Month: July 2013

Where is out Prime Minister? He does not attend Premiers meetings! Grade: F
The RCMP is looking into his staffs’ behaviour with Duffy, yet he does not feel he must  improve in how he leads, comes across as   more inclusive and not viewed as tin ear leader. We hired him. Most politicians think they own us and that business is their mentor. They work for big business and we know that. We fool ourselves every election thinking this time the leader will be ‘for us.’

Why does he not respond to issues requested by our elected provincial leaders.  His disdain for the provinces can be seen in his behaviour over the years. The PM needs to meet with the Premiers in order to get things done in the best interest of all Canadians.

The job program was not accepted by the Premiers. Just being negative is not the answer. Will the Ontario PCs agree with the Premiers or will they just keep harping on Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne? I am glad that the Premiers are acting strong around the Jobs Program.  “My way or the High way” is not the best way to make programs work. How did the Federal government come to this change without consultation with the provinces? Working together is not a strong suit of this Federal government. The Provincial Premiers did the right thing in rejecting this program as it interferes with provincial powers.

Gender of  Premiers – more women, perhaps the agenda looked more like a people’s agenda and not a big business agenda in this meeting because of them?.  Dialogue is important between the PM and Premiers. Our Federal government rejected the call for an  inquiry on missing Aboriginal women that was requested by the Premiers. I am not surprised – look at the Federal government’s history with First Nations.  I wonder if it were white women if the  the government would have acted differently? The answer is yes. A spokeswoman for Justice Minister Peter MacKay says the government has already taken concrete action, including passing legislation that gives women living on First Nations reserves access to emergency protection orders. Peter MacKay wake up, your emergency protection orders are not worth the paper it is written on.

Working as a team with our Premiers who are closer to their citizens would be a healthy change for the Harper government.

(Picture insert is my brother Richard with Odi)

If Quintana wants to resolve the Rohingyas plight in the Rakhine state he cannot use his current approach. As the UN, and Tomás Ojea Quintana cannot ask China to respect their Muslim community or Human Rights, the USA to give status to the 11 million living there, or Australia to take in Muslim refugees, nor Canada or the UK to change their citizenship laws, or Saudi Arabia to let Christians worship in public; so why does he think he can impose himself into current Myanmar?
In the past the peoples of Myanmar needed advocacy from the UN as there was a lack of free press and social media. Today, the news comes from within and there are political leaders speaking out. Let them resolve their issues. They will include the Rohingya community in some form of citizenship, perhaps not as an ethic group which may be a stretch for many within the country. The issue will be resolved by the people within Myanmar not by Quintana and his current approach.

 Added to the above historical facts,
Daw Aung San Su Kyi and other political leaders, even ex-generals, exist and can speak out for political rights, and human rights. Let them do their job as they understand the many voices within their own country. It is time that they are allowed to be the voice for Myanmar like Western politicians who are allowed the same right at the UN.

Western news agencies such as AP and Time (like Hannah Beech) using only certain local media, engaged in deliberate distortion while slanting their feeds in the West to TV outlets like Fox News, CNN to name a few. The news helps provide bias understandings towards Burma to readers. Their slanting of news also creates tensions in the region and within the country. There is a Western imperial agenda. Since the 1950s, the United States has secretly struck up alliances with the Brotherhood or its offshoots to control Communism – their rivals in the world for political control. (check Eisenhower and Said Ramadan). U.S. support of the Muslim Brotherhood, is not lost on Egyptians who just threw them out of power.

In 1986, within a period of eight months 54 Buddhist temples have been destroyed and 22 Hindu temples were burnt down by the Bangladesh military. Where was the outcry?
The world is surprised when Buddhist shrines, Christian churches get destroyed yet the Western media is silent.

The Western powers have an agenda to divide the Middle East letting women and minorities be abused by laws against rights, and killed by Islamist who do not respect the rights of others. Why should the peoples of Burma trust their meddling via the UN and Western media +NGOs.
My advice: Muslims and Rohingya within Burma work with Buddhist, Hindus and Christians within Burma/Myanmar to achieve your goals. Civil society is getting stronger there. Do not let the outsiders exploit you for their own interest.

Burma’s history goes back to at least the 2nd century B.C.
(Insert picture is of our Aunts)

What Tomás Ojea Quintana has said lately:

16 July 2013 “I have no doubt that the violations committed over the years with complete impunity have undermined the rule of law in Rakhine state, and had serious consequences for the peaceful coexistence of communities there.” the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar, Tomás Ojea Quintana. He continues, “Reform of discriminatory laws needs to accompany institutional reform, in line with the country’s national reform efforts,” he said. “How the Government deals with the situation in Rakhine state is a good indicator of the depth and commitment of its efforts at the national level to bring democracy, respect for human rights and national reconciliation to the people of Myanmar.”

In his report to the Human Rights Council in March 2013 the Special Rapporteur said he had received consistent and credible allegations of a wide range of human rights violations being committed against the Rohingya and wider Muslim population in Rakhine State. These include “sweeps” against Muslim villages, arbitrary detentions, sexual assault and torture.

Is he an independent expert? He does not even recognize issues relating to the Rakhine people and their land claims. With social media, the UN and Western NGOs are losing their grip on Rights and Justice. To have real Justice, Quintana must be balanced.

For Tomás Ojea Quintana to be heard, he must add these understandings to his report.

1) Burma was annexed to India in 1886 and then created a separate colony in 1937 with the Burma Act.

2) It was the Britishthat brought Muslims as labor from India (Bangladesh) to Burma. It flooded Burma with foreign labour, and changed the demographics of the country(and then Arakan). This requires that Britain take sole responsibility for what is happening there today.

3) Before 1823 no reference to Rohingyas in the census can be found, as well not all Muslims in Burma are Rohingya. The Rohingya have a right to self name themselves. AND Burma has a right to not view them as an ethnic group. The Rohingyas are linguistically related to the Indo-Aryan as opposed to the mainly Sino-Tibetan languages of Burma.

4) Help get the Rohingya like other non ethnic groups living in Burma who have citizenship achieve the same status.

5) Saudi Arabia, needs to be told that they are a major problem. Their large financial support for Rohingya organizations and academics speaking on the topic outside Burma makes Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State more vulnerable – due to belief that Al-Rabita, a Saudi government funded NGO, the main Islamic missionary organisation rooted in Wahhbism which is active in the region, it is entrusted with the Islamisation of the region. (look at the plight of the African Christians). Buddhists monks are weary of them.

6) Speak to the Rakhine people as well of their world view that a land grab took place during WWll killing and displaced them. That the British gave their land to non Rakhine people.

My family and I (link) loved living in Burma but left because of political reasons. Some of us live in England, some in the US, some in Australia. I live in Canada. That was the disruptive part of our lives. (Insert picture is of my mother)
We knew our history of how the British took our forefathers, Anglo Indians, to  Burma, and as an Anglo Burman I grew up with Burmese citizenship. We communicated in English and Burmses as did most everyone at that time in Rangoon.
We lived in a multi-ethnic and multi-religious community enjoying all religious holidays. There is also a book on the Jews of Burma.
This is not about Racism, or skin colour. We were of mixed race, there are also pure ethnics, and of every colour. Ask my family. My mother has light skin, I am darker. My younger brother is pure Burmese.
Women are treated as equals and I learned math and boxing like my brothers. Egalitarianism came with me to Canada and feminism was learned in Burma. I speak as a Christian raised in Rangoon.
The oppression over the past 50 years has been terrible and has taken its toll. Yet, the people survived. My mother visited Burma in the late 1990s and came back to Canada refreshed after visiting family. Some are still there and do not intend to leave.
Politics and ethnic violence does not  explain the fabric of this country and most of the people that live there. The UN paints a very negative picture of the Buddhist religion, as does the Western press and Eurocentric NGOs who make their wages from disruption and become experts of that space.

Living in Canada, I am aware of our history in Canada and the discrimination that occurs because of race, class, gender, sexuality and abilities. The Trayvon Martin case in the US and brought out discussions of 30,000 Americans killed by guns in the USA. The UN does not even mention these deaths which occurs because of political non action. So why target Burma?