Interviews with Min Yan Naing
Burma
Civil Society
How civil society is repressed in Burma.
Transcript
Right now we are an illegal association. You need to register if you are an NGO, but the NGO, they need to undertake an (application) letter. You cannot concern yourself with politics and political parties like this, but we are concerned with politics and human rights, democracy. We cannot apply. Our country has a law currently: You cannot take a foreign organization donation.
If you take, you can be arrested. Right now we can be arrested in Burma. But they don’t take action right to our organization because I think this idea is if they arrested our organization, international people will be talked that this is not good for the going to the democracy way. I got all the support from the other country donors. I start to apply.
That’s why I can be, stand up right now to my work. But in the future, I don’t want to get so long to support. I want the support from our people.
About Min Yan Naing
Min Yan Naing is a Burmese civil society activist, youth leader and rapper. He was born and lives in Rangoon. He became active in a series of 1996 and 1998 student protests against the military junta ruling the country.
In 2007, together with several schoolmates, Min Yan Naing founded Generation Wave, an underground civil society group. Generation Wave works to motivate young Burmese to become engaged in politics through music and nonviolent protest actions. Using a variety of musical styles, including rap and hip-hop, Generation Wave recordings and videos encourage youth to take a stand in favor of democracy and human rights. Like many opposition groups, Generation Wave has been unable to register as a non-governmental organization and has faced many obstacles to its activities, which are illegal in the eyes of the military regime. Many of the movement’s activists have faced arrest and detention.
Generation Wave uses a variety of techniques to spread its messages, including loading material onto CDs and flash drives for distribution in public places. The group is also known for adapting tactics used in Serbia in 2000 to oust dictator Slobodan Milosevic, such as using graffiti and distributing leaflets to encourage youth activism.
As the Burmese government has eased some of its repressive tactics, Generation Wave has moved into greater visibility. Many of its detained activists were released by the government in early 2012. Generation Wave was active in the by-election campaign that saw opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi elected to the Burmese parliament.
A number of Generation Wave’s music videos are available on the Internet, including these:
Generation Wave’s Hip Hop song
WHOMADEWHO w/ GENERATION WAVE : “LEFT HAND OF THE BOXER”