Planning on welcoming your local government officials when they pop by for a visit? Be careful how you welcome them, or you might find yourselves being charged for ‘protesting’ (yes, really).
When Sagaing Regional Chief Minister Myint Naing passed through Homalin township last Wednesday as part of an official visit, 20 excited dockworkers held up vinyl signs welcoming the minister to their home town as he drove along the planned route. Two days later, they were informed that a case had been opened against them under Section 18 of the Right to Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession Act (PAPPA). To say they were caught off guard is an understatement.
“We heard the minister was coming so we went to welcome him at the edge of town. No one from our region has ever welcomed him like this [with signs], which is why we went to the outskirts of town to greet him. The fact that this has led to a case being filed under Section 18 must have been due to a mix-up somewhere,” one participant told Mizzima.
We know the saying about the road to hell, but charging people for greeting you on your trip seems a little extreme, even by Myanmar standards. Well actually, it turns out that the problem isn’t the fact that they were greeting the minister, but the signs with which they were greeting him.
In addition to your traditional ‘Welcome to…’ salutations, the workers had printed some supposedly ‘political’ messages that voiced their support for the 21st Century Panglong Conference, expressed thanks to the minister for participating in the ethnic peace talks, and — perhaps most ‘controversially’ — asked him to help them regain control of their office from a local party that was currently occupying it.
Lieutenant Colonel Kyi Soe of the Homalin Police Station explained to Mizzima: “They’re not being charged for welcoming the minister. They had signs calling on [the minister] to solve problems that they were facing, which can be construed as a protest against the regional government. That’s why the case has been opened.”
Section 18 of PAPPA is often used to arrest and imprison political activists who hold peaceful demonstrations. If found guilty, a culprit faces up to a year in prison and/or a monetary fine of up to MMK30,000.
Constituents calling on their representatives to help solve their issues? What has this world come to?!
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