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Current Situation in Shan State



Since early January, townspeople of Larngkhur have to split rocks to
pave the motor road to Wan Hart, even civil servants are not spared. 
Each person has to finish 7 "gin" (enough to pave 10 foot-square area)
and anyone who could not go has to pay 300 Kyat <approx. US $42.00 at
official rate> for a "gin".

Once, rocks were mistakenly broken into 3 inch gravel instead of the
demanded one and a half inch.  60 people were forced to break them again
and were able to finish only 3 "gin" the whole day.

People have to stay overnight and work at the sites until they finish
their quotas.  Villagers of Wan Wawng Long have to provide 2 bicycles
and a tape-recorder to the troops overseeing the work sites.

When the Burmese army has a contract to build road, it always forces the
civilian population to do most of the work without pay, and it
officials, pocket the money meant for hired laborers daily wages.

Villagers around Siseng town have to send 2 tholagyi - (mini tractors)
loads of water to the military base there every day.  People have to
take turns to fetch water to fill the loads.  The villagers and the
tractor owners get nothing in return.

Gambling is strictly banned at all fairs and religious celebrations etc.
in the city of Mandalay, the second capital of Burma proper, while all
sorts of gambling are encouraged and even initiated by Slorc officials
at Taunggyi, the capital of Shan State.

Arbitrary punishment - Sign-boards along the roads in Sipaw <Hispaw>
area northern Shan State read "3 years imprisonment for any tree
felled", but in Larngkhur, central Shan State, they say "7 years
imprisonment for any tree felled or de-barked."

The prices of some consumer goods in Shan State have increased as
follows:
1 viss of pork	400 Kyat
1 viss of small fish	480 Kyat
1 viss of big fish	400 Kyat
1 viss of chicken	400 Kyat
1 viss of garlic	200 Kyat
1 small sack of good quality rice 2,150 Kyat
(1 viss is roughly 1.6 Kg)

Most nurses and teachers are drawing only 1,200 Kyat salary.  Government
school teachers are not allowed to give private tuition.

1 gallon of gasoline = 370 - 400 Kyat in the black-market.  Though the
price is much cheaper at the government owned pumps, only those who have
a written permit can buy there, an they can only get 2 gallons for one
car for one month!

More than 300 military trucks brought in from China are being kept at a
place near Aung Thapyay on the Mandalay - Taunggyi road.  They never use
them.  Instead, they sell the gasoline in the black market and force
civilian cars to serve almost all military purposes.

Most people -- car owners, merchants etc. -- are not satisfied with the
12% income tax because mostly they only make 5% actual profits.  To
avoid having to fulfill the remaining percentage people usually bribe
the concerned officials at least enough to buy a table of good dinner --
usually 3,000 Kyat.;.  "One table" has become a code word used by the
officials when they ask for a bribe at their work tables usually in
front of the official motto "Bribery is our enemy".

Just recently, a Palawng tribal headman in Namzarng township was asked
by Slorc troops to provide a woman for the night.  When the Palawng
headman refused, saying that it was against their culture, the Burmese
soldiers threatened to shoot him and take his wife so that finally he
had to find another woman in his village for them.  //End//

<S.H.A.N. Vol. 14. No. 1>