Maday Island villagers rally against Chinese pipeline
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About 450 people in Western Myanmar demonstrated peacefully last Thursday against the energy giant China National Petroleum, which is building huge oil and gas pipelines from Kyaukphyu to Kunming.
Villagers from Kyauk Tan, Pyein, Ywama and Panhtainsal villages on Maday Island in Kyaukphyu, Rakhine State, gathered at a Buddhist monastery at Pyein village and walked for about 30 minutes around the CNPC office, said Tun Kyi, chairman of the regional development panel.
The demonstrators asked CNPC to be responsible for the regional development activities and made nine demands over concerns about social and economic impacts from the project on the their region.
They demanded CNPC pay compensation fees for confiscated farmland at international standards, to construct a road connecting Maday Island port and the above four villages, to provide jobs for locals holding labour cards and pay wages at international standards, to
provide electricity for houses and buildings on the island, to check outside workers to ensure local workers’ security, to allow fishing in water around the island, not to confiscate any land without notice to local people, to develop new farmlands for villagers, and compensate those whose farms were damaged.
“We are demonstrating because [CNPC] has dismissed our nine claims. We demonstrate as we want the world to know our troubles and to request humanitarian support. If the company doesn’t fulfil our demands, we have decided to continue to stage demonstrations,” a leader of the demonstrators said.
When the protest started, Rakhine police chief and head district officer of Kyaukphyu arrived and asked villagers to stop. They told people they would negotiate the claims with the Social Eco Group at CNPC’s headquarters. By 3:10pm, the demonstration was called off without any violence.
Maday Island is located 12km east of Kyaukphyu and has a population of 3,000 people, most of whom live in Kyauk Tan, Pyein, Ywama and Panhtainsal villages.
