Interview with New Mon State Party about emergency meeting of the party

According to New Mon State Party (NMSP) spokesperson Nai Chay Mon during an interview with IMNA reporter Loa Htaw, party leaders have gathered at their headquarters in southern Mon State for an emergency meeting.

NMSP leaders must decide whether they will accept the Burmese government’s demands that the party to transform the Mon National Liberation Army (MNLA) into a Burmese-government controlled militia group or Border Guard Force (BGF). According to Nai Chay Mon, the NMSP leaders met with Southeast Command Lt. Gen. Ye Myint on April 7, when he gave the party a deadline of April 22nd to confirm its decision.

Loa Htaw: Could you please tell the Mon people about the NMSP’s current situation?

Nai Chay Mon: Currently the New Mon State Party has been asked by Southeast Command Lt.Gen. Ye Myint to accept the transformation of the MNLA into a militia group. The NMSP leaders, led by Vice President Nai Rot Sa, Join Secretary Nai Chan Toi and CEC Nai Tala Nyi met with Lt. Gen Ye Myint on April 7th, and he asked the party’s leaders to confirm their decision by a deadline of April 22.

Loa Htaw: What is the emergency meeting about at the NMSP’s head-quarters?

Nai Chay Mon: The main agenda is to decide whether the NMSP should accept the government’s demands or not. Currently, all the Central Executive Committee party leaders are holding the meeting about this issue.

Loa Htaw: What will happen if NMSP decides not to form a militia group? Will the the relationship between the NMSP and the SPDC return to the way they were before the cease-fire agreement?

Nai Chay Mon: We cannot say anything yet about whether the political situation will become like it was before the cease-fire agreement or not. The NMSP and other ethnic groups signed cease-fire agreements to solve political problems, and both the Burmese government and the NMSP must take time to find a solution, step by step.

Loa Htaw: The NMSP has stated several times that it will not participate in the 2010 elections, or transform its armed wing into a militia group. Why does the Burmese government want confirmation of these decisions again?

Nai Chay Mon: Before, the government asked the NMSP to accept the Border-Guard Force agreement, but now they changed the word into militia group.

Loa Htaw: What is the difference between a Border-Guard Force and a militia group?

Nai Chay Mon: A Border-Guard Force means that the force will include SPDC soldiers, but a militia group may not involve the government’s soldiers, according to our experience.

Loa Htaw: How do plan to deal with other Mon parties, such as All Region Mon Democracy Party, who are planning to run in the 2010 elections?

Nai Chay Mon: We do not want to comment on other Mon parties, or if they want to form new Mon parties and run in the elections. We do not oppose or support them. But the 2010 election is based on the 2008 constitution, which we do not approve of.

Loa Htaw: Some have said that the Mon people and other ethnic groups should have their ethnic political parties join in the elections to represent their groups’ voices. What do you think?

Nai Chay Mon: We should not view the election at a surface level . We have to consider the 2008 constitution carefully, and how it will benefit the Mon people and all Burmese citizens. Otherwise, we will face the effects of the constitution, which does not give any ethnic rights to the Mon people or other ethnic people.

Loa Htaw: What do you want to tell the Mon people, regarding both the upcoming elections, and the pressure from the government to accept an agreement to transform the MNLA into a militia group?

Nai Chay Mon: We want to tell the Mon people that MNLA still exists, and we want the Mon people to support the MNLA and NMSP, whatever the decisions the party makes.

The relation between NMSP and SPDC on the 51st anniversary of the party foundation;

Interview with secretary of New Mon State Party, Nai Hong Sar
Fri 24 Jul 2009, By Rai Maraoh
IMNA: Can you speak about the current relations between the New Mon State Party [NMSP] and the State Peace and Development Council [SPDC]?

NHS: The NMSP’s cease-fire agreement with SPDC has gone on for 14 years and the SPDC is currently planning to hold an election in 2010. The military regime will hold the election according to their desires and the constitution they have drawn up. There will be only one army, which will even control the police department, and all the ethnic armed groups will have to be under that army’s control. That’s why the SPDC is talking with us about forming a Border Guard Force (BGF) for us to be under their control. In this case, none of the strong political parties will be able to accept and only those groups which have weak political views have already accepted the SPDC offer. Like the others, the NMSP can’t accept changing the Mon National Liberation Army (MNLA) into a BGF, and this will affect the relations between the NMSP and the SPDC. They [SPDC] will still try to find a way to shape the armed groups as they want. This causes more problems for the relations and potential conflict between NMSP and SPDC.



IMNA: What is your opinion on the SPDC offer to change the MNLA into a Border Guard Force?

MNSP: The reason that we all, Mon, Kachin, Karen and Shan, have taken political action, is to gain rights for our nationalities. To be precise, our aim is to gain the right of self-determination of Mon State and for Mon people. We have to hold onto our arms to help reach our goal, as we can’t gain our rights making only verbal demands - we have to have an armed group. No political party can accept handing over their arm force to the SPDC. As we all know today, there will be no hope and no rights for us. That’s why we didn’t accept it because our nation, Burma, is not fully democratic. We can look at National League for Democracy (NLD). Although the NLD gets full support from the people, we can see it can’t do much in terms of political activities. Right now we can carry on our political movement because of our army. If we handed over our arm forced to them, there would be no way for us to carry out political activities. This is has been our experience. After the Mon People’s Front disarmed, we lost all of our opportunities. We have had the experience of losing huge opportunities before and we don’t want that kind of experience to happen to us again.



IMNA: What you mean is that you definitely won’t accept the SPDC offer, right?

NMSP: Well, I will have to say, yes. To say this, as all people acknowledge, we can’t accept the SPDC offer. The SPDC has already known this, that the NMSP won’t be able to accept it.



IMNA: What is the focus of the emergency meeting of the NMSP, which is going to be held during the approaching last week of July?

NMSP: After the SPDC realizes most of the ethnic political parties can’t accept their current offer to change the ethnic armed forces into a BGF, the military regime will turn to another method. That is either to reform the MNLA as a people’s militia force or to just ask how the NMSP wants to change its’ army. The party’s meeting will focus on this issue and how to respond to the SPDC request. We will discuss how to handle what the SPDC will come up with, and the current Burmese political situation as it will vastly affect both the Mon and all the other people of Burma.



IMNA: You just said the SPDC’s political situation will have huge affect, what do you mean by that?

NMSP: We will not be able to keep doing political work and representing the party if we deny their offer. They [SPDC] will provoke us, the cease-fire will end, and peace will end in Mon State. This will happen not only with the Mon but other ethnic groups as well. This is a big change and there will be massive conflict if the SPDC keeps doing what they want and the ethnic political parties are unable to accept their desires. To be clear, civil war will restart again. This change is important.



IMNA: What can happen if NMSP rejects the SPDC offer?

NMSP: I cannot say exactly what will happen. The reason we made a ceasefire agreement was to solve the political problems over the table. We wanted to find a political solution in peaceful way, but, we will have not found a way and we will fight again if the SPDC wants to solve this with arms.



IMNA: Does NMSP have any preparing to do to go to war again?

NMSP: Yes, we have made some preparations in our army.