Learning to Share: The PPST Strategic Meeting
(4-7 September 2017)
Everyman is my superior
in some way
In that I learn from him.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)
I’m sure I’m not the first one to say there is no
school higher than life and we all are its students. Be humble and be diligent,
and you’ll never be disappointed.
On 4-7 September, Col Htoo Htoo Lay, Advisor to the
Peace Process Steering Team (PPST), the 8 person leading body of the 8 EAOs
that signed the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA) in 2015, met to finalize
its peace strategy before meeting the government’s National Reconciliation and
Peace Center/Peace Commission (NRPC/PC) to work out a concerted plan for the
next Union Peace Conference 21st Century Panglong (UPC 21CP).
Htoo Htoo Lay’s Plan was to divide the representatives
into 3 groups PPST, UPDJC and JMC, each in one room to discuss its strategy (I
shrink every time I hear the word ‘strategy’, but to Htoo Htoo Lay, it’s his
life breath) for two days, 4-5 September. Then all of them would meet on 6-7
September to wrap up.
There’s a saying “Plans are made of glass.” So let’s
see whether his ambitious one just blew
up or became hard as diamond.
Day One. Monday, 4 September 2017
The greatest victory is one which
requires no battles.
Attributed to Sun Zi (BC 551-467), author of The
Art of War
After
the opening session, all of us go to the room assigned to each group. Coming
from the journalist background, I’m naturally in the PPST room where the
resource person, who has expressly requested anonymity, will be delivering a
presentation on Strategic Communication.
Strategic Communication,
according to the resource person (I’m avoiding using him or her
not to give him/her away), is not just about public relations (PR) which is
essentially verbal, but more about non-verbal ones (about where you and your
counterpart are sitting in a meeting room, for example) which produces public
impressions more telling even than what you are saying.
Here are some of what I have gathered from him/her:
·
Strategy, to put it simple, is what you
do
Policy, in contrast, is
how you do it
·
Four factors to consider:
1.
Audience – Who do you want to
influence? (NLD government, US government, the Tatmadaw? Others?)
2.
Your message – You have a lot of
information. The key is to coordinate them. Talking points must be agreed beforehand.
3.
The media ―This also includes social
media, meetings and local communities, not just the press
4.
The messenger ―Who says it is
important. Different messanger gives different effects
·
Needs
1.
Strategic Communications Team
2.
Spokespersons – Use each spokesperson
for each audience. Each must be well trained in order to be fluent in the topic
concerned and how to deliver the message. Social media spokespersons should
preferably be young.
3.
Schedule and share ―(Here I miss
totally what he/she says about it)
·
Strategic Communication may well be the
best weapon the EAOs have. Right now other stakeholders (the government and the
Tatmadaw) have everything: radio stations, TV stations, newspapers, websites,
Facebooks, etc. You have nothing
·
Asking a (certain Western) government
to fund the peace process is not enough. It is already a member of the Joint
Peace Fund (JPF). You have to have a specific Christmas list,
like:
1.
Support for IDPs/refugees
2.
Support for ethnic peace center in
Thailand
3.
Equal treatment of the EAO leaders. For
example, if you can train the Myanmar Army, why can’t you train us too?
·
Protocol is the relationship between
people. Are they equal? Examples:
1.
Invitation – who sends it? They or you,
or together?
2.
How do you enter the meeting room?
a.
Together
b.
One after the other
c.
You coming well ahead waiting for
him/her to enter?
3.
Sitting plan
4.
Order of speaking
5.
Control of agenda, etc
(“At the May UPC 21 CP, it
could be said that the EAO leaders were ‘hijacked by the government’s
protocol.’ The State Counselor and the Commander in Chief were ‘rock stars’ and
you were just their ‘admirers.’ This cannot happen again.”)
·
Here are how you should and should not sit
At the end of the day, somebody says:
“Now, all these seem great. But who’s going to propose it? Who’s going to bell
the cat?”
There is no answer, just smiles. That
of course doesn’t mean the EAOs are short of cat-bellers. Or full of them
either.
Day Two. Tuesday, 5 September 2017
It
is easy to love your friend, but sometimes the hardest lesson to learn is to
love your enemy.
(Attributed to) Sun Zi (BC 551-BC367)
One of the two issues that had deadlocked the UPC 21
CP #3 (officially #2) was in the security sector. (The other is the
non-secession issue.)
The long and the short of it was that while the EAOs were
calling for Security Sector Reform (SSR), the Tatmadaw had been adamant on the
Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) stance.
And the PPST wants to know how things are and how to
bring them to a win-win solution.
Fortunately, Safer World, a UK based organization, has
just published Security Integration in Myanmar: Past experiences and future
visions in May. And the authors: Kim Joliffe, John Bainbridge and Saw Lin
Chel are happy to share what they know.
On paper, at least, there is a consensus:
·
A federal system of government
·
To embark on an SSR/DDR negotiation
But when it comes to a future vision, differences
become manifest:
|
Tatmadaw
|
NLD
|
EAOs
|
|
·
Strong, capable and modern patriotic
Tatmadaw
·
DDR is a necessary precursor to
Tatmadaw returning to barracks
·
A standard army (“which doesn’t mean
anything in the international military circles”)
·
No mention of professional conduct,
ethnic makeup or human rights (The Tatmadaw is already “inclusive of all
ethnic groups, including 4,500 officers from ethnic minority background”)
·
General indications that it could
envisage EAOs taking on law enforcement responsibilities or becoming reserve
military forces, like Border Guard Forces (BGFs) and People’s Militia Forces
(PMFs) (“roles and rights still poorly defined”)
·
Current security sector is not in
need of significant reform
|
·
A Tatmadaw respected and relied upon
by the people
·
To bring the Tatmadaw under executive
branch
·
To make the police independent (“Even
China separates police for the military”)
·
Positions on EAO integration unclear,
despite rhetorical support for Federal Armed Forces (Meeting the UNFC in
2013, she stated that “there must be a federal army if there is going to be a
federal state”, according to Myanmar Times, 1 October 2013)
·
Carefully avoided security issues
since taking office
|
·
A federal union Tatmadaw
·
A complete overhaul of current
structures as pre-requisite to DDR or integration
·
Democratic oversight
·
Ethnically proportional recruitment,
including officers
·
Power sharing through state
governments and/or rotating command between ethnicities (“It is not clear if
this (second) approach has been tried elsewhere in the world”)
·
State-level police, and state-level
defense forces
·
Exact vision of how such an armed
forces would be structured is not yet clear
|
The Tatmadaw is still seen as Bamar and Buddhist
dominated, says the paper. “Writing in 2009, the scholar Maung Aung Myoe noted
that non-Buddhists or husbands of non-Buddhists were unlikely to rise above the
rank of major.
In a 2017 paper, veteran Myanmar scholar Robert Taylor
states that the Tatmadaw is diverse and relatively representative among the
lower ranks but Bamar-heavy in the officer classes.”
The authors’ conclusion is that “A political solution
will be inextricable from security arrangements.” “In the spirit of federalism,
there would be numerous options for providing states and regions with equal
influence over defense affairs.”
“Another option would be for the NDSC (National
Defense and Security Council) to be reformed to include representatives from
each state or regions security forces and/or civilian governments.” Mr Joliffe
notes here that Germany has a council representing states to oversee the
military.
On the question of unit-level incorporation or segregation,
“history has shown that cases of violence following such integration are rare,
while maintaining segregated forces has often led to conflict further down the
line, as illustrated by the July 2016 outbreak of violence between segregated
units in South Sudan.”
Burma also has had similar experiences after
Independence, according to the authors.
“You cannot depend on them (segregated units) alone to
prevent war,” says Mr joliffe.
Following the presentation, one participant comments
that:
What the Tatmadaw wants is for A+B to become A, which
to the EAOs is unacceptable. The EAOs, likewise cannot call for A+B to become
B.What may be successfully negotiated therefore is for A+B to become C.
Naturally, we cannot expect A and B to totally dismantle themselves right away,
to become C. So an agreed series of steps must also be negotiated.
We have another session with the Strategic
Communication expert in the afternoon. But to my disappointment, I’m called
away to a meeting with the faculty from the University of Songkla coming from the
Deep South.. They are interested in Hopeland’s peace process, especially the
JMC.
Another meeting with them is agreed, probably in
Pattani.
Day Three. Wednesday, 6 September 2017
The greatest bankruptcy in life is hopelessness.
Attributed to the Buddha
Today, all the three groups: PPST, UNDJC and JMC
return to a combined meeting.
The
UPDJC, led by coordinator Comrade Myo Win, reports that several options had
been discussed two days earlier on how to smooth out the problems facing the
organizers of the next UPC 21 CP. Which I’m not supposed to report here.
Suffice to say that the EAOs UPDJC has been taking into consideration the pros
and cons of their proposed options.
The JMC, led by Dr Suikhar, then takes the floor. He
says, despite being seen as the less problematic committee, it is not without
one. “What to monitor, and how, are still unclear.”
One big obstacle is the terminology in the NCA’s
Chapter 3 (Ceasefire Related Matters) and Chapter 4 (Maintaining and
Strengthening Ceasefire) which each side interprets differently. Examples:
·
Reinforcement (Does it include BGFs and
PMFs?)
·
Civilian protection (Do we agree to include
the people called Bengalis too?)
·
Demarcation (We planned for two
workshops, one in Pa-an, and the other in Namzang, but the Tatmadaw failed to
send its representatives)
Col Khun Okker, commenting on the presentations,
concurs:
“Following the drafting of the NCA, a paper explaining
the terminology was also jointly prepared, to be published together with the
NCA. However, somehow it did not materialize. Many problems that arose later
originated in our failure to publish it.”
Padoh Kwe Htoo Win, who was assigned to meet the Peace
Commission, following the PPST meeting on 9-10 August, is the next speaker.
According to him, he and his delegation met the PC on
25 August, when he reported that the PPST is of the opinion that there is a
great need for the two sides to meet to discuss the following subjects:
·
NCA implementation
·
SSR/DDR
·
Joint Pyidaungsu Accord implementation
·
Framework for Political Dialogic (FPD)
review
·
The holding of national political
dialogues (ND)
·
Joint Coordination Board (JCB) for Peace
Funding
·
The ceremony for the second anniversary
of the signing of the NCA on 15 October
·
Visa issue for EAO members
·
And that all these would need the
holding of the JICM (Joint Implementation and Coordination Meeting) to sanction
them
“Since Daw Suu took office,” comments comrade Than
Khe, “only 1 JICM has been held. Some say two but I disagree. Because the first
one failed to bring the JICM back to life. Only the second one that was held on
23 April this year with the participation by top government leaders such as the
State Counselor, Deputy CinC Soe Win and Attorney General Tun Tun Oo, we were
able to make meaningful decisions.”
He proposes a JICM during the month of September,
taking into account the State Counselor’s planned attendance of the UN General
Assembly later in the month (which is to be cancelled later.)
Delay may be dangerous,” he says, “as our country is
gradually falling into an abyss. Sooner or later, traveling abroad is likely to
become a scary adventure for Myanmar citizens.”
Day Four. Thursday, 7 September 2017
Who wishes to fight must first count
the cost.
Attributed
to Sun Zi (BC 551-BC 467)
Many items are discussed and decision was reached on
many of them, but not on the elephant in the room. And you know what I mean.
But since writing about it amounts to killing the
goose, I beg to stop here with quotes from the Buddha and Martin Luther King Jr:
In this world, hate has never yet dispelled
hate. Only love dispels hate. This is the law, ancient and eternal.
Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love
can do that.
Great minds run together, don’t they?
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TRUST-BUILDING INITAITIVE: RCSS's Nay Pyi Taw Visit
Following weeks of negative bad press stemming
from the conflict in Arakan State, the Restoration Council of Shan State's
(RCSS) visit, due to the invitation of State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi-led
government, to Nay Pyi Taw might be the much needed positive message for Burma
to show the international community that the stagnation of the ongoing peace
negotiation process is being given a boost, if not a second thought.
On September 11, the RCSS delegation, headed
by its Chairman General Yawd Serk
arrived in Nay Pyi Taw to meet Aung San
Suu Kyi, National Reconciliation and
Peace Centre (NRPC) leaders and the Military or Tatmadaw's Deputy
Commander-in-Chief General Soe Win to clear up the misunderstanding and build
trust, so that the peace process could continue based on the Nationwide
Ceasefire Agreement (NCA) guidelines.
Let us have a look, on how far the RCSS has
been able to achieve its projected goals.
RCSS's targeted goals
According to the RCSS official three-point
statement of September 9, it assumed the invitation of the government to be a
trust enhancing act and that the Chairman of RCSS, General Yawd Serk, would
lead a delegation to Nay Pyi Taw to hold talks with the State Counselor,
military leaders and Union Ministers, and would continue to Yangon to meet with
political parties and foreign diplomats.
It further said that matters concerning the
implementation of the peace process, political issues and local public
development would also be discussed with concerned leaders during the mission.
The statement concluded that it believed that
this visit of RCSS delegation to Nay Pyi Taw and Yangon will be of great
support for the building of trust, the implementation of the peace process and
establishment of the federal union.
Earlier, on September 9, Yawd Serk told Shan
Herald Agency for News (SHAN): “At this stage I believe building trust with the
government and the Military would be beneficial for our people. Because even
after five years of ceasefire, we haven't been able to do or achieve anything.
That's why I hope this (approach) would lead us to find the way out.”
He said the most crucial three factors for the
Burma is to have nationwide ceasefire, mutual trust in order to be able to
conduct political discussion, and mindful of the problems arising out of
distrust on each other leading to further separation and division.
“Actually we must build up trust so that we
don't need to be on guard against each other and also should be able to forgive
the past mistakes. Only in this way we will be able to reconcile,” Yawd Serk stressed in his clarification to
the press.
Meeting with ASSK and NRPC
On September 11, Suu Kyi met the RCSS delegation headed by
Yawd Serk at NRPC headquarters and discussed trust-building on NCA-based peace
process, development of ethnic inhabited areas, education, healthcare and
anti-drugs issues, according to the press statement of the State Counselor
Office.
According to a reliable Shan source during the
some 40 minutes meeting with the State Counselor, she mostly focused on the
issue of cooperation against drugs. On the peace process, she said it is like
an atmosphere of a dining table. You can't have all the best dishes alone. And
whatever she meant to say by that is anybody's guess.
After that the government delegation held a
separate discussion with the RCSS
delegation
The government representatives were NRPC vice
chair and Union Minister at the State
Counselor Office Kyaw Tint Swe, Union Minister for Social Welfare,
Relief and Resettlement Dr Win Myat Aye,
National Security Adviser to the government Thaung Tun, Peace Commission vice chairman Thein Zaw and
Secretary Khin Zaw Oo, chairman of Union Level
Joint Monitoring Committee Lieutenant General Yar Pyae, Deputy Minister
at the President Office Min Thu, Deputy
Minister for Home Affairs Maj‐Gen Aung Soe, Deputy Minister for Border Affairs Major General Than Htut and
Deputy Minister at the State Counselor Office
Khin Maung Tin and Director General Zaw Htay.
The representatives from the RCSS side were
RCSS chairman General Yawd Serk,
secretary Colonel Sai Ngin, CEC members and senior officials. The
meeting began at 11am and lasted two hours.
During the meeting, the same Shan source said
that Kyaw Tint Swe was said to be in agreement to the RCSS proposal that the
Framework for Political Dialogue (FPD) be revised so that other non-signatories
of the NCA could come on board.
And regarding the Shan National Dialogue,
which the Tatmadaw has been blocking due to the disagreement of Committee for Shan State Unity's (CSSU)
choice to be either held in Taunggyi or Panglong. For the government side, Kyaw
Tint Swe proposed Langkher, while the Tatmadaw proposed Mongpan. RCSS was said
to reply that it would report back to CSSU for consideration.
CSSU is an association of 3 Shan political
parties, 2 armed resistance armies, and 6
Civil Society Organizations formed in 2013, which RCSS is also a leading
member.
Meeting with the Tatmadaw
Following the meeting with NRPC, the RCSS
delegation led by General Yawd Serk met the Deputy Commander-in-Chief General
Soe Win, together with officers from the Defense Head Office around noon at
Bayintnaung reception hall.
During the meeting the conceptual misunderstanding
and interpretation on union-level ceasefire agreement of January 16, 2012,
between the RCSS and Union Peace Working Committee (UPWC) – during the
President Thein Sein government – and how to cooperate on the NCA-based peace
process were discussed.
Regarding the union-level ceasefire agreement
of 2012 signed in Kengtung, Soe Win agreed that it should be revisited. He
said, "We can also bring in witnesses who were present there: U Khuensai
and U Harn on your side, and U Aung Min and U Hla Maung Shwe on our side, for
instance,” according to the insider Shan source.
And concerning the Ceasefire Joint Monitoring
Committee (JMC), Soe Win wanted to give more power to it to handle the armed
clashes issue. RCSS says it should be handled on the military to military basis
first, before handing it over to the JMC, to which he agreed. As for the status
of the liaison offices he said they would accordingly be upgraded, meaning the
military movements will be informed to the liaison office concerned beforehand.
For example establishing hot-line communication if and when necessary.
The meeting further focused on easing military
tensions, rebuilding mutual
understanding and the two sides
agree to cooperate in order to not burden the people.
All in all, according to the Shan source, it gave the impression of the Tatmadaw is
trying to create a congenial atmosphere, which is a positive sign.
Perspective
Taking cue from the recent meetings between
the RCSS, the government and Tatmadaw, it could be said the effort of Yawd Serk
and Suu Kyi, including the Tatmadaw, should be able to remold or create a more
sincere and open relationship among the stakeholders.
Suu Kyi's urging of trust-building and the
Tatmadaw's promise to avoid further clashes, coupled with pragmatic problem
solving initiatives at the recent meeting not available before, with the RCSS
is a welcome gesture, but a more holistic approach would be needed from the
part of government and Tatmadaw to turn the gloomy situation around.
Everybody has been constantly talking about
trust-building but it seems no one is ready to accommodate or take action in a
plausible way to undertake stimulation that trust could be instilled.
For example, let us look at the complaint of
the Ethnic Armed Organizations (EAOs) on the holding of Union Peace Conference
- 21st Century Panglong (UPC-21CP), which is supposed to be a joint-undertaking
between the government and the EAOs, but single-highhandedly taken over and
manipulated by the government, with at times working in collaboration with the
Tatmadaw.
The rejection of the Shan National Dialogue,
including such proposed meetings by other ethnic states' ethnicities, and the
endorsement of the first Union (Pyidaungsu) Accord, which is going to be the
basis in all stakeholders' deliberation to be able to form a federal union, in
the last UPC-21CP against the protest of the EAOs and political parties.
Another example is the offensives on the EAOs,
signatories and non-signatories of the NCA alike. The Tatmadaw's on and off
offensives of the RCSS, that had already occurred some 20 times according to
the RCSS in two years of NCA signing, and massive to mild on and off offensives
in Kachin and Shan States are not conducive to start earnest peace talks.
The Tatmadaw considers itself a sole protector
of the country's territorial integrity and the national sovereignty and thus
presumed that all its offensive undertakings are legitimate and proper. On the
other hand, the EAOs take it as their rights to defend their homelands and demand
“shared sovereignty” instead of the Tatmadaw's “sole ownership sovereignty”
claim. Thus, it becomes a question of political demand and could only be worked
out through political settlement. The EAOs' armed struggle comes from political
grievances and to end this peace negotiation is the only way. And now since the
government has already embarked to resolve the ethnic conflict through
political means rather than military solution, the Tatmadaw should refrain from
area clearance and domination of the territories in ethnic homelands, if peace
negotiation is to be given a chance.
To conclude, trust-building stimulation should
start with conducting the commonly owned peace negotiation process jointly as
partners between the government, the EAOs and political parties; and genuine
nationwide ceasefire and all-inclusiveness should be accepted by the Tatmadaw,
if peace negotiation process is to continue in earnest and eventually be
successful.
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