12:03 PM
Waa Haa Haa
By THOMAS FULLER, Published: March 7, 2012
Aung San Suu Kyi campaigns in Myanmar
WAH THI KA, Myanmar — Wah Thi Ka is a dust-choked village without
electricity or running water, where no one has a laptop,
where no one
uses Facebook or e-mail and where sick residents sometimes die on their
way to the nearest hospital because it is too far down a deeply rutted
dirt road.
It is also ground zero for a new and risky chapter in the life of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi,
the leader of Myanmar’s democracy movement, who is transforming herself
from dissident to stump politician campaigning for a seat in
Parliament.
A global champion of democracy who won the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize
but spent the better part of two decades under house arrest, Ms. Aung
San Suu Kyi is establishing residency here for elections on April 1.
Villagers in this once obscure backwater sound as if they had won the
lottery.
“I cannot describe how happy I was when I heard the news,” said U Kyaw
Win Sein, a rice farmer in Wah Thi Ka who is helping organize the
campaign. “Some people said if we can only have the chance to see Mother
Suu in person we will be satisfied; we can die in peace.”
It is difficult to overstate Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s popularity in
Myanmar, or Burma, as the country is also known. A gathering of her
supporters in Mandalay last weekend resembled a political Woodstock,
with tens of thousands of people clogging the streets to greet her
motorcade and cramming themselves into a field where she spoke.
Yet by inserting herself into the cut and thrust of Burmese politics,
Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi is placing some of her hard-fought prestige on the
line.
Increasingly, she is being asked to propose solutions to her country’s
woes rather than merely lament them. Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi is a
consummate intellectual who spent the first decades of her life hopping
across the globe. Being elected to Parliament — assuming she wins — will
be a test of whether she can help bring prosperity to a constituency
that gets its water by pulling buckets out of a well.
“There’s an element of gamble and risk for her,” said U Thant Myint-U, the author of several books on Myanmar.
“Once she’s won, and pretty much everybody assumes she’ll win, things
will be very different,” Mr. Thant Myint-U said. “She will have to deal
with a range of issues, from the government’s fiscal policies to health
care reform to responding to demands from her constituency for
electricity, cheaper phones and more jobs.”
Until now, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s life has often been defined by her
steely defiance of the military junta and by personal tragedies,
starting with the assassination of her father, Gen. Aung San, the
founder of the Burmese Army, in 1947 when she was 2.
Biographers and filmmakers have tended to emphasize the wrenching
decisions in her adult life, including her leaving a comfortable
existence in England to pursue her political struggle for democracy
here. Her two children remained in England, and her English husband died
of cancer there as she rallied resistance to military rule, which ended
last year when a nominally civilian government came to power.
The transition from critic to policy maker has been a tricky turning point for dissidents in other countries.
Her career could follow the trajectory of Vaclav Havel, who after his
rise as an intellectual and activist against Communist rule was twice
elected president of the Czech Republic. Or she could slump like Lech
Walesa, the hard-charging hero of the Solidarity labor movement in the
waning days of Polish Communism, who alienated allies and voters,
flirting with single-digit percentages in opinion polls during his
one-term presidency.
One factor for Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, 66, is her health. The relentless
campaign is taking its toll. She fell ill during the trip to Mandalay,
cut short a speech and was put on a drip by her doctors.
Biographers say she seems to have inherited the dogged personality of
her father, who before his assassination was in line to become the first
leader of Burma after independence from Britain. Those who have met
with Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi since her release from house arrest in late
2010 say she appears driven to play a substantive role in the country’s
political future.
“I don’t think she wants to be perceived only as an icon,” said Larry M.
Dinger, the head of the United States mission here until last August.
“She’s a democrat who sees herself as a practical politician.”
During the campaign, she has spoken about the need for more jobs, better
health care and education. She emphasizes the importance of achieving
unity among the country’s many ethnic minorities. But on most issues,
Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi rarely delves into specifics. She jokes in speeches
that she does not like to make promises.
Still, Sean Turnell, one of the leading analysts on Myanmar’s economy,
described her as “fluent in the language of economics” and well versed
on issues like microfinance and property rights.
Myanmar’s economic prospects are uncertain. For a country sandwiched
between the rising economies of China and India, poverty is jarringly
endemic, especially in rural areas. Oxen pull plows; houses are made of
thatch and bamboo.
The constituency where Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi is running is a two-hour
drive south of Yangon, the country’s main city, and is not as
underdeveloped as other parts of the country. But in most areas it
remains without a sewerage system, paved roads or cellphone reception.
Residents power light bulbs with car batteries, though there are few
cars in sight.
Years of mismanagement by a corrupt military leadership have left
Myanmar without a functioning banking and finance system.
By entering politics at this delicate stage, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi is
imparting legitimacy on a government run by the same generals, now
retired, whom she battled for two decades. If the reform in Myanmar
falters, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi could be held partly responsible, analysts
say.
Even if her party, the National League for Democracy,
does well in the April 1 elections, her power in Parliament —
numerically, at least — will be slight. The 48 constituencies in
contention are just a fraction of the more than 600 seats in Parliament.
Her party’s main challenger is the Union Solidarity and Development
Party, a proxy party for the former military junta. But there are also
signs of fracture and disaffection within her wider democracy movement.
“I respect her. I like her. But she isn’t the leader of all other
democratic forces,” said U Kaung Myint Htut, a candidate running against
Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s party. “Sometimes we think she is a little
self-centered,” he added, accusing her of acting like a queen who does
not consult other democracy activists.
Bertil Lintner, one of Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s biographers, predicted
future fissures as her party entered the political system.
“As long as they were suppressed and almost banned, they remained
united,” he said. “Once the pressure comes off, all sorts of conflicts
and contradictions will come to the surface.”
Whatever bickering exists, it does not seem to be diminishing Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s standing among voters.
“I am the head of the village, so it’s hard for me to say this
directly,” said U Khin Tint, a local official in her constituency. “But I
don’t see any competition.”
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