03.12.2006
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Brain Drain
“Humankind is being led along an evolving course,
through this migration of intelligences,
and though we seem to be sleeping,
there is an inner wakefulness that directs the dream,
and that will eventually startle us back to the truth of whom we are." ....Rumi, "The Dream That Must Be Interpreted"
People use to chase the “Rainbow or dreams.”
As the saying goes, “Grass is always greener on the other side of the fence”; most of the people thought that life abroad is full of luxuries and even roads are paved with silver and gold.
“Dreams give us hope,
Hope ignites passion,
Passion leads us to envision success.
Visions of success open our minds to possibilities,
Far-reaching possibilities help us to enlist support from others,
Support from others keeps us focused and committed.
Focus and commitment foster action,
Action results in progress,
Progress leads to achievement,
Achievement inspires dreams,
Dreams give us hope.”….. (Author, unknown)
Schools, Colleges, Universities and Institutes of Higher Learning are closed most of the time during the Military rule. These are seen by Military rulers as a fertile soil of dissent. Military leaders hate and scared the intellectual stratum.
Myanmar SPDC failed to understand that_ “The fate of empires depends on the education of youth. “ (Aristotle)
Myanmar SPDC Generals learnt through their experiences that_
Education makes a people easy to lead,
but difficult to drive;
easy to govern,
but impossible to enslave.
Therefore, the educated persons are taboo for the SPDC Generals. They are thorns among the population, which they could not silenced easily with threats and intimidation.
So SPDC is ignorant of the value of educated people and these educated are also dreaming of the better life abroad. Up to now, SPDC or people of Myanmar never analyze the effects of resulted BRAIN Drain’s effects on Myanmar.
With the globalization, there is a lot of human migration. The whole world’s governments, except SPDC are worried of Brain Drain and understand the value of attracting the Intelligent Migrants to have a positive Brain Gain.
All Myanmar/Burmese accepted that “Education is the Passport for the future.” (Malcolm X.)
As Myanmar Military and “the State” controlled all the business opportunity, they have no choice but to rely on education esp. the Professional degrees e.g. Medical, Dental, Engineering, Economics, Education, Forestry, Mining, Law etc. to guarantee their future carrier. Because of the popular demand, there is a very high competition.
In addition, there were many fresh graduate doctors waiting for a chance to get experience of working with the government. Sometimes they have to wait for up to three or four years.
Now only because of migration of doctors and population growth, Myanmar Government is facing or more accurately feeling the shortage of Medical Officers and Specialists. Now there is a new law of compulsory service and made it almost impossible to resign from the government services.
Nowadays many Burmese citizens are studying around the world some in actual universities many in ‘practical life universities’. I am happy and am also proud to see that many young and old Burmese are speaking a lot of foreign languages as they had to work in various countries abroad. They got a lot of practical training in various business and factories, labs and universities. And many of them could save some hard currency. I hope that once our country gains the second independence and established a Secular Democratic Federal Union and started to practice to a free market economy, with the help of the US EU ASEAN our INTELLIGENT GRADUATES FROM REAL-LIFE-OPEN-UNIVERSITIES around the world and inside Burma/Myanmar could launch a rocket-speed rapid development of our country.
Almost every country complains about “Brain drain” but most of them fail to tap it to get “Brain gain”. Nowadays, with the process of globalisation, it is almost futile to complain about brain drain
We all know that not only the poor countries but also developing countries of ASEAN like Singapore, Malaysia, and the Philippines, are losing their professionals, well-trained scientists, doctors, nurses, and other skilled workers to developed countries. However, even the USA, UK and EU countries are experiencing this dilemma nowadays. Brain drain affects almost all countries. The Europeans have had a brain d rain to North America for centuries and even today the best and brightest continue to migrate there. In addition, some of the brains from the West, including Australia, are now migrating to oil-rich Arab countries and to the countries in the East again.
There is a great demand for professionals and all types of skilled workers around the world. Some countries recognised the demand and are accepting limited n umbers of skilled workers through proper channels and of course abiding with strict rules and regulations.
All the countries around the world wish to participate in the WTO and some of the countries are negotiating individually or in groups to get Free Trade Agreements. All the countries just want to get permission to export their products via GLOBLISATION. Why should a country want to keep out the people, professionals, skilled and unskilled labourers from free mobilization by imposing barriers, strict rules and regulations?
The United States of America was known to be one of the most generous, kind, tolerant and respective countries in the whole world. Its arms were always open to accept freedom seekers and legitimate migrants. No wonder the USA is known to be the melting pot of migrants. The country was proud of this reputation and had reciprocally gained a lot from that farsighted basic policy based on humanitarian grounds. USA gains profits because it values the widening of an assortment of gene pools, which leads to increased talents.
Migrants usually never enter with empty hands or brains. They bring along their capital, talents, intelligence, knowledge, skills and contacts. Trade networks widen and trade ties establish among various migrants and also with their old motherlands. For example, US had gained a lot from the migration of Jews. The Nazi era Jews not only brought in the above-mentioned benefits but also included some rocket and nuclear technologies.
Myanmar Military and most of the undemocratic governments around the world never try to understand the very reasons why many Burmese Citizens of all races and religions wish to leave their country in the first instance. To state a few:
1. Racial and religious discriminatory policies suck the life out of minority ethnic and religious groups, sometimes amounting to ethnic cleansings.
2. Cruel and lawless Military dictators’ oppressive and ever changing unjust laws, created according to their whims and fancies.
3. The lopsided Myanmar military-appointed eunuch judiciary, always loyal and obedient to the Military rulers.
4. Widespread corruption, abuse of power and absence of accountability at each and every level of the government machinery.
5. The police also ignore the rule of law but rule by the law, ordered by their army masters.
6. Dozens of local armed militia groups signed peace treaty with the army, and the still active Ethnic Minority rebels at the Burma borders are also crushing the people from other side.
7. There may be not an obvious war but there are internal conflicts or rebellions as well as a lot of internally displaced persons in Burma.
8. Numerous restrictions on the people’s daily life, travel, investments, trade, monetary policy, transport of goods, import/export, religion, education, etc. are pushing the people to their limits.
9. As long as there is no respect for the RIGHTS OF ETHNIC MINORITIES AND DISCRIMINATIONS against the minority religions, there is no hope of stopping people leaving Myanmar. Mary Robinson, High Commissioner for Human Rights (1997-2002) wrote: "... today's human rights violations are the causes of tomorrow’s conflicts.”
After looking at the above facts and quotations, real conditions in Burma/Myanmar and the people’s plight, we do not need to give any further evidence to convince the reader that there are a lot of problems going on in Burma/Myanmar that are almost impossible to solve or change, and no one can prevent the people’s flight out of the country, i.e. THE BRAIN DRAIN.
We hereby wish to appeal to the Myanmar Military leaders that once they take over the power, legally or illegally, and rule the country, it is their duty to take care of all the Myanmar citizens whether they are inside the country or abroad. There are the “Ten Codes of Ethics of the Rulers and Kings in Burmese/Myanmar tradition and custom”.
I am afraid; I am wasting my time, trying to play a harp in front of a buffalo, SPDC. Is SPDC still relevant to Myanmar in this globalization, revolutionary era of borderless battle of the brains, where the fate and economic progress of a nation is decided by the efficiency, creativeness and competitiveness of its people especially skilled labourers and especially Intelligent professionals.
No amount of excuses can hide the failure of SPDC leadership in the disastrous performance of Myanmar economy. The plain truth is that Myanmar Military political leadership has been fooling around in the steering of Myanmar with untenable ideology of permanent dominance of the Military and chauvinism of single race and religion and outrageously antiquated corrupted economic policy for far too long.
The remedy lies in the qualities of Myanmar people and the improvement in competence of our country’s leadership. We need to change the corrupt and an inefficient political leadership of SPDC Military Junta, bedevilled by racism and corruption to stop the Burma’s Brain Drain.
SHWE BA (BURMA DIGEST)
Comments:
Nay Aung Kyaw said _
Brain Drain, the article in Burma Digest is a wonderful, straight to the point article, with very interesting quotes from the famous as well as infamous persons. I wish you could share more ideas in your future articles.
Sea Angle said _
Thanks to you Shwe Ba, couldn't agree more, but drained brain is better than
brain in the drain.
Your Comments here_
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