Starting with diplomats from the West to Myanmar diaspora working abroad to the working or unemployed locals around your neighbourhoods, everything happening in Myanmar could only be attributed to the fault of one i.e., the current military government. Diplomats, especially those who are doing nothing now for Myanmar development at present, kept on blaming the administration for every single failure, and the only purported solution from their point of view seems to be bring back the crooked Su Kyi back from the dead. The blame is even more notable from those who contributed nothing but hot air for Myanmar stability and recovery. At least China and India have been constructively engaging Myanmar on many fronts, putting the money where their mouth lies.
Myanmar diaspora continued their funding and support of terrorist activities within the country, cheering on the NNCP (NUG. NLD, CRPH, PDF) terrorists and EAOs who has done nothing but brought heartaches and agonies to the local population in many destroyed towns and villages. While these compatriots working overseas continue to enjoy their earnings in stable currencies in peaceful countries, spare a thought for those who had to run away en mass from Kyauk Mae, Lashio and Thandwe, because the embolden attacks backed by their $ and cyber support. The irony is if these supporters are given an ultimatum of either having to stay in Koh Kant, Kayin, Kayah, Sagaing or in Nay Pyi Taw, they would have chosen the last city whole heartedly.
The working or employed locals do not fare so well either. Most of them are gifted with dubious ethics, spending their times wisely playing video games, tiktok or watching porn, doing the bare minimum work and expecting to be treated like rare earth. Putting an extra effort or carpe diem do not apply to their brilliant minds. Yet they would be world #1 in the Guinness Book for the population who swear, smear, slander, stain and sully the government, our military and its leaders the best. How can this be! MI examines the reasonableness behind the blame game based on genuine anecdotes.
The risky world of Microfinance
ABC micro-finance (names have been altered) was the biggest lender after the government in Mon State, prior to Covid. The company has a supervisor/manager Ms Alice Aye Mon who went around with her assistance to disbure micro loans to the farmers in different townships of the state. Instead of actually supervising the distribution of funds, she eventually ended up touring the state with her her young toy boy, while just leaving the funds the company disbursed at the branches with just the branch officers (who are simply responsible for collection of debts). She bribed her assistant to refrain from reporting the infringements to the company’s management. Alice eventually became so daring to the extent of creating false invoices and hotel vouchers and went AWOL in totality.
Due to her sheer adeptness, Ms Saw Yu, a branch officer in Ywar Lut village of Chaung Zone township managed to steal 55 million Kyats (a lot of money then), through just lending all the money to herself, using the farmers documents to create fake loans. Another branch officer in Thaton township, Mr Aung Mg also used the same modus operandi to lend the company funds to himself (both of them, using documentations from previous borrowers), defrauded more than 120 million Kyats from the company, sending his uneducated daughter to Japan and setting up businesses for his sons, using these funds.
When the investigation came, Alice took no responsibility at all, saying this was solely the fault of the branch officers. Only when the investigation discovered her fraudulent claims and mismanagement altogether, she suddenly disappeared and tried to half-heartedly apologise to the management for her misdeeds through an email.
All three of them has been found guilty of Criminal Breach of Trust, Theft and Misuse of Company’s funds and properties. Aung Mg had served his time and gave his farmlands to the company in lieu of some of his debts. Alice Aye Mon and Saw Yu are still on the run from warrants of arrests issued by the courts and the police. The competencies of the country law enforcement ensure that they would remain loose unless the company hires bounty hunters themselves. The company had wanted to enrich the lives of farmers and the rural population yet eventually lost their confidence in the integrity of the local staff. And hence, it since withdrew from lending across three different states within the country.
Besides the farmers and the poor being deprived of access to micro finance, more than twenty permanent jobs were lost. To lose a company that is supplementing the government efforts to develop the rural economy speaks of volume of the lasting damage to the development of these states at grassroots levels.
Yes, blame the government please, for the poor and farmers not having access to finance. Blame the government please for not providing employment opportunities to crooked staff and over-motivated employees. Blame the leaders and ministers for failing to get the companies to come over to less-developed States and Regions.
The most polite population on earth
If you do know how to read Myanmar language, just look at the Facebook pages of anti establishment, pro Su Kyi forces who want the country and its military to fail. Their pages are full of swearing, cursing, condemning, profanities, foul languages, especially on leaders and military personnel, based on fake news most of the times. A few who tries to tone down the rhetoric were tyrannised and intimidated in various forms to cower away from speaking the truth and for civility.
As an historical example, based on fake news that previous President Office Minister Soe Thane has kept or stolen $11 Billion of government money (totally maliciously created information), he and his family were always sworn and cursed at in the anti establishment Facebook pages, even if he is acknowledged as most honest, uncorrupted minister of pre-Su Kyi era, by the international community. His successful children were also tormented, slander and cyber bullied. Su Kyi supporters even wrote to the University where his daughter is a tenured professor to sack her because of her being the daughter of an alleged killer. These criminals also coerced wikipedia to alter her biography to include the falsehood of her being the daughter of a killer. Mind you, he has nothing to do with the change of government, which had happened due to elections fraud by Su Kyi administration.
How would the government and its leaders function under such circumstances! How can they ever get proper respect from other countries, if people from their own countries, keep on attacking and accusing them and their own families based on malicious agendas and allegations. “A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes!,” said Mark Twain. Yet, there is not an ounce of self policing or control, on these platforms. The current 66D criminal charges are also weak. Most people were just given fines amounting to a couple of hundred dollars.
Observe the Facebook situation in Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam or Thailand. Such a contrast from Myanmar in terms of civility and courtesy in these countries. Oh no, it is not the fault of Facebook, Su Kyi, terrorists, uneducated population, celebrities and artists, or ethnical teachers. It is the fault of the government or Myanmar military. Just blame the government please, for all the impertinence, insolence and impudence happening online.
The un-population
An insinuation of having to deal with the majority of uneducated, untrained, untrainable, unschooled, unread, illiterate, uninformed population in this country would definitely spark a tumult in the Facebook with a barrage and bombardment ranging from expletives to death threats set upon the writer or the speaker. Mind you, Myanmar population want the freedom, especially the freedom of speech; just not when other people counter their illogical and incoherent blasphemies with facts and data.
Let me give you an authentic anecdote. An agricultural entrepreneur named Mr Chan decided to start planting rubber trees on two acres of his hilly land in Mon State. He bought the seedlings himself and deployed his farm supervisor, farm worker plus two external daily wage workers to plant all the sprigs. He also get one of his managers from Yangon Office to monitor the work. It cost him more than 1.5 million Kyats last year. When it came to revisit the plantation this year, as fate would have it, more than 95% of the plants do not survive. It was surprising as rubber is the primary tree of value that is abundantly grown in this Mon State. So what’s the culprit then? It turned out that the plastic bags that were used to hold the seedlings were not removed when transplanted into the ground. How can this simple mistake be made! Either they do not know this simple act of having to remove the plastic cover (the UN- population) or all five of them do not want to bother doing their jobs properly. The end result has been the same!
While a Thai entrepreneur in similar situation was paying their staff extra bonuses as most of the seedlings he planted last year blossomed into baby trees this year, this entrepreneur from Myanmar is having to fork out another 2 million Kyats to redo the same thing of last year, wasting previous time and resources. How would the latter possibly increase the wages of his staff! Who is to blame here? Probably the government please!
Slayers of ‘Conan the Destroyer’
Conan the Destroyer would have cried if he encountered damage done to the country by its own Myanmar people. They would made him so small in his feats. They destroyed Myanmar businesses, Myanmar brands, leaders, personalities and success stories.
Probably the best beer in South East Asia, Myanmar Beer, was targeted first. Until now, a lot of F&B establishments who are anti government, are not having the national beer on their menus. They also tried to destroy Mytel, including the assassination of its CFO. The only online platform who could compete with Alibaba in Myanmar, rgo47, was also left in ruins due to their cyber terrorism. Myanmar largest bank KBZ was bombed many times, due to its unwillingness to side with the terrorists. And if someone ever ask why Myanmar do not have large corporate brands like neighbouring Thailand, they would answer that it is the government fault.
In the meantime, the terrorist keeps on bombing the highways, blowing up the rail tracks, drop bombing the schools, hospitals and bridges, blasting the transmission towers, burning the transformers, shooting randomly at express buses and extorting money from travellers through intimidation. And it is the government fault that Myanmar have lousy logistic and appalling power infrastructure too.
The speciality of just asking for money
Myanmar people, including some in position of power, are good at doing nothing effective but extracting from budgets or not using the brain and just asking for money.
Let me just give you one final example. One so called accountant of a real company keeps on asking for an increasing amount of money for the diesel fuel. The amount began to go up to twice the expense of the previous weeks. The boss who was overseas tell her that there must be something wrong with the generator to be costing that much in fuel. The accountant gave the flimsy excuse that there are longer times without power supply during the week, hence the bills mounted. Eventually when the boss returned and directed her to check the generator, it turned out that the fuel pipe was leaking inside the machine. Any extra effort other than just giving excuses is unfamiliar to most staff. The only thing the accountant is proficient in is asking for money from the boss and distributing that money. A very competent professional indeed.
A government agency tasked with bringing up one of the Myanmar sector has a lot of paid local experts. The Chairman rather than making the best use of them, to effectively develop the sector, is only interested in attending the national events, travelling to and fro Nay Pyi Taw, extracting the agency budget and doing the the least possible every month. No strategy, no tactics, just grab all the power, get all the benefits, ask for all the welfare and awards from government solely for himself. This is not fiction!
How can Myanmar develop with these types of attitudes and capabilities in both private and public sectors? Well may be it is also the fault of the government.
Detractors may argue these cases may not be representative of the population, but I beg to differ. Whatever the reality might be, we can all agree that it is always easy to find an excuse and blame the government. What we all need to is to put in some elbow’s grease to effectively get the job done through putting in an extra effort for the sake of future generations. Above and beyond the call of duty perhaps!
