The Rohingya Muslims are mere collateral in the global buy-in of Myanmar's new democracy, writes Azad Essa.
"To kill babies, toddlers, young children and rape women when you are trying to find insurgents doesn't make sense.”
This is what Linnea Arvidsson, a UN investigator, told a British newspaper after a report detailing horrific abuses against Rohingya Muslims was finally released.
The report, based on 204 interviews with survivors who fled the October 2016 assault, to Bangladesh, is a clear indictment on the woeful state of affairs in Myanmar’s Rakhine State.
According to the report, some 90 000 people have fled the Maungdaw region after security forces conducted vicious raids in the area, following an attack on three border guard posts in October.
Around 66 000 Rohingya have ended up in Bangladesh.
The scale, and nature of the government offensive belies any intention to root out Rohingya insurgents blamed for the attack on the border post.
Hundreds of homes, mosques, shops and markets have been razed under the military’s “clearance operations”.
In some cases, civilians, including children and the elderly were pushed into burning homes. Paddy fields were trampled, food destroyed and cattle seized.
One witness told the UN how soldiers slaughtered an 8-month-old child with a knife. Another woman described how her daughter was trying to save her from rape when a man “took out a long knife and killed her by slitting her throat”. The child was 5 years old.
The report further noted that it was likely that the accounts were an underestimation of the scale of incidents. More than half of the women interviewed reported having suffered rape or other forms of sexual violence.
At least 47 percent reported having lost a family member, 50 percent said their homes or property had been burnt or destroyed. Men and boys were rounded up before disappearing. And as people were beaten, chased and harassed, they were taunted with: “What can your Allah do for you?”
The horrific tales of violence meted out upon the Rohingya is neither new nor surprising. The community has been living in Myanmar without basic rights, including citizenship, since 1982.
The removal of citizenship always carried the intention of making the Rohingya outsiders, and the current violence is part of a long pattern of exclusion and marginalisation.
Ironically, the campaign against the Rohingya has only escalated since Myanmar embraced democracy and began opening its borders to foreign investment in 2012. That the violence began during the symbolic transfer of power also postulates the military’s need to remain relevant in the face of a coming democracy. It is partly why Aung Sun Suu Kyi will not mention “Rohingya”, or speak on their behalf, because it will annihilate her chances politically.
The northern Rakhine state, where around 800 000 Rohingya live, has been under curfew since violence erupted in June 2012. Following elections in 2015 – in which the Rohingya were, of course, not allowed to participate – Myanmar purportedly entered the realm of civilised nations.
Late last year, former US president Barack Obama lifted sanctions on the country at the behest of Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung Sun Suu Kyi. It was Suu Kyi who had originally insisted that foreigners stay out of Myanmar until democracy returned.
In many ways, Myanmar is precisely where South Africa was in the early 1990s. The transition needed "stability", and not justice, so that the foreign investors wouldn't leave.
The transition needed symbols, like Madiba and the Springbok jersey, so that white people wouldn't run away. The transition needed quick fixes and the promise of later-on solutions. Hard questions were sidelined. Redress was deferred.
Unfortunately, it's the world's pithy fascination for capitalist-democracy that has gifted Myanmar with the opportunity to finally cleanse the country of the Rohingya.
The brutality of the military junta would also be gifted to amnesia. Suddenly we must spar with official speak, when they were the credible oppressors of yesteryear. All with our consent.
Why? Because there's too much at stake.
Myanmar’s deep gas reserves await the claws of multinational exploration. Its large population is primed with opportunity as a pregnant consumer base, awaiting goods, services and other trappings of 21st century democracy. Everyone is involved.
Take the telecommunications industry: Of the three operators running the industry in 2016, one is from Norway, the other from Qatar, and the third state-owned. When a fourth tender opened in mid-2016, companies from China, Singapore, Hong Kong, France and even South Africa's MTN put in a bid. The democratic myth has facilitated global buy-in. To dissent is to lose out on a mammoth business deal.
The Rohingya are mere collateral.
* Azad Essa is a journalist at Al Jazeera. He is also co-founder of The Daily Vox.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.