If I were King...

This piece is from my Contemporary World Issues class and the goal of it was to select a country, and from the point of view of its leader discuss what exactly you would change. I chose the country of Burma, and it's imprisoned but rightful leader Aung San Suu Kyi, rather than it's acting president who is simply another in a line of military dictators.

My name is Aung San Suu Kyi. I was the democratically elected leader of Burma in 1990, but have been under house arrest by the opposing militaristic government for the last twenty years. The people of this country and myself have long been under the thumb of these tyrants, and its time Burma took a step forward with a new attitude. I intend to replace military spending of this oppressive government with a health and education system, work to slow the spread of the AIDS virus, and increase our trade relations with foreign markets to offer greater economic opportunity.

This country has for too long been run by soldiers. From the 1960’s to the late 1980’s it was a military dictatorship, and when elections were finally held in 1989 I was arrested and imprisoned just before I was elected. Spending most of our hard earned money on guns and bullets, when we don’t have any wars to fight, does not make any sense. The military budget is 15-20x larger than the healthcare budget. “The government spends 30-50% of its budget on the military, yet only 2.2% is spent on health, (1)” which is essentially the opposite of what we need. The repercussions for spending half of our money on weapons have led to lack of development in education and health programs.

An estimated 30% of children under age 5 are moderately to severely underweight due to food insecurity, lowering their immune systems and making them susceptible to even more health problems.

These health risks include things like malaria, HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis, the latter of the three being the worst because 40% of the populations have a drug-resistant form of it. Their health care is comparable to that of the worst in the world, including Rwanda, Congo, Dar fur, and Sudan. These issues are only going to get worse, as international organizations like Doctors Without Borders have been forced to withdraw from the country. Without any international aid, and half of the entire budget continues to go to weapons than the situation can only get worse.

The aids problem in Burma is nearly the worst in Southeast Asia, second only to Thailand. The issue isn’t just sex or the virus going from mother to child, but the increase in aids is due to drug habits and the sharing of needles more than anything else. And these people that develop these habits don’t have access to the proper help to get them back on track.

People Living With HIV/AIDS (PLWHA), and drug users or the organizations that represent them, have not been consulted or been able to participate in the formulation of polices and decision-making processes that have such tremendous impact on their health, livelihoods and lives.

What this essentially means is that when the people in need don’t have any say on what action will be taken to address that need, it essentially puts them in a dirt hole looking for answers. This is a fundamental problem because the organization trying to provide the solution doesn’t necessarily know what the people need. They might think they know what needs to be done, but without any sort of dialogue with those receiving the help, whatever sort of development that’s supposed to be taking place, won’t occur at all. It is clear that Burma needs help from the Global AIDS/TB fund, but international organizations have set up a blockade to stop that support from going in.

A recent report done suggests that it’s possible the United Nations is actually a few years with their data regarding presence of HIV/AIDS in Burma, and that it is among Thailand in the worst in the area.

The explosion of the disease in Shan state is even more frightening. Dr Beyrer estimates that more than 10% of the adult male population there is now suffering from HIV. ‘That's the worst ever incidence of the disease in the region’.

Beyrer headed the study and compared it to that of the situation in Thailand 10 years ago. “The difference then was the Thai Government recognized it and did something about it, whereas the military juntas are allowing this one to rage out of control.” This is another example of where the government should be spending our money. Probably the biggest issue with the AIDS epidemic is that the government won’t accept that it’s an issue, and blames it on western media.

Burma's health minister, Major General Ket Sein, told a Word Health Organization (WHO) meeting earlier this month: ‘Contrary to the gloomy picture presented in some reports in the western media, HIV/Aids is not rampant in Myanmar’ (Burma).

The big question is whether or not the military government will take a stance against AIDS, or whether there will be some form of international effort to stem to progression of the virus.

Burma needs to increase its trade with foreign countries in the global market. As of 1999 more than 80% of the exports went to other Asian countries including Singapore, Malaysia, and China. Malaysia also provides 31% of all imports to Burma. The total export to the United States makes up less than 5% of trade, and the number is a little less for Europe. These exports include basic goods like beans, rice, rubber, but the black market is arguably more abundant than the legal one. The smuggling of exotic animals yields extreme amounts of money, and they also smuggle gems, mineral, and teak into surrounding countries. the choices on their imports are not the best either.

During the 1997-98 fiscal year, imports included raw materials, transport equipment, construction materials, and food items. While priority was given to the importation of materials needed for the Yadana natural gas pipeline, the government took measures to control importation of non-essential goods.

Whether or not the people of Burma get fed up with the militaristic government will determine the fate of the country. I want to instate a democracy, where the people of Burma have choices in what they eat, where they work, and so the citizens won’t have to cower in fear of the government. We need education and health reform rather than military spending, foreign aid for the HIV/AIDS epidemic, along with a substantial increase in global trade to the more developed nations like the United States and the European Union.