The Irrawaddy Magazine

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• Photo of the Week (27.12.2014)
• Landmark City Elections Underway in Rangoon
• Lawyer Confident of Testimony to Clear Burmese Duo of Britons’ Murders
• ‘It Took Everyone in the Region by Surprise, Yet the Moken Survived’

Photo of the Week (27.12.2014) Posted: 27 Dec 2014 03:30 AM PST Novice Buddhist nuns take rest under election posters opposite a polling station in Sanchaung Township, Rangoon, on Dec. 27, 2014. (Photo: Steve Tickner / The Irrawaddy) The post Photo of the Week (27.12.2014) appeared first on The Irrawaddy Magazine.

Landmark City Elections Underway in Rangoon Posted: 27 Dec 2014 12:11 AM PST Election workers hold a YCDC ballot at a polling station in Rangoon's Sanchaung Township on Saturday. (Photo: JPaing / The Irrawaddy) RANGOON — Rangoon residents went to the polls on Saturday to elect a portion of their municipal government for the first time in more than 60 years, though initial reports indicated the landmark vote was under attended by an ill-informed electorate. A total of 293 candidates are vying for 115 seats at the central, district and township levels of the Yangon City Development Committee (YCDC), which oversees management of Burma's biggest city. Early indications were of an underwhelming voter turnout. Polls opened at 6:00 am and by midday, three polling stations in Insein Township—each of which had registered 500 households as eligible to vote—had seen 148, 36 and 41 voters cast ballots, respectively. Win Cho, a former political prisoner and rights activist, is running for one of four seats on the YCDC Central Committee, the municipal government's highest representative body. The nine-member Central Committee is also comprised of five appointed members, including its chairman, Rangoon Mayor Hla Myint. The 57-year-old Win Cho, who is not eligible to vote due to his criminal record, told The Irrawaddy on Saturday that his wife had run into problems at their local polling station. "I have found that some officials at the polling station had no idea about the procedures," he said. "My name appeared on the voting list. That's not what is supposed to happen. After my complaints, they fixed it and let my wife cast the vote." Voter awareness also appeared to be an issue. "I voted for U Khin Maung Soe, from Insein Township. I know him, but the other two that I voted for, I don't know about them," said 53-year-old Aye Mu. "I hope they are good people. I just wish the three I voted for are good for the country and for the people." In Insein Township's Zaygone quarter, where many people are civil servants from police and railway departments, resident Win Lwin Oo, 48, said the election was "low-profile," and that many in his neighborhood had only learned of it on Saturday. "Another problem is that many people here are civil servants. The government has warned that every civil servant must have nothing to do with politics, so people think it'd be better for them to stay away from the election too." By 1 pm on Saturday, two Zaygone quarter polling stations where 838 households were registered had only seen 76 ballots cast, polling officials there told The Irrawaddy. In addition to the four Central Committee seats, 12 district- and 99 township-level positions are up for a vote. According to the 2014 YCDC election by-law, each district and township will consist of an elected three-member committee. Candidates for these seats are running under one of three designations—community leaders, academics and civil society representatives—and each committee will be made up of one of each. "I think the process is clear, it's not confusing, but I don't know who all of the candidates are. I only know one candidate contesting for the Central Committee," said Thi Thi, a 45-year-old voter from Insein Township. "I voted for him because I know him personally. He and his family do social work in the ward." Election officials have set up 1,086 polling stations across Rangoon's 33 townships. Polls close at 4 pm, and ballots will be tallied at each individual polling station, with the results then forwarded to City Hall. YCDC Election Commission chairman Tin Aye told The Irrawaddy last week that final results could be expected within 48 hours of the vote cut-off. While Saturday's polls mark a measure of democratization for a municipal body that has been appointed since 1949, critics say the election falls short of allowing for a fully representative city government. Only one member of each registered household in Rangoon, a city of some 5 million people, has been allowed to vote, and the post-election Central Committee will remain majority-appointed by Rangoon Division's unelected chief minister. This week Rangoon Mayor Hla Myint appeared to downplay the significance of the vote, saying YCDC committee members were "not policymakers or decision-makers," and were ultimately tasked with carrying out the dictates of their divisional and Union government superiors. Reporting by Lawi Weng, San Yamin Aung and Feliz Solomon. The post Landmark City Elections Underway in Rangoon appeared first on The Irrawaddy Magazine.

Lawyer Confident of Testimony to Clear Burmese Duo of Britons’ Murders Posted: 27 Dec 2014 12:07 AM PST Htoo Chit, left, Aung Myo Thant, second left, and Kyaw Thaung of a committee set up by the Burmese Embassy in Thailand to investigate the Koh Tao island murder case address the media at Orchid hotel in Rangoon on Dec. 18, 2014. (Photo: Reuters) BANGKOK — A lawyer for two Burmese nationals indicted over the murder of two British tourists on a Thai holiday island said on Friday he was confident of persuading scared witnesses to testify and exonerate the accused. A trial date was set on Friday for July 8 next year by a court on Koh Samui, the neighboring island to Koh Tao, where the bodies of David Miller, 24, and Hannah Witheridge, 23, were found on a beach on Sept. 15. Police arrested Burmese workers Zaw Lin and Win Phyo, both 21, in October, saying their DNA samples matched those found on the victims. After a pre-trial hearing on Friday, Nakorn Chompoochart, the head of suspects' legal team, said there was more time to convince witnesses currently in Burma to appear at the trial. A committee of investigators set up by the Burmese Embassy in Bangkok last week said potential witnesses able to prove the suspects were innocent were too scared to appear in court for fear of retribution by Thai police or their former employers. "Now we have witnesses but the problem is they are scared. We might need more time and we might have to go to Myanmar to meet them," Nakorn told reporters. "I'm confident because we have enough information to convince the court that the two did not commit the crime." The embassy's investigators said they had interviewed about 40 Burmese nationals who were working on Koh Tao, a tiny island and popular diving destination, at the time of the murders. They said "strong witnesses" had returned to Burma because they were worried they would be implicated in the crime. The murders dealt a blow to Thailand's vital tourism industry, worth about 10 percent of its economy, when it was already hurting from a rash of cancellations due to months of unrest and a May 22 coup. The military government pressed police to solve the case quickly. Zaw Lin and Win Phyo, who were migrant workers, initially confessed but later retracted their statements, saying they were given under duress. Police deny that and say they have solid evidence. The post Lawyer Confident of Testimony to Clear Burmese Duo of Britons' Murders appeared first on The Irrawaddy Magazine.

‘It Took Everyone in the Region by Surprise, Yet the Moken Survived’ Posted: 26 Dec 2014 03:30 PM PST A still from the film "Sailing A Sinking Sea," which explores Moken mythology and culture. (Photo courtesy of Olivia Wyatt) Olivia Wyatt is an American filmmaker and photographer originally from Little Rock, Arkansas. Her current project, a documentary film titled "Sailing A Sinking Sea," explores the culture and mythology of the Moken, or "sea gypsies," of Thailand and Burma—a nomadic group numbering only a few thousand who live for long periods at sea. When a devastating tsunami hit 10 years ago on Dec. 26, 2004, the majority of Moken living off the coast of Thailand survived, despite their villages being swept away. The Irrawaddy contributor Sam Cartmell spoke with Wyatt about the film and her experience living with Moken communities as modernity closes in. Question: How did you come to make an experimental documentary with the Moken people from southern Thailand? Answer: I first read about the seafaring nomadic community, the Moken, after the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami in December 2004. It took everyone in the region by surprise, yet the Moken survived. They survived due to their mythology, their ancestral wisdom, their shaman's dreams, their symbiosis with nature and their ancient songs. Nothing modern predicted nor was able to prepare people for the disaster when it came. I thought it was so beautiful that one of the smallest ethnic communities in that region had such an innate knowledge of surviving an upset sea. The Moken not only predicted the tsunami, but they are aquatic super heroes, according to some researchers—they can swim farther and see farther than any other human being under water. The Moken live in little wooden boats with their entire family the majority of the year and during monsoon season sleep on islands in houses set on stilts. As a lover of indigenous communities and the sea, I was captivated by the Moken. I continued to read about them as the years passed and discovered that their life was rapidly becoming engulfed by modernity. I read that their population was in decline, that their communities were becoming government-endorsed tourist attractions and that governments were also controlling how often they fished and how much they made from selling their fish. I discovered that many of them were no longer nomadic and read that many Moken were dying. It saddened my heart to read all of this. I knew that soon we wouldn't be able to differentiate Moken from [people in] the rest of the world and that their traditions, life-saving stories, mythology and songs were disappearing. I decided I wanted to make a documentary exploring their mythology and culture. It took three years, me losing almost everything in Hurricane Sandy and my friend Will Oldham believing in me and the project before I would actually make the dream a reality. I went and stayed with 13 different Moken communities in the spring of 2013 and documented everything I could. I interviewed village elders, mothers, lovers, and teenagers about their mythology and recorded as much music as possible. Q: There are some great singing and percussion performances in the film. Can you talk about the music in the film and the role of music in Moken culture? A: Many members of the Moken community performed several of these songs [in the film] during ceremonies and some songs were sung during interviews to illustrate something to me. There are a few songs that blend Moken [style] with traditional southern Thai styles. My favorite songs come from the ceremonies and generally [involve] free form call and responses between a man and a woman. I found these songs to always have a sense of humor. There is a song about a 'shrimp' and a 'crab' becoming new lovers and hiding from each other and the singers are actually referring to male and female genitalia. There are Moken songs for everything. There is even a song Moken sing to the fish while spear fishing. Songs are very powerful among the Moken community. In fact, there is one song that children sing to call the waves, and some elders feel that song carries enough energy to create a tsunami. It is also interesting to me that within the Moken community women are the percussionists. The Moken used to have guitars made of coconuts and I searched high and low for one. I even traveled six hours by boat to an island to find one [but] when I got there they said, 'We used to have one right here, but someone stole it.' Q: How does your film deal with the political and economic pressures faced by Moken and other nomadic and semi-nomadic communities? A: I believe ethnic communities, regardless of where they are, should be allowed to exist on the land that their ancestors also called home. There are so many battles the Moken have to fight— missionaries, modernity, governmental sources, non-governmental agencies—the right to land shouldn't be one of those struggles. The films I create are meant to celebrate cultures rather than exploring the atrocities surrounding them. I feel that the news and other films do a good enough job of covering that aspect. With 'Sailing A Sinking Sea,' I only explore Moken mythology and music, though several of the Moken interviewed do mention the challenges they face today due to political, economic, and even environmental factors. While these issues are briefly touched upon, they are not a central focus. The world is getting smaller and unfortunately we cannot [stop] these factors [from affecting] their lives, but it is my hope that through sharing and celebrating how beautiful and unique the Moken community is, it will cause others to want to approach it delicately and in a way that maintains the distinctiveness of the community versus destroying it. Q: Has 'Sailing A Sinking Sea' been completed? What are your plans for the film? A: I have just finalized a cut of the film, however I still need to do audio mastering and color correction. I have applied to many festivals and am hoping to be selected to show my film. My main goal is to have a DVD release of the project and I would like to have screenings on the Moken islands. One village elder said that in his village, which is on the mainland and often referred to as Moken, even the Moken children no longer speak the language and they are losing a sense of pride for their ancestry. He felt that the project could help make them feel honored to be who they are and want to carry on their traditional ways. I truly hope this is the case! Sam Cartmell co-founded and regularly contributes to The Archive of Southeast Asian Music (http://aseam.info/). The post 'It Took Everyone in the Region by Surprise, Yet the Moken Survived' appeared first on The Irrawaddy Magazine.

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