far from their mother in the UK. She lives with the knowledge that just as SLORC has locked up and “disappeared” many of her closest friends and associates, so too is it capable of doing the same to her at any time. Yet she chooses to stay on and continue the nonviolent struggle.

Aung San Suu Kyi has considered in great detail the question of whether or not placing economic growth before political growth is the way to bring happiness and democratic rule to Burma. Starting from the Burmese saying, “Morality can be upheld only when the stomach is full,” she argues that the maxim is “hardly a faithful reflection of what actually goes on in human society.” She realizes that while the need to survive does drive people to crime and immorality, “it is equally evident that the possession of a significant surplus of material goods has never been a guarantee against covetousness, rapacity, and the infinite variety of vice and vanity that springs from such passion.” 10

For Aung San Suu Kyi, true development involves much more than mere economic growth. A sense of empowerment and inner fulfillment alone will ensure the importance of human and cultural values. She says, “The quintessential revolution is that of the spirit, born of an intellectual conviction of the need for change in those mental attitudes and values that shape the course of a nation’s development. A revolution that aims merely at changing official policies and institutions with a view to an improvement in material conditions has little chance of genuine success. Without a revolution of the spirit, the forces that produced the iniquities of the old order would continue to be operative, posing a constant threat to the process of reform and regeneration.” 11

What can be done to bring about a revolution of the spirit in Burma? Trusting as she does in the power of thought, Suu Kyi asked in a recent interview that those interested in supporting her work “think about the situation in Burma.” 12 They can certainly read works by and about Suu Kyi, especially Freedom from Fear (available from FOR), which over the years of her house arrest has been her primary financial means of support. In a speech that her husband delivered for her at the American University in 1996, she asked that students living in freedom extend a helping hand to the Burmese. 13 Students and all those committed to progress in Burma can work toward international sanctions of the SLORC, she said, for worldwide sanctions against apartheid contributed to political freedom for the people of South Africa. But no matter what we do outside Burma, ultimately the people of Burma will have to free themselves from fear of the government and exercise their power to resist. 14

Suu Kyi realizes that no one can know when and how the Burmese will attain political freedom. On December 3, 1988 she admonished her compatriots to continue the struggle without regard for the outcome. “Even though we don’t know what will happen,” she said, “we need to carry on as best we can, without wavering, along the correct path. Even though we don’t know what will happen, it is right that we take part in the struggle. If you ask whether we shall achieve democracy, whether there will be general elections, here is what I say: Don’t think about whether or not these things will happen. Just continue to do what you believe is right. Later on the fruits of what you do will become apparent on their own. One’s responsibility is to do the right thing.” 15

Aung San Suu Kyi is strong. This is not the strength of guns or money, but rather the power derived from faith in a simple idea: that all men and women have the right to a life that is free from fear and oppression. Through her action and determination, Aung San Suu Kyi has demonstrated a heroic commitment to nonviolence. Her courage and wisdom have inspired millions of Burmese, and can help millions more throughout the world to continue to strive toward freedom and justice for all. It is no surprise that her people call her the Lady of Burma.

Notes

1.“Suu Burmese,” by Ann Pasternak Slater, in Freedom from Fear and other writings, edited by Michael Aris, 1991, Viking, p. 266.

2. For more details, read, The Voice of Hope: Conversations with Alan Clements, 1997, Seven Stories Press, NY, introduction, pp. 9-18.

3. “A new page? Myanmar,” The Economist, (US), May 11, 2002.

4. “Deadlocked; Myanmar,” The Economist (US), March 22, 2003, v366 i8316.

5. “Aung San Suu Kyi and the Peaceful Struggle for Human Rights in Burma,” by Philip Kraeger, p. 293, 285 etc.

6. Freedom from Fear and other writings , p. 167.

7. Ibid, p. 174

8. “The Idea of Freedom in Burma and the Political Thought of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi,” Pacific Affairs, n 2 (Summer 1996), pp. 211-228.

9. Freedom, p. 178

10. Aung San Suu Kyi, Toward a True Refuge, Oxford: Refuge Studies Programme with Perpetua Press, 1993, p. 17.

11. Freedom, p. 183.

12. An interview with John Pilger, New Internationalist, 280, n 20 (June 1, 1996), p. 22. There are a number of possible actions listed on p. 30 of this issue.

13. This speech—and a number of Suu Kyi’s speeches, writings and interviews—can be found on the Free Burma Coalition webpage (http//wicip.org/fbc/auspeech.htm).

14. “Pilgrims in Quest of Truth and Perfection: Aung San Suu Kyi and her Forefathers, Mahatma Gandhi and Aung San,” by Richard L. Johnson, The Acorn: Journal of the Gandhi-King Society, Fall 1998, vol. ix, no. 2, p. 16.

15. Freedom, p. 212.

Krishna Mallick, Ph.D is a Professor and Chairperson of Philosophy Department and she was the coordinator of the Peace Institute, at Salem State College in 2004. She has co-edited two books with Doris Hunter, An Anthology of Nonviolence: Historical and Contemporary Voices (Greenwood Press, 2002) and Nonviolence: A Reader in the Ethics of Action, University Press of America and Gandhi Peace Foundation, New Delhi, India 1990).