More than a week has passed after the Yes or No vote to Spain’s Catalonia region was taken on Sunday, 9 November.

Propelled by the economic crisis, sentiment in favour of a complete break from Spain has been on the rise (Photo by BBC)

These are the facts:
• Catalans, like non-Burmans in Burma, are ethnically distinct from the majority Castilian Spanish

• Spain is made up of Castilian 74.4%, Catalan 16.9%, Galician 6.4 %, Basque 1.6% and others 0.7% (www.populstat.info)

• The use of Catalan, as the Catalonian language is known, has equal status with Castilian and is now actively encouraged in education, official use and the media (BBC)

• It is one of Spain’s richest and most highly industrialized regions, and also one of the most independent minded (BBC)

• The region’s population is 7.5 million. 5.4 million were eligible to vote. 81% of the 2.25 million who had participated in the referendum had voted Yes. Meanwhile, more than 58% are non-participants. Therefore, the “results were obviously skewed toward independence”(Business Insider)

• The main reason for the majority of eligible voters staying away was attributed to two things: the supreme court’s earlier decision that the referendum would be illegal and Madrid’s threat to use force

• Above all, Spain’s 1978 constitution’s Article 2 champions “the indissoluble unity of the Spanish nation.” The public vote therefore ended only as a non-binding and symbolic victory.



So how does it compare with the Shans of Shan State?

• Shans, like Catalans, are ethnically distinct from the majority Burman

• Burma is made up of Burmans 58.69% and others 41.31% including Shans 7.08% (1931 census)

• The use of Shan is limited to teaching it at non-school hours and media but not official

• It is one of Burma’s richest in terms of natural resources and also one of the most independent minded

• The state’s population is 5.8 million of which around 50% (according to 1941 census) are Shans. The rest is made up of PaO, Ta-ang, Wa, Kachin, Lahu, and others

• According to the 2008 constitution’s Article 10, “No part of the territory constituted in the Union such as Regions, States, Union territories and Self-Administered Areas shall ever secede from the Union.” Moreover Chapter 11 has empowered the armed forces to exercise all 3 sovereign powers “If there arises or if there is sufficient reason  for a state of emergency to arise  that may disintegrate the Union”

Besides the Shans are notorious when it comes to the question of unity though most of them are said to be bent on independence.

The other crucial question is whether or not the non-Shans who constitute the other half of the state’s population, may join them in their quest for independence.

A cursory look therefore says that unless the Shans have satisfactory answers to the above two questions, our Burman rulers need not be overly worried about separatism. Because worry may be just a reflection of their feelings of guilt over their past and present misrule of these peoples, both Burman and non-Burmans alike.

The integrity of a nation however does not rest on laws, constitution or force, but only in returning to the basics, according to the Chinese sage Lao Zi:

A great nation lowers itself
And wins over a small one
Rivers and seas can rule the hundred valleys
Because they are good at lying low
They are lords of the valleys