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| Wai Wai & Debbie Stothard at the RTD on Rohingya at GMM (April17, 2014 |
I feel honored to have the chance to speak as a panel in this discussion on Rohingya issue. I myself is a Rohingya, and I hope participants in this group will finally give me some hopeful and practical assurances that I can take a long with me to convey to my persecuted Rohingya people. I am very much thankful to the sponsors of this meeting who invited me.
Here
I would like to present a short and precise analysis of the Human right
situation in Rakhine state. Since Rohingya’s identity is denied by Myanmar
Government their citizenship question became on stake.
1982 Myanmar citizenship law which
the world regards as an arbitrary and harsh law, short of international norm
and standard, section 3 says “Only the 8 major indigenous races and sub races
associated to them are, Myanmar citizen”. Since Myanmar’s independence in 1948,
Rohingya were listed as one of the ethnic races but the 1982 law excluded them.
From that time various forms of discriminatory and suppressive rules and
mechanism have been in continuation until today. Rohingyas are no longer
regarded as Human being. Their socio-economic life is so suffocated that almost
all Rohingyas are just eking for survival.
What the successive military
Governments intentionally did to strip Rohingya of everything vital for their
livelihoods are;
Firstly, they are deprived of their
history: despite their existence in Arakan for thousand years they are
portrayed as Indians who came into Arakan (Rakhine) since British occupation in
1824.
Secondly, their ethnicity is
misinterpreted and branded them as Bengali. This is a deliberate attempt took
place since 1973 and 1983 censuses to make them stateless. Though they
themselves enlisted them as Rohingya then, census reports said this people are
Bengali which are about 29% of total Arakan’s population of 3.3million.
Thirdly, the government looted away
Rohingya’s citizenship under a new and arbitrary citizenship law in 1982. Now
Rohingyas are branded as noncitizen or stateless. As there were conventions
under UN supervision for the protection and reduction of stateless people,
Myanmar government prefers the term noncitizen.
Finally, in the 2014 Myanmar census
which started on April 1, there are 135 code numbers for each of so called
national (ethnic) peoples but not for Rohingya. The government gave two
different stories to international and to local media. To international media
they said Rohingya must list themselves under the category 914 which means “other”
but can write “Rohingya” to give more detail. This means that Rohingya will not
be counted as an ethnic group but people were free to identify themselves. BUT
some local media reported the Immigration and Population Minister said, “Rohingya must enlist as Bengali.
Otherwise, one who enumerate as Rohingya is liable to legal punishment.” The
worst is the demonstrations, led by extremist Monk Werathu, to totally ban the
word “Rohingya” from the census. Rakhine politicians are threatening for more
intensive violence unless Government bans the inclusion of Rohingya. So, now, if we want write “Rohingya” as our
ethnic identity in the census, we will be stopped from joining the census. We
are forced to write we are “Bengali” or we will not be counted at all. This
census is funded by the UN Population Fund, European Union and other western
countries, so it is extremely disappointing that the census is so racist.
The
lead monk of hate the speech monk
“Wirathu” whom Time magazine
remark as “the face of Buddhist terror” visited Maung Daw Town (northern
Arakan) in first week of January. Here on 13th January a big
terrorized incidence occurred where dozens of people were injured and killed,
the whole villagers had to flee away from the village and their belongings were
looted away by Rakhine mobs and security personnel. The government “investigated”
this violence two times and said there was no evidence of violence against
Rohingya. They just said one police was killed but they couldn’t find his body,
and recommended that police should be given better weapons. The international
NGO Medicins Sans Frontiers (MSF) said they treated 25 Rohingya people who were
injured in that violence, so the government banned MSF from Rakhine state. Now
more and more international NGOs giving humanitarian aid are being banned or
attacked. The Burma Bulletin for March is distributed here, so you can read
about the attacks last month.
Abuses
and discriminations against Rohingya are intentional, well prepared well
organized. Rohingyas have been dehumanized, demonized, pushed into camps and persecuted in so many other ways. This
includes restriction on movement, on marriage, on child birth and access to
education and medical treatment. The restrictions on marriage and birth means
about 60,000 Rohingya children could not get birth certificates. Rohingya
children and youth have found it difficult to get education, especially girls.
After the violence started in 2012, the situation got much worse. Now, there
are more than 20,000 children unable to go to school and 1,000 students unable to continue their
university education. Most Rohingya in Rakhine state cannot not get any health
services at all. The government hospitals treat us as an enemy and we keep
getting reports that hospital staff have beaten or mistreated Rohingya who seek
medical treatment.
Economic
life is stagnated. All most one third of Rohingyas’ farming lands were seized
for distribution among non Rohingya newly settled model villages and military
installations. Forced eviction and removing of Rohingya villages are routine.
Due to one-sided attack and assault 150,000 Rohingya became IDPs, living in
squalid camps without necessary facilities. Other Rohingya whose villages were
not burned are virtually in confinement. No freedom of movement and freedom of
access to any means of livelihood. There is no visible plan to resettle the
IDPs. Even after kicking out all the INGOs from Sittwe last month, it’s become the question of serious humanitarian
problem. Women and children are dying every day due to lack of food, water and
heath care.
The
systematic and widespread human rights violations of Rohingya is not an
internal matter. It has caused tens of thousands of Rohingya to flee as
refugees to neighbouring countries including Malaysia and other ASEAN
countries.
Our
request to justice loving people, specially to ASEAN countries is as follows:
1. Insist
for protection of Rohingya from violence and access to basic needs such as safe
shelter, food, water, health and education. Rohingya are being segregated in
camps in cyclone- sensitive areas. They could easily die from bad weather and
deprivation of food, so they need to move to a safer location. For this, the
government must also ensure protection and assistance to NGOs providing
services to Rohingya and any other displaced people in Rakhine state.
2. Pressure
Myanmar government to restore to Rohingya their right to get listed as Rohingya
in the present census process which will last for next two months. Forcing
rohingya to register as “Bengali” under the census may lead to all of us being
forcibly deported from our own country as illegals.
3. Work
with the rest of the international community to ensure that Rohingya are
restored their full citizenship and equal rights. Now the government is hinting
that only some of us will get naturalized citizenship. However naturalized
citizenship means we cannot run in elections, we cannot own certain kinds of
property or pursue professional education, and this citizenship can be revoked
anytime.
4. Health
and education is extremely important for our survival as Rohingya. Please allow
Rohingya children living in Malaysia to get education so they can grow up as
capable and moderate Muslims. Please allow our people to have access to basic
health services.
5. Next
year, Malaysia will be the Chair of ASEAN. This year, Myanmar is the Chair and
it has censored even ASEAN leaders and ASEAN civil society from talking about
Rohingya. Please make a space for this to be discussed openly next year. We
need governments and civil society to have the freedom to openly and honestly
discuss and work for long term peaceful solutions for our people.
I
sincerely hope Malaysia, as a leading member of ASEAN and of the OIC, will
wholeheartedly work with other states, civil society and international
mechanisms to solve this issue. ASEAN has been aware of the situation for more
than 20 years but have not taken decisive action to address it, so this
situation is getting critical. We have a justified fear that the mass killings
will continue, with the aim of totally wiping out Rohingya from Myanmar.
We
know Malaysia and other ASEAN countries are concerned about Rohingya
boatpeople, refugees and asylum-seekers but if they do not help stop violence
against Rohingya, Rohingya will be
forced to leave their homes and seek survival somewhere else. It is definitely
in ASEAN’s interest to have a coordinated strategy to ensure Rohingya’s human
rights are protected.
We
Rohingya people hope Malaysia will take a prompt and concrete initiative to
solve this Rohingya crisis. Please work with us and other moderate Burmese in
our country to get a peaceful and fair solution.
Thank
you.
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Text of speech presented at the GMM-AMAN-Proham RTD on Human Rights Violations & Remedies: The Rohingyan CASE on April 17, 2014
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