Junta's Fear To Hear People's Voice

The successive Burmese military regimes have accused all opponents and dissidents using the same formula: "Under the guise of ............, these people have been trying to disrupt country's peace and stability by attempting to create unrest and heading towards the disintegration of national unity"

To our Burmese Students Union, the regime accused us that “under the guise of establishment of Burmese Students Union, these people have been trying to disrupt country's peace and stability by attempting to create unrest and heading towards the disintegration of national unity"

To our student annual publication, “Fighting Peacock (Khut Daung 1968-75)”, the military regime accused us that “under the guise of publication of Khut Daung, these people have been trying to disrupt country's peace and stability by attempting to create unrest and heading towards the disintegration of national unity"

We ask the military regime some questions:

1. Why are you so afraid of our Burmese Student Union which consists of only some decades of students?

2 Why are you so uneasy, as if you are sitting on pins and needles? You arrested and deported our student leaders: do you think that if you arrest our leaders, then all other students will kneel down before you?

We admit that our publication, “Fighting Peacock” always denounces you.

E.g. condemning you for massacring ethnic nationalities everyday.

E.g. being overwhelmed with indignation that you have brought disaster to our country and people, converting our rich Burma into one of the poorest countries in the world.

E.g. being furious that you, the junta, are only masters of killing and destroying.

E.g. denouncing that your Generals believe only the political power that comes out of guns!

We speak the truth and you do not want to listen, you fear to hear people's voice!

But you know we denounce you only once a year, as our Fighting Peacock Magazine is annual. You are guilty of crimes for which even death is insufficient punishment. Can you not accept the blame even only once a year?!

You seized power on 2-3-1962 in a coup, and we demonstrated on 7-7-1962 at our campus in Rangoon University. You dared to send troops to our campus shooting us dead and wounding us, and drove all the un-dead (like me) home. You fascist butchers!

We recollect too that we took to the streets to demonstrate for domestic peace and a new democratic Burma. You at once ordered all the universities to be closed, and you expelled the student-leaders from university for ever.

At that time you declared arbitrarily by radio broadcast, “we use swords against swords, guns against guns to the agitators”.

Is it not a joke? We students are unarmed, and you fascist soldiers have bayonets and guns. Your bayonets are pointing at our chests and your guns are aiming for our hearts.

On 8-8-1988 our younger students in Burma, being beyond all bearing, swarmed onto the streets because they wanted democracy. You fascist butchers ordered your army to open fire on them, resulting in thousands and thousands of people dead and wounded. Your soldiers even gang-raped the female-students!

We are indeed like sheep, and you kill and cut us up as you like.

Are we not killed and cut by you at will?

Look- Ko Ko Gyi, vice chairman of the All Burma Federation of Student Unions was arrested in 1991 and was only released by you a few months ago.

The accusation against him? "Under the guise of protesting together with university students, he has been trying to disrupt the country's peace and stability by attempting to create unrest and heading towards the disintegration of national unity".

You junta sentenced him at first to 10 years imprisonment. When his release day came, you found his release not so good for you, so you extended his detention by applying your Security Act, section 10A. Recently you thought his attendance at the National Convention would be good for your propaganda, so you freed him_ but, when he got back home, he found sadly that his mother had passed away.

MAUNG CHAN