Aung San Suu Kyi: Daughter of Independence, Mother of a Future Free from Fear

By EVE SCHAEFFER

Aung San Suu Kyi advises that “you should not let your fears prevent you from doing what you know is right,” yet her actions speak even louder than her words. On her speaking tour to promote democracy in Burma, she strode without hesitation toward a line of soldiers who threatened to shoot if she took one more step. She took part in a hunger strike for twelve days until her demands for humane treatment of her imprisoned political supporters were met. In order to serve the people of her homeland, she eschewed the opportunity to watch her children grow up, as well as the last chance to see her husband before his death. Among political prisoners, however, Aung San Suu Kyi’s courage is not unique. She fits the common mold of a political prisoner in that she stands up to injustice and consequently is deprived of her liberties by government officials seeking to secure their own power. Nonetheless, Aung San Suu Kyi’s story is extraordinary in its combination of historical legacy, peaceful resistance, and self-sacrifice.

Aung San Suu Kyi is the daughter of General Aung San, a lauded historical figure in Burma. The equivalent of the United States’ George Washington, Aung San won independence for Burma in 1948 from Japanese occupation in World War II and also from British colonial rule. A few months before he would have assumed the presidency of Burma on January 4, 1948, however, Aung San was assassinated on the orders of his political rival. The two-year-old Aung San Suu Kyi, who thus lost her father at the dawn of Burmese independence, grew up in his legacy. Although she left Burma at the age of fifteen when her mother was assigned an ambassadorship to India, Aung San Suu Kyi was raised to honor the heroic qualities of her father, notably his selflessness, courage, and self-discipline, and she studied his life’s work in college at Oxford. At the same time, she studied Burmese culture and history, her Buddhist religion, and the teachings of Gandhi.

In 1988 Aung San Suu Kyi was living in England with her husband, a British scholar, and her two sons then in their early teens. Upon receiving a midnight call that her mother back in Burma had suffered a severe stroke, Aung San Suu Kyi immediately left her family and returned to Burma. While Daw Suu Kyi (as Aung San Suu Kyi is also known) was nursing her ailing mother, a youth-led democracy movement flared up in Burma, opposing the existing government (a military dictatorship established in 1962). The peaceable demonstrations were greeted with massive violence by the government military force, resulting in the slaughter of more protesters than died in Tiananmen Square. Aung Sun Suu Kyi had long believed that she would return to Burma to serve the people of the country when her leadership was necessary, and she realized that this was the time.

Initially, the people of Burma did not know Aung San Suu Kyi other than as the daughter of their national hero. When Aung San Suu Kyi first addressed a large crowd of pro-democracy protesters, they greeted her with both curiosity and respect. Daw Suu Kyi implored the government to halt its violent anti-demonstration actions and suggested the creation of a “People’s Consultative Committee” to work toward reconciliation. The words spoken were Aung San Suu Kyi’s, not her father’s. The Burmese people heard her passion, humor and underlying devotion, and they adopted her lovingly as their spokesperson and leader. Still, it may be asked whether Daw Suu Kyi rose to her position of leadership based solely on the legitimizing influence of her father’s legacy. Especially as a woman, she faced cultural challenges to her authority. Aung San Suu Kyi herself once noted “an outmoded Burmese proverb still recited by men, who wish to deny that women too can play a part in bringing necessary change and progress to their society: ‘The dawn rises only when the rooster crows.’” The memory of General Aung San was certainly the starting point in Daw Suu Kyi’s adoption by the Burmese people as well as in her adoption of the cause of Burmese democracy. Daw Suu Kyi’s own book, Freedom from Fear, a collection of her essays and speeches, begins with a piece entitled, “My Father,” seeming to imply that one must first know the life of Aung San before you can understand the ideas of his daughter. In a 1997 interview, Aung San Suu Kyi defines her perception of Aung San’s role in her present life: “My father is no longer alive and I am very much aware of it . . . I may be alone, but I know I have [his] backing.”

Aung San Suu Kyi’s spiritual connection to her father may give her most strength during her periods of enforced isolation from the rest of society. In 1989 she was placed under house arrest in response to her organizing activities. Seeking to unite and enlarge the pro-democracy movement, Daw Suu Kyi had traveled throughout the country addressing crowds of thousands. Her speeches emphasized human rights and non-violence as the goal and means of the democracy movement, both of which, she explained, were rooted in the Burmese Buddhist tradition. Having worked in the United Nations for three years after college, Daw Suu Kyi was experienced in international relations and publicized the government’s abuse of power in the international community. Intent on thwarting this threat to its authority, the government first demonized Aung San Suu Kyi as a Communist and then, citing law prohibiting political gatherings larger than four people, placed her under “restricted residence.”

In September 1988, shortly before the house arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi, the dictator of Burma was replaced by a military regime, the State Law and Order Restoration Committee (SLORC), which restored the nation’s pre-colonial name of “Myanmar” and promised to yield power to the winning political party in a free and fair election. When this election took place in 1990, the political party founded by Daw Suu Kyi, the National League for Democracy (NLD), won 82% of the seats. Although Daw Suu Kyi was prohibited from declaring candidacy, it is widely believed that the votes cast for candidates of the NLD were intentionally cast for her. Following this election upset, the SLORC reneged on its promise, refusing to relinquish its power.

In its treatment of Aung San Suu Kyi, the SLORC is acutely conscious of the special position she holds in the country. They understand that to dishonor the memory of her father would have even more dire consequences in terms of public opinion than to directly demonize her. Hence, they grant her official guardianship of his venerated legacy, and they have treated her differently from other dissident prisoners. When first detained under house arrest, Daw Suu Kyi insisted that she be treated the same as her political supporters; if they were in a real prison, suffering physical torture, she should be by their side. Her protest manifested itself in the hunger strike, ending with an agreement that her supporters in prison would not be maltreated.

While Daw Suu Kyi was under house arrest in the early 1990s, the SLORC experimented with the boundaries of publicly tolerable treatment toward her. At times during her detention, Daw Suu Kyi was denied adequate nutrition. Her weight fell from 106 pounds to 90, her hair fell out, she had heart palpitations, and was often too weak to get out of bed. She was denied visits and mail, and signs stating “No U-Turn” and “No Slowing Down” were prominently posted on her front gate. Throughout this imprisonment, however, Aung San Suu Kyi’s spirit proved indomitable. She practiced her father’s famous trait of self-discipline as well as her own teachings of non-violence and the value of human rights for all. When healthy, she exercised, studied, practiced her Buddhism, and worked in her garden (the SLORC later filled her garden with snakes). Describing her house arrest experience, Daw Suu Kyi states: “I got used to it immediately. I decided, well, I’ve been placed under house arrest and I need to enjoy it as much as I can.”

Unlike many political prisoners who, once imprisoned, have no control over their release, Aung San Suu Kyi has always been given an option: she has been free to leave the country at any time with the provision that she will never be allowed to return. Arguably, Daw Suu Kyi’s greatest display of courage, her “freedom from fear,” lies in her decision to stay in Burma after her husband and teenage sons were denied permission to visit. Supporting their mother and wife from a distance, however, in 1991 her eldest son accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on her behalf and her husband published her book, Freedom from Fear. In 1997, Daw Suu Kyi explained that she did not agonize over the pain of not seeing her family “because it doesn’t do any good. You don’t help your family in that way.” Yet in 1999 she suffered even more for her country when her husband, then fighting prostate cancer at age fifty-three, was disallowed a visit to her. Because leaving the country to be with her husband would mean permanently relinquishing her position in the movement for a democratic Burma, Aung San Suu Kyi made the personal sacrifice to never again see her husband before he died that year in England.

Aung San Suu Kyi was released from house arrest in 1995, but military roadblocks prevented her from leaving Burma’s capital city of Rangoon. She was again detained in her residence in September 2000. Daw Suu Kyi’s attempts to secure international sympathy for her cause have been successful. In 2000, President Clinton, with backing from Europe and Japan, warned the SLORC against violently confronting the opposition because “the whole world is watching,” and he awarded Daw Suu Kyi the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In August 2001, the SLORC released but then quickly re-detained Daw Suu Kyi in house arrest.

Aung San Suu Kyi’s “freedom from fear,” her courage to persist in peaceful resistance and to accept self-sacrifice, may be a quality critical to the survival of every political prisoner. Daw Suu Kyi’s mission, in part, is to explain that in order to attain a peaceful world, all people, both the oppressed and the oppressor, must strive for this virtue. As she explains, “Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.” In a sense, Daw Suu Kyi’s imprisonment itself has promoted her cause in that it has given her the opportunity to provide for the world an example of “freedom from fear.” Maintaining, through her father’s legacy, a spiritual connection to the victory of independence in her country’s history, Aung San Suu Kyi’s life work has the power to give birth to a more peaceful and democratic independent Burma.

NOTE: On May 6, 2002 Suu Kyi was released from over a decade of restriction and house arrest — on the same day a longer paper upon which this article was based was presented to a joint Harvard-M.I.T. class on political prisoners by Modesto’s Eve Schaeffer.

Join Connections for food, frolic, and fundraising—September 14

By DAN ONORATO

A two hour bedazzling balloon ride over our rich heartland; six months of scrumptious berry-apricot-apple pies; an unforgettable dining experience prepared by Mediterranean chef Luigi Fulabulone; a one hour photo shoot with Modesto's sexiest Elvis impersonator—these are just a few of the tantalizing items to be auctioned at the Stanislaus Connections Fund-raiser on Saturday, September 14. Come one and all! This is not just a quick-action auction with bargains galore.

This potluck party with food and fun for all will take place at the five acre Ceres estate of Robert Rudholm and Jeff Schweichert. This splash of Thurman Field fireworks and Modesto's famous weekly auction mixed with potluck and party of World Music will be  one glorious jambalaya of a night not to be missed.

We need auction items, from grand to fanciful, delicious to practical such as those from past auctions: a night for two in San Francisco or a comfy Sierra cabin; a gift certificate to Gypsy's unique clothing shop; tickets to a Sacramento King's game next year when they will chasten the Lakers; three hours of free house cleaning, window cleaning, or weed pulling; free tickets to a rhythm and blues music concert at The State Theatre; an evening of Rock, Rumble, and Roll at downtown Modesto's newest night club, Fat Cat; three free lessons to learn the Tango; a piece of art from Amado Peña; dinner out to one of Modesto's fine restaurants; romantic dessert under the stars at an undisclosed hideaway along the Tuolumne River; a home-cooked repast for four that will rival the Grecian gods' ambrosian feasts on Mt. Olympus. All sorts of less extravagant items, from baked goods to home-made original photo-note cards, exotic cactus plants to jars of prize-contending jams and jellies would also tease the tastes of the eager and generous crowd of Connections supporters. As you play with the possibilities of what you might donate, mark your calendar now.

Don't miss this delightful evening. Bring your favorite dish to share, relax with old friends and meet new ones, frolic and spend wildly at the fun-filled auction, and dance to rhythms from around the world. This is a party for everyone, so for kids of all ages the password is "surprise and adventure."

See you there, Saturday, September 14!

ACTION: To donate auction items, call Dan Onorato, 526-5436, or Jim Costello, 537-7818.

Khmelnitskiy/Modesto mark 15th year as sister cities

By TINA ARNOPOLE DRISKILL

Khmelnitskiy Ukraine, the first of Modesto’s five sister cities, and Modesto are celebrating a 15 year anniversary as Sister Cities this summer.

A delegation of Modesto Sister City Committee members and the American Ambassador to Ukraine attended ceremonies in Khmelnitskiy on June 15. An 18 foot statue incorporating an old missile topped by a globe with joining hands and doves flying overhead was presented on behalf of Modesto by the Modesto Sister City representatives.

Members of the Modesto committee have learned since some of the group first visited Khmelnitskiy in 1987 that the missile in the statue may have been one of over 90 missiles in the Khmelnitskiy area which were once trained on the United States.

The anniversary celebration will continue in August, when a 10 member delegation, from Khmelnitskiy, including the local mayor, makes a reciprocal visit to Modesto beginning August 9. The Modesto Sister City Committee is seeking host families to house the Ukrainian group for a one to two week stay.

In Memoriam

GORDON W. NUTSON  —  SAMUEL R. TYSON

As this issue goes to press, we mourn the very recent deaths of two wise elders of the Modesto Peace/Life Center.

Gordon Nutson was a Conscientious Objector in World War II and one of the original founders of the Center in 1970. He was most active as a Draft Counselor during the Vietnam War, and remained loyal to and supportive of the Center until his death on June 15 at the age of 88 years.

Sam Tyson was a lifelong Quaker peace activist and World War II Conscientious Objector. His commitment to nonviolent direct action led him to participate in numerous acts of civil disobedience over many years. One of the original founders, he remained a guiding light at the Center through many different eras, issues, and changes. Until a few weeks ago, Sam still regularly attended Board meetings, volunteered weekly, and took care of many routine office tasks. He died on June 17 at age 83 years.

With the deaths of these two men, an important era in the Modesto Peace/Life Center’s 32-year history is drawing to a close, and the torch is being passed to succeeding generations of peace activists. The September issue of Connections will include more detailed tributes to these men. For now, we honor their lifelong commitments and bid them fond farewell.

State of the North American Environment

The Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC), charged with administering the NAFTA side agreement on the environment, released its first analysis of the overall state of the North American environment. The report assembles information so that policymakers and private citizens can decide what steps to take to move more rapidly towards sustainability. It examines the economy and our daily lives to show the risks and the damage we are causing, not just to the environment but to ourselves and to our health. It includes a number of conclusions and recommendations in virtually every key area of the environment. Findings include:

• Natural disasters becoming more frequent, more expensive

• Poor are hit hardest by environmental problems

• Transportation follows unsustainable trend

• Soil erosion declines but threat of drought rising

• North Americans “fishing down the food chain”

• Freshwater species more vulnerable to extinction

• Global warming-induced rise in sea level would threaten Florida, Louisiana, North Carolina, among other areas worldwide

• GDP revisions needed to measure “true cost” of development

• Canada and the United States are world’s largest per capita water users

South Africa finds hope for HIV/AIDS victims

An interview with TOM HAMPSON by Myrtle Osner

Home from a recent trips to South Africa and Afghanistan, Tom Hampson says there are small seeds of hope being planted around the world.

Recent news would make you believe that Africa will soon be de-populated by the AIDS epidemic. That may indeed be so, but women and children are suffering the stigmatization of this disease, and they are fighting back.

“We often feel overwhelmed by such issues,” says the former Modesto Peace/Life Center Board member. “But what is heartening is encountering the partners of Church World Service around the world who are doing creative things to help.”

Just back from Durban, South Africa, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe, Tom, Church World Service (CWS) community education specialist, helped make a unique concert possible. He arranged concerts by Tim Janis, world renowned U.S. classical composer called “Symphony of Hope”. It featured the Kwa/Zulu-Natal Philharmonic Orchestra and a choir whose members are all HIV +. Thousands of dollars were raised at the concerts performed in Johannesburg and Durbin, co-sponsored by Church World Service, U.S. based international humanitarian relief and development organizations, and the South African Council of Churches.

The money will help support the Sinikithemba HIV/AIDS Christian Care Centre. Others performing were the Imilonji KaNtu Choral Society, a choir which sang at Nelson Mandela’s inauguration as President of South Africa.

“We need to ensure that all people with HIV/AIDS are treated with dignity, respect and love,” said the regional Church World Service Director, John McCullough. “Many people living with AIDS report that the greatest pain is not having the disease itself, but the stigma associated with the disease.”

Tom glows with pride when he describes the singing of the African people, like no other in the world. A CD of the concert will be available this fall.

Tom, gave me a pin to wear, with the AIDS symbol and the South African flag hand-beaded by the women of Sinikithemba Christian Care Center. The most tragic result of the AIDS epidemic is the effect on the children. Instead of perishing alone, these women and their families earn money through pin sales to support themselves.

Refugees in Afghanistan assisted

Tom also told me of the work CWS is doing in Afghanistan. A housing program near Kabul is rebuilding houses for those devastated by the war. Six million Afghans have experienced famine, four million are refugees, 1.2 million are internally displaced. For 48 years CWS has worked in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Its work focuses on shelter and women’s income generation programs. Families provide the bricks and labor and CWS gives them a housing kit with supplies to build a home and a latrine.

Also exciting is the income generation program in Kabul. At least 1600 widows need a safety net after the 23 years of Taliban rule and continued strife. The women make quilts and are paid $1 for each one. These quilts are then distributed to hospitals, clinics and displaced persons in Afghanistan. There is a similar program in Pakistan for refugee women there. When women earn income, the whole family benefits.

If you walked in the CROP walk or participated in One Great Hour of Sharing at your place of worship, you helped support Church World Service and its worldwide work. Church World Service has no evangelical component, but serves people in need wherever they are, of any faith or none.

Tom Hampson lives and works in Modesto and is active in the Modesto Peace Life Center. Church World Service headquarters are in Elkhart, Indiana.

ACTION: You may buy this pin for a $5 donation at www.churchworldservice.org/Educ_Advo/aids-pin.html or by calling 1-800-297-1516.

The unraveling of health insurance
By DON MCCANNE
(submitted by Betty Vencill)

“New health-insurance policies that increase employees’ responsibility for costs could ultimately result in shrinking coverage for insured people. Instead of bringing people into one gigantic pool where the risk is spread evenly, market-driven policies further fragment the system. Just as the young, in effect, subsidize Social Security for the old, the healthy have traditionally subsidized health-insurance costs for the sick or injured so that no one is clobbered by huge bills. Consumers Union does not support replacing Social Security with self-directed savings accounts, nor does it support undermining health insurance with personal health accounts.”

“With no viable solutions in sight... “

— Consumer Reports, July, 2002

Comment: Personal health accounts are the insurance industry’s response to medical savings accounts. They will have appeal for the young and healthy who can watch their accounts grow, and they will be a disaster for those with significant medical needs who will rapidly spend down their accounts and be left with inadequate PPO or EPO catastrophic coverage.

Consumers Union recommends budgeting for health care expenses even if you think you have good insurance. Because insurance companies are shifting risk to the beneficiaries, any significant medical problem can leave you financially strapped.

Formerly, health insurance provided security that would allow you to build financial reserves for other needs such as supplementing Social Security at retirement. Now, the insurance industry is using your financial reserves to provide them with security against losses in the event that you would require health care. And for that non-service, we pay them close to a couple hundred billion dollars. Why do the incrementalists insist that we protect this industry, especially at the cost of perpetuating profoundly inhumane health care injustice?

What’s ahead for health insurance in the United States?

By DON MCCANNE
Physicians for a National Health Plan
(submitted by Betty Vencill)

“The announcement that most of the nation’s biggest insurers - Aetna, CIGNA, Humana, the United Health Group, and Wellpoint Health Network - will be introducing a new kind of health plan during the next year or two signals the beginning of a new era in health insurance in the United States. These plans feature a complicated menu of premiums, copayments, and deductibles that will add impetus to the trend of employers’ offering a defined contribution for health benefits. Each employee will get a fixed amount of money to spend as he or she sees fit and will use the Internet to “shop” for medical care. The plans will encourage the use of medical savings accounts in combination with catastrophic-illness insurance to cover expenditures that exceed a large deductible. One of their major effects will be to shift the burden of health care costs from employees who use little care to those who use more. Thus, the new plans will be another nail in the coffin of health insurance as a form of social insurance.”

                        — Victor R. Fuchs, Ph.D., Stanford University, The New England Journal of                    Medicine June 6, 2002

(Dr. Fuchs then discusses the erosion of social insurance, the advantages and disadvantages of the new plans, and the problems with reliance on catastrophic-illness insurance. He then closes with the following comments on the reemergence of social insurance.)

The case for the fairness of the social-insurance model will be strengthened as people realize that most health problems have, at least in part, a genetic basis. The case for the model’s efficiency will benefit from recognition that employment-based insurance has high administrative costs but provides no advantages to society as a whole. The desire to exert more direct control over increasing expenditures will provide an additional reason to introduce some form of national health insurance.

The timing of such a change, however, will depend largely on factors external to health care. Major changes in health policy are political acts undertaken for political purposes. The political nature of such changes was apparent when Bismarck introduced national health insurance to the new German state in the 19th century. It was apparent when England adopted national health insurance after World War II; and it will be apparent in the United States as well.

National health insurance will probably come to the United States after a major change in the political climate - the kind of change that often accompanies a war, a depression, or large-scale civil unrest. Until then, the chief effect of the new plans will be to make young and healthy workers better off at the expense of their older, sicker colleagues.