Myanmar Spring Chronicle – 34th Anniversary of the 8888 Uprising, Comparing  1988 & Spring Revolution

Myanmar Spring Chronicle – August 08 Scenes

MoeMaKa, August 09 2022

34th Anniversary of the 8888 Uprising, Comparing  1988 & Spring Revolution

 

If we were to say the most important facts about the Anniversary of the 8888 Uprising are;  to honor and tribute all those who sacrificed and lost their lives in the struggle for democracy on that day of uprising and after and to learn historical lessons from that 88 uprising. To bring justice for fallen, there is still no justice those who were responsible to pay for the acts of their atrocities, shootings, killings committed in the past and also for those who gave orders and oppressed Myanmar people under their bloody boots. There’s no apology or reconciliation with Myanmar military after all these years.

The courage, determination and solidarity of students and protesters who sacrificed their lives with swagger at gunpoint to overthrow the one-party dictatorship system ruled by the military and socialist regime in historic 8888 Uprising, has been recorded as non-violent democracy movement in our history.

One month after Nation wide protest, the Myanmar army ignored the demands of Myanmar people and staged coup, took power back from their own Socialist regime in September 18th 1988. During the period of military rule by the coup army, students left for border regions to revolt by means of armed resistance. They did establish a student army called “All Burma Students’ Democratic Front (ABSDF)” and fought in armed struggle for decades. Their struggle would have to be recognized and recorded in history.

 The next step to review is the fact whether the political organizations, parties, other activists’ groups and individuals have been able to take enough historical lessons from the incident of the 8888 Uprising.

The 8888 Uprisings proclaimed democracy and human rights, and the military dictators defamed the 8888 Uprisings by saying that they were orchestrated by the BCP (Burma Communist Party) from behind. The underground activists and politicians who were arrested after the uprising, were portrayed as the ones who instigated and participated past-uprisings before this 8888 incident. And they were accused in many  Military’s  press conferences and their propaganda newspapers such that  they were in connection with former student protesters of uprisings  in the 70s  who wanted unrest and lawlessness towards the country. In 88 uprising, most student arrested were framed as underground members of Burma Communist Party which the junta regarded as terrorist rebel organization. 

Although it was true that the Burma Communist Party had given some advise and help support the democracy struggle in some way politically, the nationwide public uprisings and protests is mainly caused by the public discontent, sky rocketing prices due to mismanagement and decades long corruptions of MaSaLa Party’s (Burma Socialist Programme Party – BSPP) one-party dictatorship. After the Socialist regime declared their cancellation of some Myanmar currency notes in September 1987 before 1988 uprising, the public and students took it as major blow to their lives waking them up towards activism. Then came  severe violations of human rights by Myanmar soldiers in the student protest that killed Phone Maw and other students in March 13th, 1988 became driving force to public to stand up against the MaSaLa Party’s yoke fell off from their shoulder.

It can be concluded that the Burma Communist Party participated in the overthrow of the military dictatorship after observing the public’s dissatisfaction, crisis and the situation with the potential of 1988 uprising as they had fought in armed resistance and underground movement for decades to bring down the MaSaLa military dictatorship.

After the 8888 Uprising, the military regained control of power as another form and continued to rule for more than 2 decades. Within a few days of the coup, the NLD party was formed, which included the leaders who emerged during the uprising, former politicians and some retired army generals, and within a few years, it became the political party with the most public support and operated as a party on ground throughout the period of opposition to the military dictatorship after 1988 until now. The public had hoped and supported the NLD, the party on the ground, for the emergence of a democratic country, which was the goal of the 8888 Uprising. As for armed resistance, they also had faith in the ABSDF, which was called the Student Army by civilians.

According to World situation at that time, the armed revolution did not receive popular support. The landslide election victory by NLD party in 1990 was not recognized by the junta  with the excuse that there was not yet a constitution. Then  Myanmar political struggle, protests and oppression continued for next two decades. During 2008, the Military staged people referendum to enact Military backed constitution against public protests. After that, in the 2010 election, it was the USDP party backed by Myanmar military won the election by a landslide and recognized by the regime to form government. In the next second election in 2015, the people’s NLD party won majority and became the ruling government. However then in this 2020 election, it returned to political and military conflict again. The Myanmar military declared unfair election results and took the power back to them on 1st February 2021.

As an armed revolution that occurred after the 2021 coup, what lessons can be learned from the 8888 uprising? In terms of party politics, the NLD party, a party on ground, emerged after the 8888 election, so what lessons can we learn by reviewing the history. Similarly, as for the ethnics armed organizations know as EAOs and regional armed groups, generally known as PDFs, that emerged after the 2021 coup d’état, what lessons can be learned from the experiences that ABSDF went through? I think these questions are the most important and precious ones here.

If we look at the 88 and 21 spring revolutions, I would like to say that all the working living classes of Myanmar uprisen in 88 did slowly settle down under the oppression of the military dictator, however all of the different generations took part in the 21 spring revolution have continued to fight persistently.

In 1988, the employee strikes did not progress into the CDM movement of the spring revolution.

In 1988, the student strikes and the student youth forces were weakened under the coup regime’s arrests, imprisonments, and bloody oppression, but the new generation of spring students were able to continue marching in the on-ground and underground and keep on striking the struggle.

The armed Resistance could not be considered as resistance of all classes in Myanmar but only limit to the student force and some ethnic group, however now in 21 Spring, it became clear as an armed resistance is the war of  all working living classes of Myanmar people.

In 1988, the people’s support and encouragement were cut off under the “four cuts” (no money, no people, no food, no land) policy of the military regime, but now, in 21 spring revolution, we can see that the people’s support and encouragement flows to the fighters without limits. It can be regarded as significant that people are supporting collectively to anyone fighting against Myanmar regime, rather than selectively limiting to particlur group, class or religion.

We can see political parties, ethnic armed groups, strike (Boycott) groups, and in addition to on ground and underground armed revolutionaries, all activists from CSOs and NGOs, are able to ally as partners and fight against a common enemy.

In this Myanmar Spring Movement, the participants and supporters have common understanding on the importance of forming federal democratic union for Myanmar, establishing the new constitution that guarantees this and the clear vision of overthrowing the military dictatorship.

An important question among many controversial issues during the previous 88 uprising is like; who is the leader of which group and to whom will they follow, since there’s so many leaders, interests and priority involved and people got confused and divided all the time.  Now it can be said that it is unique that the current NUG and NUCC has been designated as a fore-front in the spring revolution of 2021, shaped and pushed from the ground up.

In any case, the 21 spring revolution will continue to be monitored over time. I also think that can they really learn from the 8888 Uprising?