Daw Aung San Suu Kyi

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AUNG SAN SUU KYI STRIVING TO BUILD A DEMOCRACY AMID THE HARSH REGIME OF MYANMAR

By Scott Kraft
Los Angeles Times

Aung San Suu Kyi had a rigid routine during the six years she spent under arrest in her family's lakeside home. She would rise at 4:30 a.m. for exercise and meditation, then spend the day reading biographies or autobiographies and listening to the radio. The only human being she would see was the maid.

Although free for eight months now, she still spends most of her days in that two-story house. But the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner is hardly isolated. Two appointments secretaries, one for foreign dignitaries and the other for fellow party members, have guided thousands of visitors to meet her.

"I'm afraid I can no longer keep to a strict timetable," Suu Kyi says. "I can't get up at 4:30 anymore because there are times I don't get to bed until 2 a.m. If I got up early, I wouldn't be able to operate full-steam for 12 hours."

Many here hoped her release was a first step toward democracy in Myanmar. But the military regime, which nullified her party's victory in the 1990 elections, still runs the country. It is stage-managing a constitutional convention while trying to attract foreign investment.

Suu Kyi is bidding her time and rebuilding her party network. Her weekdays are filled with appointments and on weekend, hundreds of supporters gather outside the gated compound to hear her speak and answer their questions. Soon, she says, the government will come to its senses.

Even as the government tries to ignore her, Suu Kyi, 50, remains the most-respected political figure in Myanmar. Her father, Aung San, is considered, even by her detractors, as the greatest hero of Burmese independence. He was assassinated in 1947, when she was 2.

Suu Kyi left Burma in 1960, at age 15, and later received a degree from Oxford University. She married a Briton, Michael Aris, who is now a professor and specialist in Tibetan studies at Oxford. In 1988, she returned to Burma to tend to her ailing mother and became a leader of pro-democracy movement.

Aris and the couple's two sons, Kim, 18, and Alexander, 22, who are in school abroad, usually visit Suu Kyi at holidays, as they did during her years of house arrest, if the government grants them visas. Suu Kyi is prevented from leaving Myanmar only by the certainity that she would never be allowed to return.

In person, Suu Kyi is low-key and polite, though her determination is evident. She always refers to the country as Burma and the capital as Rangoon, purposefully ignoring the government's decree that the nation be called Myanmar and the city, Yangon.

She meets visitors at home in a square room surrounded by 1940s-era photographs of her family and a wall-sized painting of her father. "The painting is a bit Andy Warhol, don't you think?" she says. "But it's really a very good likeness."

Question: How would you assess the eight months since you've been released? What are the positive developments and the disappointments?
Answer: Well, in politics, I don't think you ever get disappointed as such. It's an occupational hazard that things don't always turn out as you would wish them to. You hope for the best and prepare for the worst. That's politics. But we still have the strong support of the people and we manage to get along with our party building.

Q: Many in the West thought that when you were released, everything would begin to improve.
A: I don't think it's as simple as that. There are some people who say I was released because the government thought the National League for Democracy was dead. But in fact, it is far from dead. There have been miscalculations like that in the past by the government. In the 1990 elections, the government thought we might win a plurality but not an absolute majority. In fact, we got 82%, with the result that those elections have been totally ignored and our members persecuted.

Q: So you aren't disappointed in the slow pace of change?
A: I wouldn't say "disappointed" is the word. There is so much happening within our party that it does compensate for what is not happening on the other side. Of course, we know that the best thing for the country is national reconciliation, which can only take place through dialogue. And we hope that it will take place sooner rather than later. But that doesn't mean we just sit and hope. We have other work to do and we carry on.

Q: So you aren't impatient with the pace of things?
A: If you are very busy, you have no time to be impatient. If you ask us when do we want democracy, well, we want it now, of course. I feel just as strongly about that as anybody else. But because we are so occupied with our numerous jobs, we are not that impatient.

Q: Do you think the current constitutional conference, in which your party is not participating, is a step in the right direction?
A: No. That constitution is not headed for democracy. In the first place, they are not allowing political parties to operate effectively, and without political parties operating effectively there can be no multiparty democracy. The constitution they are writing really doesn't mean anything. A constitution is just a piece of paper unless it has the support of the people. Such constitutions do not last.

Q: So what can you do to get this government to change direction?
A: It is the will of the people that the country should become a democracy, and I'm sure the people will join in guiding the country to its democracy. We will do what we can as a legally registered party. We will use political means of reaching our goal. This is our constant.

Q: So you are talking about passive resistance.
A: We don't really believe that the way to bring about democracy is by encouraging popular uprisings. We believe that democracy will come through the strength of the political will of the people, expressed through political parties.

Q: How does it feel to be a free citizen?
A: I'm a free citizen but the country is not free. So I feel like a citizen in an unfree country. I appreciate the opportunity to be in touch with the people. That is what our work is all about. You know, I always felt free. I felt free when I was under house arrest because it was my choice. I chose to do what I'm doing and because of that. I found peace within myself. And I suppose that is what freedom is all about.

Q: Do you think that it is possible the government thought it could make you a non person by releasing you?
A: Sounds likely, doesn't it? Yes, it seems likely.

Q: The government often points out that you are married to a foreigner. How important is that criticism to the average Burmese?
A: I don't think it means very much. If I were married to a Burmese, they'd probably attack my husband's family for other reasons that he was foreign. Don't forget that they are also attacking very, very viciously other party leaders who are not married to foreigners.

Q: Is your husband able to visit you?
A: He came for Christmas, but last year he was refused a visa for the Easter holidays. So he comes if he gets a visa.

Q: You have frequently called for dialogue with the government.
A: Yes, we believe in dialogue and we will always believe in dialogue because that's the way all political problems end up.

Q: Has the government made any overtures to you?
A: Our party has a policy that we will make no statements about dialogue until we decide we are ready to bring out an official version.

Q: So you're saying .......?
A: What I'm saying is that I'm not answering your question (laughs).

Q: If there is an election based on the government's new constitution, would your party participate?
A: We don't even know whether there is going to be a constitution or what sort of constitution. In any case, I don't think we should be talking about the next elections when the issue of the last elections has not yet been resolved.

Q: Currently, the government is promoting foreign investment, and many companies, including Unocal in Los Angeles, have investments here. What's your message to those companies?
A: We always said -- very, very clearly -- that Burma is not right for investment. The climate is not right because the structural changes necessary to make an investment really profitable are not yet in place. We have now acquired in Burma a small group of very, very rich people. We did not have such people eight years ago -- people who could go to a hotel and spend $1,000 on a meal. That was unheard of. And the gap between the haves and the have-nots is increasing. That does not make for social stability.

Q: Do you think the government's hold on power will be strengthened as it opens up the economy?
A: Well, it is not a free market. Some are freer than others in their access to the market. The mechanism necessary for a really healthy open economy does not yet exist. And one of the most important parts of that is the rule of law. You have to know where you stand . . . Without that, there can be neither credibility nor confidence. And every businessman must agree that good business cannot be done without credibility and confidence.

Q: What do you do to discourage investment?
A: It's not just what I say and it's not just the support there is abroad for the movement for democracy. Potential investors who really study the situation the situation in depth, who don't just take a superficial view, will come to their own conclusion that the time is not right. They may want to put a little bit here so they can have a toe hold, waiting for the day when Burma takes off. Of course, that day will be when democracy comes.

Q: In your heart, do you think that will come? Are we talking five years?
A: I can't really say. But certainly I don't think it will be that long. On the other hand, I know there will be a lot of problems to deal with once we have democracy. In fact, I think we'll probably have more problems after we have democracy than before. This is always the case when a system changes from an authoritarian system to an open and transparent one.

Q: You tell the crowds that democracy is no panacea.
A: I tell them that under a democracy, we will have to be prepared to take responsibility for our country's problems. Once they have democracy, they can no longer blame the government because they are really the government.

Q: But won't there need to be pressure to bring about change here?
A: There is international pressure. But of course what is more important is that there is pressure from within. The Burmese people are tired of authoritarianism, and they have seen for themselves that authoritarian system has not done the country any good at all. Our standards of education are falling. Standards of health are falling. The fact that we have new hotels does not make up for the fact that our children are less well-educated.

Q: Were you surprised, after your release, that there was still strong support for you? Did you worry that you might have been forgotten?
A: No, no. I was not that surprised. It is nothing to do with me. It has more to do with the desire of the people for a system that gives them both liberty and security. This is what the people want, isn't it? People want to be free and at the same time they want to be secure.

Q: And you personally?
A: It is not me they are supporting in particular. The government seems to think it's me personally that the people are supporting. The government always gets things wrong. We won the elections in 1990 because the people wanted democracy. It was not because of me.

Q: Do you worry about your safety?
A: No. I don't worry very much at all. It's not because I'm all that courageous or anything. It's just that there is no point in it. If they want to do anything to me they can do it any time they like.

Note: Scott Kraft, Paris bureau chief for the Times, interviewed Aung San Suu Kyi at her home in Yangon, Myanmar.