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<\/a><\/p>\nBy breaking down these racist and religious divisions which the British so brilliantly exploited anywhere and everywhere they ruled, the anti-colonial campus activists made the most lasting contributions, intellectually and ideologically speaking.<\/p>\n
The political contributions of colonial-era campus activism are well-documented \u2013 and well recognized nationally.\u00a0 After all, Burma\u2019s National Day is the celebration of the very first anti-colonial student strike \u2013 known as the First University Strike.<\/p>\n
Often scholars and the public mention names such as Thakhin Mya, Aung San, Nu, Ba Hein, Rashid, Ba Swe, Kyaw Nyein, Thein Pe (Myint), Oway Nyo Mya, Bo Let Yar, etc. as the gifts that campus activism gave to the colonized society, who rose to prominence and formed the post-independence leadership (save the martyred Mya and Aung San).\u00a0 It was the campus activist leaders and the rank and file \u2013 such as Thakhin Ba Thaung, Tun Sein, Ba Sein, etc. who went on to found the most inspiring secularist anti-colonial organization, We the Burmese Federation, in the preceding years before the World War II.\u00a0 It was also a former student activist \u201cKo Aung San\u201d and his Marxist-influenced student comrades, who, under Fascist Japan\u2019s patronage, gave their fellow subjugated country-men and -women their very first national army in 1942, the first since the fall of Konbaung Court at Mandalay in November 1885.<\/p>\n
But to limit the assessment of the tradition and contributions of campus activism to these venerated student nationalists \u2013 now all deceased \u2013 and their inspirational tales of nationalist struggle against the imperialist ruler is to overlook perhaps a very crucial foundation they attempted to lay.\u00a0 They worked hard to create the exemplary national politics that transcended, and that was to continue to transcend post-independence, the divisive and toxic issues of race and faith.\u00a0 This inclusive politics, in turn, enabled these young radical intellectuals, to be so effective and so inspirational as the main source of progressive social force in the then otherwise reactionary and\/or tradition-shackled colonial world.\u00a0 One needs to only take a cursory glance at their revolutionary pamphlets, essays, and declarations which rejected the discourse of \u201cfeudal kings and Buddhist faith\u201d.<\/p>\n
The strategic and intellectual relevance of their kind of politics \u2013 both secular & multiculturalist – cannot be overstated, particularly against the backdrop of our country\u2019s institutionalized and legalized anti-Muslim racism, both within the nominally ruling NLD and the real power, the Tatmadaw<\/em>, and to a lesser degree, religious discrimination against Christians, Hindus and other non-Buddhists.<\/p>\n In complete and utter violation of the founding vision of Aung San and his fellow leaders, many of whom cut their teeth in the anti-imperialist campus activism, the Tatmadaw has pursued an unwritten policy of cleansing itself of all non-Buddhist officers, particularly those with Islamic and Christian backgrounds.\u00a0 As if not to be outdone, Aung San\u2019s daughter made the decision to not have a single Muslim representative in her NLD, thereby creating a situation where the country\u2019s legislature is almost exclusively Buddhist. Today, we have a deeply non-secular country where national identity is based nearly exclusively on Buddhism.\u00a0 The unhealthy saying \u201cto be Burmese is to be Buddhist\u201d has become both a popular and official reality \u2013 to the detriment and alienation of all non-Buddhist communities and non-ethnically Bama or Bama-identified communities for whom Burma is their only home.<\/p>\n That is like setting back the ideological and intellectual clock of the country back to the colonial days of \u201cdivide and rule\u201d.<\/p>\n Contrast this extremely regressive politics, pursued officially and popularly in today\u2019s Burma, with that of the campus activists nearly 100 years ago. As many know, the First University Student Strike challenged the British authorities on the University Act, which restricted access to higher education for the colonial public and set stringent rules and control over a small body of university students privileged enough to be able to afford university education. What is lesser known is that the resulting National Education Movement which established \u201cnational schools\u201d were very liberal by today\u2019s standards in Burma. While they provided the compulsory religious education for the Buddhist students who felt their faith had been trampled on by British colonial policies and in the realm of curriculum they allowed other non-Buddhist faiths to organize curricula and instructions for those of their own faiths, if there were enough non-Buddhist students.<\/p>\n In the subsequent birth of the student union, made up of campus activists from Christian-dominated Judson College and University College, as well as Indian (Muslims and Hindus), Chinese, Buddhist of various ethnic backgrounds, and \u201cmixed race\u201d students joined hands together forging a multi-ethnic, multiculturalist and democratic model of politics, unprecedented in Burma\u2019s recorded history, pre- and post-colonial.\u00a0 Today\u2019s anti-Muslim Burmese public may be surprised to learn that it was a Muslim student of Indian ancestral origin named Tun Sein who successfully challenged and persuaded his Buddhist and other student activists at Rangoon University to stop singing Britain\u2019s \u201cGod save the King\u201d at every Student Union meeting.<\/p>\n As a matter of fact, that same Muslim student \u2013 Tun Sein – went on to become the Second President of Rangoon University Student Union and subsequently co-found We the Burmese Federation, with the first Thakhin \u2013 Thakhin Ba Thaung, a university tutor and nationally acclaimed writer.\u00a0\u00a0 With the staunch campaigning by prominent Buddhist nationalist students such as Ba Sein (later Thakhin Ba Sein), the Muslim activist could beat a Buddhist candidate named Maung Ein for the Student Union\u2019s top leadership position.<\/p>\n There were other non-Buddhist names who rose to national prominence as a result of their campus activism.\u00a0\u00a0 Rashid, Razak, and Pe Khin spring to mind. Pe Khin, a Muslim student from upcountry Burma, beat Aung San, a Buddhist, for an officer\u2019s seat at Social Welfare and Reading Club at Pegu Hall, Rangoon University.\u00a0 They played vital roles in the successive national efforts, of which Aung San became the unrivalled leader.\u00a0\u00a0 Aung San personally recruited Rashid and Pe Khin to be his top colleagues to secure Indian nationalists\u2019 support and the collaboration of the Frontier Area communities at Pang Long. \u00a0\u00a0It was Pe Khin as head of the Frontier Areas Department within the flagship Burmese political party, the Anti-Fascist People\u2019s Freedom League (AFPFL), who helped secure Burma\u2019s founding treaty \u2013 Pang Long Agreement \u2013 in February 1947.\u00a0 Likewise, Abdul Razak, for example, who was an important leader of the above-mentioned National Education movement, enjoyed overwhelming support from the Buddhist monks in tradition-bound Mandalay \u2013 his hometown.<\/p>\n There were also intellectual contributions made by former student activists of Sino-Burmese mixed ancestry.\u00a0 The late Thakhin Aung Gyi (Paung Tae) \u2013 better known as Brigadier General Aung Gyi, deputy Chief of Staff of the Tatmadaw \u2013 springs to mind.\u00a0 His writings in connection with the post-independence problems confronting Rakhine State, showed a very progressive and social scientific understanding of identities of the borderlands peoples such as Wa, Shans, Mons, Kachins, Karens and Rohingyas, as fluid and non-blood-based.<\/p>\n These national leaders were of mixed racial heritage or non-Buddhists; but evidently they were no less Burmese or patriotic than Aung San, Nu, Ba Hein, Thein Pe Myint, Soe or Than Tun.<\/p>\n Besides his exposure to secularist, non-racist Marxian ideas, it was Aung San\u2019s first-hand experience working with an ethnically and religiously diverse group of talented, anti-colonial peers \u2013 such as Raschid, Pe Khin, and Razak \u2013 that enabled him in his final two years (1946-1947) as the Chair of AFPFL to define and espouse such progressive post-racial and non-racist definition of \u201cTai Yin Tha\u201d, as anyone who was born in Burma, loved their birthplace and dedicated to the advancement of the country and its peoples, irrespective of faith, race, ethnicity and gender.\u00a0 Today\u2019s official and popular racist talks of \u201cprotecting Buddhist faith and race\u201d is an act of betrayal of the pre-independence dream of Burma as a secularist, multiculturalist society.<\/p>\n Finally, no discussion of campus activism will be complete without mentioning the movement\u2019s contributions to gender equality.\u00a0\u00a0 While no woman activist presided over the student union since its founding in the 1930\u2019s, there was no shortages of woman activists who earned the nation\u2019s highest esteem.\u00a0\u00a0 These included the late Ahma of Ludu Press and university lecturer Ma Ohn, to name only a few.\u00a0 Their male counterparts recognized the important intellectual and political roles of these women activists.\u00a0 University Student Union election campaigns involved many female students who later distinguished themselves as nationalist leaders, beyond the confines of campus activism.<\/p>\n The campus activism which rose 100 years ago set a fine and viable model of national politics where individuals from a very rich mix of religious, ethnic and racial backgrounds embrace Burma as their home and make dedicated efforts for the advancement of all <\/em>people. It was this kind of campus activism that gifted the colonial nation the likes of Aung San, Razak, Rashid, Ba Hein, Mya, Nu, Letyar, Ahma, Ma Ohn and others.<\/p>\n To tell today\u2019s student activists to simply mind their own business and focus on educating themselves in the enclosed walls of campuses not only violates the spirit and broad mission of education \u2013 as defined by Aung San himself \u2013 but deprives the public the chance to see how Burmese can be multicultural and secular citizens.\u00a0 Burmese students, particularly those affiliated with the All Burma Federation of Student Unions (ABFSU), have kept alive the flame of a secularist, inclusive national vision for all.\u00a0 It is imperative that society at large, particularly the intelligentsia among the \u201cgrown-ups\u201d, wake up to the value of campus activism.<\/p>\n All governments and political parties are corruptible as they pursue power and control for their own sake.\u00a0 Our Burmese campus activists, in contrast, continue to be driven by conscience, compassion and idealism, neither swayed by the corrupting influences of NGO money nor intimidated by iconic national politicians.\u00a0\u00a0 Therefore, We, the Burmese people, must lend our hands of solidarity as campus activists attempt to take the front-line trenches for liberty, equality and universal human rights for all. Yes, fifty years of military and hybrid-military administrations have bloodied the idealistic heads of campus activists.\u00a0 But their heads remain unbowed.<\/p>\n In the Burmese society today so violently fractured by the regressive politics of racism, bigotry and exclusion it is these idealistic and principled students who are best positioned to serve as the moral compass.\u00a0\u00a0 Their activism needs to be cherished and nurtured \u2013 not trampled on and repressed.<\/p>\n ___________________________________________<\/p>\n In the Burmese society today so violently fractured by the regressive politics of racism, bigotry and exclusion it is these idealistic and principled students who are best positioned to serve as the moral compass. Their activism needs to be cherished and nurtured \u2013 not trampled on and repressed. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-96696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-transcend-members"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96696\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>Dr. Maung Zarni is a Burmese activist blogger, Associate Fellow at the University of Malaya, a member of the <\/em>TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment<\/a>, founder and director of the Free Burma Coalition (1995-2004), a visiting fellow (2011-13) at the Civil Society and Human Security Research Unit, London School of Economics, and<\/em> a nonresident scholar with the Sleuk Rith Institute in Cambodia. His forthcoming book on Burma will be published by Yale University Press.<\/em> He was educated in the US where he lived and worked for 17 years.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"