To Hopeland and Back The 23rd trip
Day Two. Sunday, 6 November 2016
Drugs take you to hell
Drugs take you to hell
Disguised as heaven.
Donald
Lynn Frost, Chairman,
Sturgis Bancorp, Inc.
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Opium tincture (Photo:
healthy.kaiserpermanente.org)
|
On my way to Mingladon, where the bus is waiting to
pick up inbound drug experts. I drop in at the Shan Nationalities League for
Democracy (SNLD) office to pick the party leadership’s brain for tomorrow’s gathering in Naypyitaw.
I’m
not disappointed. A lot of them I’ve already read and written. But there are
also two specifics I’ve never heard about:
·
The
government-owned Burma Pharmaceutical
Industry (BPI) used to have poppy farms in Taunggyi and Lashio before 1988 to
obtain opium for its product, opium tincture
(Opium tincture, about which I have only a rough idea,
is an oral linquid medication used to control diarrhea and relieve pain. But it
is also a controlled drug, because of its unwholesome side effects: sedation,
constipation, itching, and physical and psychological dependence
·
The UN also
used to have poppy fields in Taunggyi, Lashio and Kengtung, 2 acres each, to
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MR Disnadda Diskul Na Ayudhya
Secretary General of the Mae
Fah Luang Foundation
(Photo:hrd.nida.ac.th |
At
10:30, I’m off to Mingaladon, where Tom Kramer of Transnational Institute (TNI)
and his wife Nang Pann Ei Kham of Drug Policy Action Group (DPAG), with their hired
bus, are waiting for the likes of us.
Among the passengers, when the bus starts, are people
I know: Sai Long of Myanmar Opium Farmers Forum, John Buchanan of Institute for
Strategy and Policy, Col Hkam Awng, former CCDAC Secretary General now working
with Mae Fah Luang Foundation in northern Thailand. The Foundation, established
by the late King’s Mother, has development projects in Yawng Kha and Mongtoom
(Monghsat township) and
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Col Hkam Awng (left) commemorating the
110th Birth
Anniversary of Somdej Ya b
y Mae Fah Luang Foundation under
Royal Patronage (11
Nov 10)
|
The
distance from the old capital to the new capital is 327 km (203 miles). But it
takes us 6 slow hours, including 1 ½ hour for lunch and snack, to get there.
The bus is going as if it is riding
waves. But our driver is good. So I manage to catch some naps on the way.
At
some point, someone is relating to us about the conversation among opium
farmers, which goes something like this:
Farmer A: We have to pay
tax to 5 different armed groups.
Farmer B: You’re lucky. I
have to pay tax to 7 groups.
Farmer C: I must be the
luckiest. Because I have to pay only two armed groups.
Former A/B: Which groups ?
Farmer C: The MA (Myanmar Army) and the PMF (People’s Militia Force,
the extended arm of the MA).
We also discuss future plans:
·
Visiting Doi
Tung, Mae Fa Luang district, Chiangrai Province.
*For readers unfamiliar with different English labels
used by the two countries, the following should be the guide for them:
Burma Thailand
Village Village
(Muban)
Village Tract Tambon
Sub-Township Sub-District
(King-Ampher)
Township District
(Ampher)
District Province
(Jangwat)
 |
The Royal Ace Hotel ,
Naypyitaw.
(Photo: asiatravel)
|
·
Direct Myanmar
Army/EAO consultations on drugs (“Government meeting CSOs are okay. But
without open discussions between the MA and the EAOs, nothing is going to
change,” a CCDAC official is quoted as saying.)
·
Study mission
to licit occultation in India and Australia (it appears legal production is not
without problems either)
We
are greeted and entertained at Naypyitaw’s Royal Ace Hotel by CCDAC officials
among whom are Police Colonels Zaw Lin Tun and Myint Thein. The latter says
he’s from Taunggyi.
Tags: Opinion
