Farmers fight on for grabbed land

 

Residents from Michaungkan, Thingangyun Township started their third protest camp on March 24, 2014. Having been there for nearly seven months, it shows the longest protest in Myanmar.

“Actually, we are not fighting against the government. We just demand for the return of our grabbed land. This camp has lasted for 200 days. Our health and jobs are affected. If we didn’t lose our land, we wouldn’t have lived on a road like this, not even for a single day,” Khin Maung Myint, a protester.

 “We have only water. Since morning, we have been sitting under the sunlight, just to get back our land,” Myint Htay, another protester.

The protesters threatened to step up their protest if no government agency addresses their problem. 

The government earlier issued a notification, ordering the protesters to remove the camp by October 3. However, the residents fought on, vowing to fight until their land is returned.

Visiting the camp on September 8, Farmland Investigation Commission commissioner MP Khaing Maung Yi said a proposal was submitted to Parliament, seeking its special attention to the dispute, following the government’s slow actions. 

 “The government has been slow in dealing with the first three parts of the commissions’ report. For the fourth part of the recommendation report, which won parliamentary approval, the government is obliged to take a swift action,” Khaing Maung Yi told reporters.

Residents of Michaungkan ward in Thingangyun Township, the eastern part of Yangon, began their protests last November, accusing the military of seizing farmland from them in 1990. They say they have all the necessary legal documents to prove they own the land and are demanding its return as well as compensation for losses.

Farmers in many areas of the country have complained on the confiscation of their land by the government or the military. Protests have happened here and there. 

On August 13, about 1,000 farmers in Kantbalu Township, Shwebo District of Sagaing Region staged a protest to ask for the return of confiscated lands and fair trials. The protestors called for the immediate release of 56 jailed farmers, ending the prosecution of farmers, the return of confiscated lands, the stoppage of destroying the farmers’ crops by Tatmadaw (Army) and the rule of law. 

Earlier this month, Farmland Investigation Commission chair Tin Htut said that the commission is being stonewalled by ministries and companies accused of grabbing land from farmers, despite instructions from the President’s Office that they cooperate with it.

“Companies and ministries are not cooperating with the commission’s MPs investigating the complaints,” said the MP from the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party.

The commission was set up to investigate land disputes.