Category: ASEAN

For 50 years, Maung Maung has been a horse-and-buggy driver in the ancient city of Bagan, ferrying tourists around to its soaring spires and iconic Buddhist pagodas and temples.  But tourists have dwindled to a trickle, thanks to the combination of the Covid-19 pandemic that reached Myanmar in March 2020 and military coup the next February. “Recently, a few tourists came back but not as many as before,” said Maung Maung, who’s 70. “Now there are very few. Some days, I don’t make a single dime (what word did he use?). Others, I make only a little money.” Making matters worse, rising inflation has eroded his spending power.  When business was good, he typically made 20,000-30,000 kyats (U.S. $6-10) a day, but that’s dropped sharply. He said he charges 1,300 kyats (about U.S. $0.40) per hour for pleasure rides around Bagan and dedicated prices to specific temples pilgrims want to visit. Since the junta took power, a year-and-a-half ago, Myanmar’s economy has tumbled. Last year, its GDP contracted by 18 percent, and the International Monetary Fund estimates that 1.6 million jobs were lost in 2022, or around 7% of the workforce.  Economic growth estimates for 2022, including the World Bank’s forecast of 3% growth, seem overly optimistic now that about 40 percent of the population is living under the poverty line. Soaring Inflation, Plunging Currency Inflation was 14 percent in mid-2022 and accelerated to more than 18 percent by mid-September, with rice prices up 35-50% and gas prices spiking amid shortages. That‘s impacted all kinds of businesses, as many rely on generators due to frequent electricity shortages.  Myanmar’s currency, the kyat, lost 60 percent of its value against the dollar in 2022. The kyat briefly traded at a record low, below 4,000 kyat to the U.S. dollar, while the official conversion rate is 2,100. The son of farmers, Maung Maung’s father bought him a buggy when he was just 20 years old. He told RFA Burmese that the vehicle had provided him with a steady stream of income for many years behind a mare named Mi Chaw. Bagan, in Myanmar’s central Mandalay region, has long been a cultural capital and a major tourist hub that’s home to the remains of more than 2,200 Buddhist temples and pagodas, mostly dating from between the 11th and 13th centuries. The former capital of the Bagan kingdom that would unify the regions that collectively became known as Myanmar, the city was officially recognized as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2019.  Despite dwindling income and few visitors, Maung Maung continues running his business because driving horse-drawn buggies is what he knows, and is one of the few jobs he can do at his age. When he was younger, Maung Maung would farm during the tourism off-season, but he no longer has the strength for agricultural labor. Kyi Kyi Swe, Maung Maung’s daughter, told RFA that he cares deeply about the horses he has bred and taken care of their whole lives, and would never think of abandoning them. “Before, he asked his son to drive the buggy while he worked on the farms,” she said. “As he has grown old, he can’t do farm work and is back in buggy driving.” “He takes good care of [Mi Chaw]. He doesn’t want to see her lean. He feeds her all the time. Even at night, he gets up to feed her,” she said. “The horse also knows him well. She whinnies for more food at night. My dad leaves home around 5:30 a.m. every morning to drive to the buggy station and wait for his turn to drive.” Dwindling tradition Other buggy drivers in Bagan told RFA that the city council has granted licenses to around 300 people to operate horse-drawn carts, but only around 100 of them are actively working due to the decrease in tourism. One driver, named Soe Tint, said horse drawn buggies are as much a symbol of Bagan as the landscape and temples, and are often seen together in promotional material for tourists. But even prior to the pandemic and the coup, the number of buggies in Bagan had declined as they were replaced with modern vehicles. “I want to sell my horse since I have farm work. I paid around 1,500,000 kyats for them, but now they are worth only 700,000-800,000 kyats. I would even sell them for 600,000 kyats only, he said. “If things get better and the visitors return, the buggy business would grow again. Touring Bagan is most enjoyable by horse-drawn buggy. But they won’t come back if the good times don’t return.” Maung Maung acknowledged that if business conditions don’t improve, he will have to give up his business and depend on his family. “My business is so bad that I have been struggling to make ends meet. I just want to make enough for food and other necessities, like rice, cooking oil or salt,” he said. “If I get just a few more visitors [than average], I can make just enough to cover necessities. If I don’t have any, I have to buy them on credit. If the business doesn’t improve, I will have to sell my horses and live on my children’s income.” Translated by Ye Kaung Myint Maung for RFA Burmese. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

Cambodia’s Supreme Court ordered the Court of Appeals to retry the case of Kak Sovanchhay, the autistic teenage son of opposition activists, who was last year sentenced to eight months in prison for incitement and insulting public officials. Kak Sovannchhay, 17, is the son of Kak Komphear, a jailed senior official of the banned opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP).  He was arrested at his home in Phnom Penh on June 24, 2021, over a Facebook post and voice messages in which he was critical of the government in response to someone calling his father a traitor. The Phnom Penh Municipal Court sentenced him on Nov. 1, but credited him four-and-a-half months for time served and commuted the remainder of his sentence, thereby allowing his release a little more than a week later. Additionally the court ordered he remain under judicial supervision for two years. He appealed the conviction but it was upheld on March 14, 2022. The Supreme Court on Wednesday accepted the facts from the appellate trial but rejected the conviction and six conditions set on Kak Sovannchhay while under judicial supervision. Prum Chantha, Kak Sovannchhay’s mother, told RFA’s Khmer Service that her son’s imprisonment was a threat from the government because her family continues to promote democracy. She said the Court of Appeals should drop the sentence because her son, who was only 16 at the time of his arrest, was a child. Additionally the sentence leaves a mark on his record that could seriously affect his future. “First, it affects his opportunities to learn, second he gets discrimination, and third, when he goes to find work, his name will be associated with the conviction, so it is a very serious punishment,” said Prum Chantha. “He is just a minor and he has a disability,” she said, referring to his autism. “He is very young.” Kak Sovannchhay’s lawyer Sam Sokong told RFA he believes the verdict is a violation of his client’s human rights. “I urge the authorities as well as the Royal Government to consider the case of this child and to consider the interests of the child as enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of the Child and other rights related to children’s rights,” he said. Based on Cambodia’s Penal Code and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which Cambodia is a party, judges should be highly considerate and refrain from convicting children, opting for rehabilitation or education instead of imprisonment, Sam Sokong said. Am Sam Ath of the local Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (Licadho), a local NGO, told RFA that he believes the Supreme Court handed the case back to the appellate court because it is skeptical about certain aspects of the law and how they were applied in Kak Sovannchhay’s case. He urged the Court of Appeals to retry the case as soon as possible and drop all charges. “We look at first the interests of the child,” he said. “Secondly, this child has a chronic disability called autism, and thirdly, if we look at the dialogue in social media used to convict him was a private conversation,” he said. Kak Sovannchhay had been previously arrested in October 2020, then in April 2021, two men attacked him with bricks while he was driving a motorbike, leaving him with a fractured skull. Police never found either attacker. The conviction and sentence of an autisitic child was neither necessary nor proportionate,  a May 2022 report on the trial by the American Bar Association said. “Sovannchhay’s conviction further shows the lengths to which the Cambodian government will go to silence dissenting voices as well as the urgent need to reform Cambodia’s ‘incitement’ law, which has been a crucial tool in the authorities’ crackdown on civil society,” the report said.  Translated by Samean Yun. Written in English by Eugene Whong.