it’s the stupid economy
Posted by: “Edith Mirante” maje@hevanet.com emirante
Wed May 28, 2008 6:18 pm (PDT)
May 28, International Herald Tribune
Even with access, distributing aid in Myanmar is difficult
A sport-utility vehicle for $250,000 and a cellphone for $3,000. As
foreign aid workers test Myanmar’s commitment to allowing them to
operate
inside the country as part of the relief effort for Cyclone Nargis, they
face not only administrative hurdles erected by a xenophobic military
government but also an economy warped by years of misrule.
Myanmar’s military limits the sale of cellphones, bans satellite phones,
sharply restricts car imports and rations gasoline to one or two gallons
(between 3.5 and 7 liters) a day. The main beneficiaries of this system
are government employees and military officers, who profit by selling
permits, gasoline and many other items on the black market.
Aid workers from the United Nations and private aid agencies continued
Wednesday to travel into the Irrawaddy Delta, the area hardest hit by
the
May 3 cyclone, after an agreement last week reached with the Myanmar
government. Richard Horsey, the spokesman for the UN relief effort, said
the military was requiring aid workers to give 48 hours’ notice before
traveling into the delta but that he was hearing only positive news
about
their access.
“I’m not aware of any rejections or people not able to go where they
wanted to go,” Horsey said.
By government count, the storm left 134,000 people dead or missing, and
the United Nations estimates that 2.4 million survivors face hunger and
homelessness. Yet as the number of aid workers increases, Myanmar’s
capacity and willingness to accommodate their needs are likely to be
stretched.
“I assume we will be running out of quite a lot of things when the
influx
comes,” said Hakan Tongul, deputy country director in Yangon of the
World
Food Program, a UN agency delivering supplies to the victims of the
storm.
“There will be logistical problems for sure.”
In the days after the storm, the World Food Program asked for permission
to import six vehicles, Tongul said. “We haven’t heard anything from the
government.”
To the outside world, the government’s torpor in reacting to the cyclone
has come across as callous indifference. But dysfunction has also been a
factor. When a domestic Myanmar Airways passenger plane crashed in 1999
only five kilometers, or three miles, from the airport in Tachileik,
near
the border with Laos and Thailand, it took the authorities five days to
locate the wreckage.
“Passengers who might have been saved all perished,” said a frustrated
Myanmar government official who requested that his name be withheld
because talking to a foreign reporter could cause him to lose his job or
worse.
“The same thing is happening now,” the official said, referring to the
cyclone. “We don’t have the infrastructure for the kind of rescue work
we
need in times like this. In this country, where everything moves through
the military chain of command, no government official takes the
initiative.”
China, Sri Lanka, Indonesia and other countries struck in recent years
by
natural disasters have varying degrees of political restrictions. But
they
all allow something Myanmar has lacked for the past 46 years under
military rule: the right to do business.
Myanmar’s government controls many of the country’s largest industries -
including timber, gems and petroleum – and requires permits for the
importation of the most basic items, including rice. The World Food
Program, which fears shortages later this year, has been denied permits
to
bring in foreign rice. “It’s an issue of pride,” said Paul Risley, the
agency’s Asia spokesman.
The economy is highly inefficient. Electricity – even in most parts of
the
commercial capital, Yangon – is available just five or six hours a day.
To
ride in a taxi in Yangon means a rickety journey on 20-year-old shock
absorbers.
India, Myanmar’s neighbor to the west, is preparing to roll out a $2,500
car. To the east, Thailand exports half a million pickups. But those
fortunate enough to own a car in Myanmar are often stuck with a leaking
jalopy. The government allows only a few thousand cars to be imported
each
year, many fewer than are needed in a country with nearly 50 million
people. Import restrictions have skewed the prices of used cars to
levels
that would be considered absurd in neighboring countries: A 1986 Toyota
Chaser, a model the company stopped selling eight years ago, sells here
for $16,000. Those vehicles allowed for import are parceled out among
high-ranking military officers and civil servants. The richest residents
of Yangon have been seen driving Hummers and Italian sports cars.
In such a restrictive environment, the black market thrives. Rationed
gasoline, which goes for $2.50 a gallon, or about 65 cents per liter,
sells for at least twice that at the roadside bamboo shacks that serve
as
illegal but tolerated gasoline stations. The military, which has easier
access to cheap gasoline, is one of the largest sellers, say drivers who
regularly fill up with the illegal fuel.
Government officials and military officers also make money from
reselling
mobile telephone numbers and car and motorcycle registration documents,
all of which are very difficult to obtain.
The Myanmar official gets $120 a month for his official salary, but that
hardly meets his needs. “Everyone must find a way to survive,” he said.
The police collect bribes at checkpoints from truck drivers. At
airports,
pilots and ground crews split the extra-luggage surcharges from
passengers. “Everyone is doing it,” the official said. “If you don’t or
can’t, you are doomed.”
Business people in Yangon say it is impossible to do business without
connections to generals or their children.
“Do you see the car out there?” the Myanmar official said, pointing to a
used Japanese sport-utility vehicle parked outside a restaurant. “It
will
probably cost $50,000 to import that car. But it’s sold here for
$250,000.
The $200,000 balance is for all kinds of government permits.”
The going rate for a cellphone on Yangon’s black market is $2,500 to
$3,000.
The government also makes money by doing business with the United
Nations.
Each UN agency was allowed to buy 10 cellphone numbers – at $1,500 each,
according to Tongul, of the World Food Program. In Thailand, by
contrast,
cellphone numbers are sometimes given away by companies counting on
making
their money back on use of the phone.
A Chinese-made motorcycle in the northern city of Mandalay costs $300
but
sells for around $1,000 when the black-market registration is included.
“They squeeze you for money,” said a retired teacher in Yangon who did
not
want to be named for fear of retribution. “You know the Abraham Lincoln
speech about government of the people, by the people, for the people?”
the
teacher asked. “The people get nothing here, and the military takes
everything.”
