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Trouble brewing again in Myanmar's monasteries*

By our correspondent*

26-09-2008

A year after the monks' protests were crushed it seems peaceful in Myanmar, formerly Burma. A Radio Netherlands Worldwide reporter visited a number of monasteries and witnessed increasing disquiet.

The hubbub of the streets of Mandalay in northern Myanmar dies away inside the monastery. Instead the incessant muttering of hundreds of student monks can be heard. Swathes of dark red habits hang on wash lines.

However, behind this serene façade, trouble is brewing again just over a year after the crushing of protests against poverty and oppression led by monks. "Every day, we say that something must be done, but we don't know what, how or when," says one 38-year-old monk who has lived in the monastery for 16 years. A student monk nods in agreement.

The monks and their supporters have worldly interests. Each day, they listen to Burmese-language radio broadcasts from abroad and discuss how dictatorships were done away with in foreign countries.

Religious boycott
This monastery has a tradition of activism. The monks joined in demonstrations against the military regime in 1988. Two years later, they again protested at arrests and other attempts to bring the monasteries to heel.

They paced the streets, their begging bowls turned towards the ground, stopped carrying out their duties and held protest sit-ins. They imposed a religious boycott of the military and their families. Some were killed when security forces fired on demonstrating crowds. Dozens of monasteries were raided by police and hundreds of monks were arrested.

After the iron fist came the velvet glove. The monastic leadership was courted with gifts, and restoration work was done on pagodas. This ‘hearts and minds' campaign led to a schism in the monastic community or Sangha, which persists to this day. However, more monks than ever took to the streets last year to demonstrate against the junta. The protests were crushed and there followed reprisals against the monasteries, with monks complaining of the widespread infiltration of informers.

Myanmar has about the same number of monks as soldiers, between 400,000 and 500,000. It is estimated that 10 percent of monks are politically active. They draw inspiration from the fact that monks were among the leaders of Burma's independence struggle against the British.

Alms
Like most of his colleagues in the monastery, our monk returned to his home last year to escape arrest. More than 100 monks, including 27-year-old U Gambira, the leader of the All Burma Monks' Alliance, were incarcerated and defrocked. Nearly all the rest have now returned to their monasteries. In Mandalay, they walk through the streets in long lines in the early morning to receive the traditional alms. "People don't have nearly enough to eat," he complains angrily. "We see it with our own eyes as we do our morning rounds. How can we ignore it?"

He rejects the idea put forward by the junta and by a number of senior monks that the monastic community should only concern itself with spiritual matters. "For centuries, the monks mediated between the people and their royal masters in times of crisis. He pulls out The Teachings of the Buddha and points out some passages, demonstrating that rulers have a moral obligation to take care of their people. This shows the Buddha took an interest in people's welfare.

Typhoon
Since Typhoon Nargis struck Myanmar's southern delta region on the night of 2 May, the monks have become more active in the community than ever. In the first weeks after the storm, while the regime was busy stopping foreign aid from entering the country, lorries rolled out of countless monasteries bringing supplies and manpower to the disaster area. Local monasteries acted as nerve centres for the relief operations. "Many people were killed, but the disaster did give us the opportunity to strengthen our ties as monks to the people. We were able to demonstrate our sympathy and commitment, while the government frittered away its chance of doing something good," says a monk from Sagaing, whose many monasteries makes it a centre for meditation.

However, he is not optimistic for the future. He suspects the junta will use the elections scheduled for 2010 to legitimise its rule. "Political change will take a long time, and we'll have to become far cleverer."

*RNW translation (mw)

Tags: birma, monks, myanmar

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