Rising above communal politics
THE outpouring of help for Rohingya refugees who have fled to Bangladesh has been heart-warming.
For a country itself plagued by scarcity, people have come forward to help in whatever capacity they can. Buddhists in this country have set up camps to donate blood. Muslims here have come out to help both Muslims and Hindu refugees from Rakhaine. Sikh volunteers from India have arrived in Teknaf to set up a community kitchen.
And some Muslims have come out saying that it is the duty of Islamic leaders here to ensure that no one harasses minorities in this country through misappropriation of the plight of the Rohingyas.
This is timely. There have already been reports of a few isolated incidents.
Last week, a university student was forced out of a bus she was travelling in as she was a Buddhist from the Chakma community, and by some twisted logic to some people, responsible for the atrocities in Myanmar.
One newspaper reported on Sept 14 how a Buddhist monk who had just arrived in Bangladesh was picked up by three youths from a shop when he went there to buy water, and threatened.
To ensure security of Buddhists here, police have increased vigilance around monasteries in Chittagong.
We have seen before how simplistic narratives of persecution of minorities can give rise to further communal tensions.
A little history of Myanmar, and how communalism works in general, is relevant. The religious nationalism that fuels the ethnic cleansing that is happening today in Rakhine State is not something that suddenly flared up.
Communalism is the use of a supposed religious identity as the basis of a political and social ideology. It seeks to categorise human beings as distinct communities along religious lines.
It's the expression of political and economic power through the use of religion.
As recently highlighted in an article in The Guardian, the persecution of Rohingyas “might be partly generated by military-economic interests” – land grabbing and the greed for natural resources in Rakhine.
As for politics, the use of religion to consolidate support against some “other” is not new.
The Rohingya issue cannot be described as an either/or: it is an entangled mess of religion, race, ultra-nationalism and business interests – to name only a few dimensions.
Myanmar is home to at least six groups of Muslims including the Indian-descended Muslim community of Rangoon, the Panthay who are Burmese Chinese Muslims and Zerbadi Muslims, descended from inter-ethnic marriages between Muslim men and Burmese women.
Rohingyas are one such, although they are not recognised by the Myanmarese government. The official country puts the Muslim population at 4.3% but as a 2006 US State Department report pointed out, the census may have underestimated the country's Muslim population.
The Rohingya population, which is not enumerated, consists of about half of the Muslim population of Myanmar. Myanmar claims that the Rohingyas are ethinically Bengalis, who crossed over and so not deserving of citizenship.
To say that religion is not a factor is wrong. As it is wrong to claim that religion solely drives the hate. There is a recent historical basis for Muslim-Buddhist conflict in Myanmar, but the case of the Rohingyas is distinct. And their plight is worse, because unlike other Muslim communities, they are not officially “citizens” of the country.
Ethnicity is a crucial factor which drive the Myanmarese narrative – that of refusing to acknowledge Rohingyas as an ethnic group and claiming they are Bangalee immigrants.
Muslims have lived in what is Myanmar today for centuries – and at times, the Buddhists, the majority, have coexisted peacefully with the minority population of Muslims who had started settling in Myanmar from at least the ninth century.
By the time Myanmar gained independence in 1948, the usual suspects of colonialism's divide and rule policy had set in. Historically, tensions existed between those who lived in Rakhine, which was once independent from Myanmar, and the Burmese, but not along religious lines.
World War II added to the discord when the two made different alliances. After Ne Win’s military take-over of the country in 1962, this hardened further. The precoup government of U Nu had recognised the ethnic identity of the Rohingyas, but since 1962, their claim to citizenship has been systematically denied.
If one looks beyond the official Myanmarese narrative, one finds that in 1974, the government used the issues of race and religion to consolidate its declining support.
The infamous Operation Naga Min of 1978-79 is reported to have been directed against both the Muslims and Buddhists of Rakhine. The Rohingya sought refuge in Bangladesh, hoping for shelter from their co-religionists. Between 1978-1983, military atrocities like those of today resulted in the deaths of 1,725 and the rapes of 2,715 Rakhine Buddhists.
In 1990, the military government refused to hand over power to a democratically elected government, and had killed a few monks who were protesting.
The targeting of the Rohingyas in November 1991, therefore, fulfilled the double-task of consolidating the Buddhist majority and, at the same time, wrecking the unity of the Arakanese.
This time, pandering to populist sentiments, the main targets were the Rohingya Muslims, who were made targets for being of a different religion and ethnicity. Like rightwing populist leaders we see today, demonising one another, the military government wanted the support of Buddhists throughout Myanmar.
Placating of hard-line monks meant increased tension between Buddhists and Muslims. The point of this short and incomplete summary is to show how communalism appropriates religion.
Worse still, are those who intentionally use the horrors against the Rohingya to strengthen their brand of hate. The Buddhists of Bangladesh are not complicit to the crimes of Myanmar, as all Muslims should not be targeted for the crimes of those who intentionally misrepresent Islam.
The background to the ethno-religious violence against the Rohingyas and the combined effort of all communities in helping the refugees should be an antidote to the hate Myanmar preaches. What we are doing to help the Rohingyas and speak up for them, stems from a shared humanity, and rises above communal politics. — The Daily Star / Asia News Network