Nay Pyi Taw November 29
Senior officer trainees should make efforts taking into account with the four views by conducting inter-course discussions, written expressions and studies to have correct thoughts without conceiving wrong ideas and to understand the objective conditions of the nation for adopting right ideologies, clear-cut resolutions and State-level policies by combining and comparing the aims of the National Defence College – political outlook, defence outlook, economic outlook and administrative outlook – with international outlook, said Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Senior General Min Aung Hlaing at his meeting with senior military officers from the Office of the Commander-in-Chief, senior officer instructors and senior officer trainees at NDC training hall this morning.
Also present on the occasion together with the Senior General were Deputy Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Commander-in-Chief (Army) Vice-Senior General Soe Win, Union Minister for Defence Lt-Gen Sein Win, Chief of the General Staff (Army, Navy and Air) General Mya Tun Oo, Commander-in-Chief (Navy) Admiral Tin Aung San, Commander-in-Chief (Air) General Maung Maung Kyaw, senior military officers from the Office of the Commander-in-Chief (Army), the commander of Nay Pyi Taw Command, the commandant of NDC and senior officer instructors and senior officer trainees.
First, the Senior General explained the political outlook. In adopting the means applied by the successful countries, serious consideration should be made to know whether they are suitable to the objective conditions of Myanmar. Views should be made from all angles for the development of the nation. The country is standing on political, economic and defence driving forces and they should have connections between one another. It will not be appropriate if the political strength is good and the economic and defence powers are week. Some countries are weak in international relations and economy as they are strong in defence strength but weak in political strength. If we divide our country into two sections – the pre-independence period and post-independence period, it can be seen the country used monarchy system in the past and after independence was restored it adopted the parliamentary democracy system. Beginning from 1962, the country adopted centralized system and it adopted the multi-party democracy system in 2011. In practicing the multi-party democracy system they are diverse views and disagreements. There was rivalry between socialist and capitalist systems. The oppressed people of the colonial era accepted socialism. The whole country became a colonial state in 1886. Due to the divide-and-rule policy of the colonial government, hill region administration, 91-department administration, separation or integration problems occurred in the country. We must note that there appeared diverse political, defence and administrative views depending on the leaders.
In the colonial era, the British imported Chiteers and Bengalis as labourers and coolies into Myanmar. Myanmar regained independence in 1948. The country became a member of ICJ in that year. At that time the so-called Rohingya or Bengali was not included in the national races of Myanmar. In conducting the Hintha project in 1974-1975 all the periodicals used the term “Bengalis”. Even during the period there were multiple problems including the immigration issue.
During the parliamentary period and Revolutionary Council period after the independence was regained, almost all the border could be demarcated and recognized. All the national races accepted the approved State boundary. There was no objection. During the post-independence period, internal armed conflict broke out due to disagreement in politics and national races affairs. The country has been solving the conflict till today. Due to the historical experiences, the country adopted Our Three Main National Causes – non-disintegration of the Union, non-disintegration of national solidarity and perpetuation of sovereignty – for the national interest. Independence was regained after sacrificing lots of lives, blood and sweat. So all the citizens including the Tatmadaw must take the past as a lesson and safeguard Our Three Main National Causes.
Currently, Tatmadaw has to continue its participation in national politics so as to ensure political stability and safeguard Our Three Main National Causes. We must safeguard what should be safeguarded and we must mend what should be mended.
In Myanmar tradition for example, there but they can be harmful to our health nowadays. This is why we must mend what should be mended to suit the current age. Anyhow, we must act in accord with the law.
As to foreign policy and international relations, Myanmar exercises an independent, active foreign policy based on its geographical and historical conditions. It is also practising the policy based on friendly relations with the global countries. In international relations, there is no forever friend or forever enemy. Particularly, it is necessary to have the best relationship with the neighbouring countries. We must understand that we have no choice to choose our neighbours. We need to cooperate with the neighbouring countries in the like-minded issues. It is needed to make correct decisions in the State and national interests.
Regarding economic outlook, national economy must develop as the economy is a major driving force of the State. Everyone or every country wants to develop. Development of a country depends on enough electricity supply, good transport, good communications and disciplined human resources. As electric power is crucial, it is not good for a country to see insufficient supply of electricity no matter how its technology progresses. Although Myanmar has water, solar and wind power sources to generate electricity, there are public protests for various reasons. So it is necessary to ensure that electricity is produced in a systematic manner and to organize the people to understand. Good transport contributes to the economy. In various modes of transport such as water routes, motor roads, railroads and air route, our country needs to use marine transport efficiently as it is blessed with coastal areas, rivers and creeks. As today is the news and information age, we need to catch up with the advancing communication system. But we need to take care of cyber security.
National development requires human resource development. We need not only education but also skills and discipline. We need to ensure continued pursuance of higher education, reach step-by-step educational grades and turn out highly-educated people. Universities and colleges have been opened across the country so that educated persons can emerge in their own regions. Moreover, private education sector has also developed. So we need to encourage the emergence of educated people for regional and national development. Emerging human resources must be employed in a correct manner and job opportunities must be created.
Socio-economic progress of rural people plays a key role in national development. A large gap between rural and urban areas will cause various problems because large cities will become densely populated. Therefore, emphasis must be placed on the economic progress of rural people. By boosting manufacturing of products based on agricultural and livestock and finished goods rather than raw materials, there will be more benefits and job opportunities. For example, export of sawn timber instead of timber logs will create jobs at factories and industries, paving the way for increased income for workers and use of by-products. With smokeless businesses like garment industry and tourism, we can attract global tourists in a way that our natural environment is not harmed. We must try to boost our tourism industry by ensuring that national character is not harmed. In every country practising market economy, the government plays a role. In some businesses, the State needs to intervene for a certain period. Only with good conditions for market economy, will the role of the government have to be reduced gradually. He stressed the need to levy the taxes fairly and correctly, and tax-payers need to correctly pay taxes. Moreover, it needs to encourage locally made products in order to develop the economy so as to reduce import volume.
With regard to the administrative outlook, the Senior General noted that as democratic administration system is being realized, it needs to be peaceful, stable and fair system while people need to abide by laws and disciplines. As election system is implemented on desires of the majority of people, elections must be free and fair. Administration must be based on consideration. Administration of democracy is fairly handled by the government or administrative organization elected by the public. Peace and stability of the nation plays a key role in practising democracy. Although Pyidawtha Project was implemented in Pha-Sa-Pa-La era, internal armed insurgency caused deterioration to the project. The State needs to restore peace and stability as well as to have qualified administrators so as to strengthen democracy. The administrative system based on party politics would not be good. Opposition parties will join democratic system. If the administration is based on party politics, the aforesaid parties will oppose the administration. The ruling party will strive for occupying the power for existence. As such, both sides will never harmonize each other. Hence, administrative system needs to ensure peace and stability with fairness in the democratic system. As peace and stability of the nation is of great importance for political, economic and administrative improvement and it needs to cease armed conflicts, peace process is being implemented. As rights of authority related to self-administration have been prescribed in Schedules (1, 2, 3 and 5) in the constitution, it needs to efficiently utilize the authority. Weak points and needs must be amended and supplemented in accordance with the law. The Senior General pointed out that legislation, executive and judiciary need to base on practice of separation of power and check and balance.
With respect to the defence out-look, the Senior General said it needs to have separate outlooks on rule of law, administration, security and defence. Administrative bodies and lawful police take responsibilities for rule of law and administration while security organizations including armed police must give a helping hand to them. Lawful police must discharge duty of security while armed police must take responsibility for important places. If necessary, Tatmadaw organizations must help them. The Tatmadaw must mainly take responsibilities for defence duty. If necessary, armed police and the entire people must join hands with the Tatmadaw. Building the defence is based on man power, material power and mental power but it cannot be built to achieve success immediately. If mental power is bad, mission will fail even though man power and material power are high. A country cannot stand alone. It must cooperate with neighbouring countries in respective sectors so as to restore regional peace and stability. It must enhance harmonized cooperation with neighbouring and friendship countries in undertaking defence, rescue and relief tasks in natural disasters. Preservation of characteristics of national culture through collaboration of people means discharging national duty. Only when people participate in rule of law, security and defence, will it achieve success. It needs to understand situations of building the defence depending on actual trend of the State and international relations. Lack of public cooperation in State defence will not secure achievement.
Concerning the information technology, the Senior General urged them to apply IT technologies in discharging political, economic and defence duties. So they must study to have comprehensive skills. And, they must have skills to apply these technologies in the practical fields. As IT technologies are development with momentum, advancement of the technologies differs from last two decades. Rapid development of space technologies makes narrow gap of technologies across the world, speeding up communication systems. He stressed the need to take special care of applying IT technologies not to break own culture and security. Based on political, defence, economic and administrative outlooks, strenuous efforts must be made for development of the nation by applying modern technologies.
