BANGKOK, Oct 7 (AFP): For now the streets of Yangon are quiet after Myanmar's bloody crackdown on protesters, but simmering public discontent over crushing poverty is likely to spark more civil unrest, experts say.
The sharp fuel price hike that triggered the first demonstrations in August has hit people hard who were already struggling with soaring food costs, and the future looks grim for many families in one of Asia's poorest countries.
"It's not over. Unless the government fixes rising energy and food prices, it will continue to face demonstrations," said Shigeru Tsumori, a former Japanese ambassador to Myanmar.
"People have long suffered from the government's mismanagement of the economy, and their economic frustration is beyond the breaking point," said the former diplomat, who was based in Yangon from 2000 to 2002.
Up to 100,000 people took to the streets in the biggest challenge to the iron-fisted regime in nearly 20 years until the junta started using force to end the rallies on September 26, killing at least 13 people and jailing over 2,000.
While Myanmar is blessed with resources including natural gas, the country is among the world's poorest, with gross domestic product per capita at just over 200 dollars per year, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
The Southeast Asian country, which has been under military rule since 1962, has claimed its economy is expanding at more than 10 per cent each year, with inflation also around 10 per cent.
"It's a fantasy economy," said Sean Turnell, an expert on Myanmar's economy at Macquarie University in Sydney.
"A lot of economic policy decisions have been made on the basis of advice from astrologists. It's a complete fantasy and it's very clear that people make up numbers to give the leadership the numbers that they want to hear."
The Economist Intelligence Unit, a London-based research firm, has estimated Myanmar's economy has actually contracted by 2.0-3.0 per cent from 2003 to 2005, and the IMF has put inflation at nearly 40 per cent.
Turnell, a senior lecturer in economics, said half of Myanmar's 54 million people were unemployed and that the country formerly known as Burma lacked a manufacturing sector.
"People in Burma are so poor and they just scrape by," he said, arguing that economic misery would continue to be the force behind protests in the future.
"If you look at Burma's long history, the thing that really gets people out on the streets is an economic thing," Turnell said.
In 1988, the military crushed student-led pro-democracy rallies, leaving more than 3,000 people dead. Like the latest protests, the 1988 movement was also triggered by severe economic problems.
Then-dictator Ne Win suddenly invalidated currency notes in a bid to clamp down on the black market in late 1987, crippling the livelihoods of ordinary people who depended on the illicit market because of soaring inflation.
Yoshihiro Nakanishi, a Myanmar expert from Japan's Kyoto University, where detained democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi studied during the 1980s, said drastic economic changes could again spark mass protests against the junta.
"Since the economy is not getting better, any drastic changes like the fuel hike could trigger demonstrations," said Nakanishi.
"People, especially labourers, don't have enough food, and they are surviving day by day. We don't know when their simmering frustration will erupt again," he said.
Turnell from Macquarie University agreed.
"People will likely take to the streets again and again because of severe economic problems," he said.
Poverty looms as threat to Myanmar junta
FE Team | Published: October 08, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00
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