Associated Press
April 26, 2001

Ethnic Karenni claim the electricity from the Baluchaung hydropower plant has never provided for indigenous Karenni villagers, but only feds the capital Yangon and the second largest city, Mandalay.

BANGKOK — Ethnic Karenni opponents of Myanmar’s ruling military said Friday that Japan’s plan to provide dlrs 24 million to the regime for renovating a hydropower plant will only hurt local people.

They claimed the electricity from the Baluchaung hydropower plant has never provided for indigenous Karenni villagers, but only fed the capital Yangon and the second largest city, Mandalay.

“The Karennis there don’t have a single light (bulb). They have to buy candles to burn,” Doh Say, director of foreign affairs for the Karenni National Progressive Party, told The Associated Press by telephone from northern Thailand.

The KNPP has a small armed wing that fights a guerrilla war against the regime. Earlier this month, Japan announced it was considering a plan to renovate the power station, which was originally built in 1960 with Japanese war reparations to Myanmar, also known as Burma. A final decision on the aid is expected by the end of the year. With nearly 200 megawatt production capacity, the plant is the biggest electricity generator in Myanmar.

The Japanese aid would represent the most significant foreign grant to Myanmar since the regime took power in 1988 after a bloody crackdown against a democracy uprising. Since then, donors have only allowed a trickle of humanitarian assistance. The grant from Japan is designed as incentive for the regime to press on with talks with democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whose party swept general elections in 1990 but has been barred from taking power.

The talks, which began in secret in October, are seen as the most significant dialogue in a decade of political deadlock, although there has been no public announcement on how they are progressing.

The KNPP said in a statement this week that providing aid would only “further entrench and empower a government that holds no regard for the people of Burma.” It asked that plans to rebuild or repair the dam be stopped.

Doh Say said that seven villages had been forcibly moved out of the Lawpita area around the power station in the early 1990s to secure the plant. Rebel guerrillas had attacked the plant and electricity pylons in the past.

Doh Say claimed that thousands of anti-personnel land mines have also been laid in the area, which lies about 320 kilometers (200 miles) northeast of Yangon, often injuring villagers and livestock.

In 1998, when water level in Balu river became low, water was diverted from farmlands to supply the turbines, Doh Say said. He feared the problem would worsen if the power plant was expanded.

“Whatever they do, the Karenni people will face forced labor and more land mines will be laid,” he said.

The rebels signed a cease-fire with the Myanmar regime in 1994, but took up arms again when they said government forces invaded their territory and cut timber. The regime has accused the KNPP rebels of involvement in the drugs trade. Nearly 20,000 Karenni refugees live in Thailand.