Latest update April 18th, 2024 12:59 AM
Sep 09, 2017 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon
It has not surprised me that the de facto leader of Myanmar (formerly known as Burma), Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize holder, has supported the army’s genocidal violence against the Rohingya Muslim minority race in her country. Homo sapiens species which we call humans is a cruel species of evolutionary biology.
Humans are capable of the most bestial instincts, far exceeding any group in the kingdom of lower animals. I regard Arthur Koestler’s brilliant description of the evolutionary faults of Homo sapiens as the best ever portrayal of Homo sapiens’ destructive nature. Reading Koestler is not for the faint-hearted.
Suu Kyi has only now spoken up and her words carry no condemnatory tones, and she found her voice after some top humans the world respect immensely, have called upon her to intervene. The Guardian of London in its Thursday edition has her on the front page, sentimentally clutching the hands of Bishop Desmond Tutu, in the days when the world admired her for her courage against the Burmese army.
The occasion for the photograph was Tutu’s appeal to her. Tutu referred to what the army is doing to the Rohingya race as ethnic cleansing. Some of the top newspapers in the world are referring to it as genocide. In my opinion it is. Suu Kyi has damaged her reputation permanently. The world will never see her the same way again. Commentators and analysts are calling for the withdrawal of her Peace Prize. I will sign that petition.
Video footage has revealed the horrific violence committed against these people, including children. Children have been slaughtered, reminding us of the horrors of the world’s most bestial acts of genocide from slavery to the civil war in Bosnia.
Let us quote Nobel Peace Prize holder, Tutu; “For years I had a photograph of you on my desk to remind me of the injustice and sacrifice you endured out of your love and commitment for Myanmar’s people. You symbolised righteousness.
“Your emergence into public life allayed our concerns about violence being perpetrated against members of the Rohingya. But what some have called ‘ethnic cleansing’ and others ‘a slow genocide’ has persisted – and recently accelerated.
“It is incongruous for a symbol of righteousness to lead such a country,” said the 85-year old anti-apartheid activist. “If the political price of your ascension to the highest office in Myanmar is your silence, the price is surely too steep.”
These are harsh words against someone, who prior to her support for her country’s army massacre of a minority race, was regarded as one of the most admired citizens of the world. Malala Yousafzai, the youngest ever recipient of the Peace Prize intoned this week that “the world is waiting” for Aung San Suu Kyi to act. She went on to add; “Over the last several years, I have repeatedly condemned this tragic and shameful treatment. I am still waiting for my fellow Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi to do the same”.
The campaign to revoke her Nobel Prize will not happen, because the Swedish Academy said there are no rules that would allow such a process. Suu Kyi has succumbed to the two worst instincts in Homo sapiens – power and tribe. From the time her party won power in Myanmar, she became an apologist for her government that was showing signs of authoritarian directions. See a sound and plausible analysis of her dictatorial style in The Guardian of March 31, 2017 captioned; “Aung San Suu Kyi: Myanmar’s great hope fails to live up to expectations.” It makes for very good reading and I suggest you Google it.
Deep inside the mind of Suu Kyi is her belief that the Rohingya people are an inferior group that do not belong to Burma and have no Burmese blood. In other words, she takes a racial position on the problems. This explains her silence while the army was committing genocidal violence again these people invading their homes, killing families on a large scale, and burning down their houses.
When she first spoke on the violence, she was supportive of the army, explaining that the Rohingya people had formed an insurgency. This was a horrible statement to make, because once a member of a race picks a gun and attacks the symbol of oppressive power, it does not give the army license to murder thousands of innocent women and children.
The story of the fall from grace of a woman who the entire world loved and respected is testimony to the monster that lurks inside all of us. Homo sapiens most dangerous trait is the tribalist instinct. Africans and Indians in Guyana, please take note.
Comments are closed.
JAGDEO ADDING MORE DANGER TO GUYANA AND THE REGION
Apr 18, 2024
SportsMax – West Indies captain Hayley Matthews has been named Wisden’s leading Twenty20 Cricketer for 2023, as she topped all and sundry, including her male counterparts. Alan Gardner looks...Kaieteur News – Compliments of the Ministry of Education, our secondary school children are being treated to a stage... more
By Sir Ronald Sanders Waterfalls Magazine – On April 10, the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States... more
Freedom of speech is our core value at Kaieteur News. If the letter/e-mail you sent was not published, and you believe that its contents were not libellous, let us know, please contact us by phone or email.
Feel free to send us your comments and/or criticisms.
Contact: 624-6456; 225-8452; 225-8458; 225-8463; 225-8465; 225-8473 or 225-8491.
Or by Email: [email protected] / [email protected]
For those too young to remember there was a time in Guyana (British Guiana) when there was a racial war between blacks and east Indians. I clearly remember as a child accompanying my father patrolling the streets of an East Coast village at night with only a stick as a weapon against those who would dare to ‘invade’. We were defending the village against any east indian ‘suspects’. But how could we defend ourselves with a stick if it became necessary .. east Indians in the near by ‘housing scheme’ were equipped with guns. The village of Buxton gained notoriety as a place dangerous for those of east indian heritage to pass through. They were subjected to harassment, a fine thrashing or even death. As was Success for black people. Those were dangerous times. The haunting sounds of a song sung by Neville Changur (east indian folk singer) and the arrival of British troops along with the suspension of the constitution (I think) helped to bring an end to this tragic part of our long forgotten history. Some blame could be laid at the feet of the ‘hap-en-jat’ purveyors.
I have often wondered if this part of our sordid history has ever been written somewhere for the present and future generations to take note.
It is said .. ‘those who choose to forget the past are doomed to repeat it.’