COMMENT ON THE CHIN CONSENSUS BUILDING SEMINAR

1.  It is a great pleasure for all of us the Chin people that this Chin National Consensus Building Seminar is over successfully within April 7 to 10, 2004. We congratulate those who took part in it. We all have our aims and objects, which we all can not discover in each other until we practically and personally meet together face to face in such get together seminar. We have discovered practically in each other now that we have the same aim and objective for our state and people as it has been issued in the Victoria Agreement.

These same aims and objectives should make all local and party consciousness melt away. Thus there should be equality among the participants no matter they be party or non party in PACC formation as the common aims and objectives will be the principles that is to lead the PACC to achieve the agreement and there will be open also for other Chin national political parties to join in.

2.   That notion of having the same aim and objective for our state and people will make us have good understanding on each other.  That good understanding will in turn lead us to the same destiny even when we depart and live in different parts of the world. Our meeting and good understanding we have got from the seminar will always be in our consciousness wherever we are. That good understanding among us will ever strengthen our unity in our common cause for our state and people. That good understanding we get from this seminar can solve our differences if there is any in the future. That is one of the main aims of the Seminar itself.

3.  We all have to be aware that we, the Chin people, are a people who have a territory bounded by definite boundaries with our neighbors. We have every rights of legitimacy to be our own self as the Chin people, within our territory bestowed to us by God to our ancestors. We have inherited this motherland and our being to be the sons and daughters born of the Chin people from our forefathers who have defended our being as a people and our beloved land with their sweat, blood and lives. The fact of being a people in a definite territory of the landmass larger than many independent sovereign nations makes us have common aims and objectives, which we have discovered in each individual by participating in such seminar.

4. Our Common aims and objectives we could see through the seminar and Victoria Agreement are:-
(1). We and our people at home and everywhere else want to live a peaceful and prosperous life, which will give us happiness throughout our life in our own-self as the Chin people in our own national territory.
(2). In order to lead a peaceful and prosperous life, we want a peaceful co existence with our neighbors. We know that we are not alone in this world. We are surrounded by other people .We do not want to intrude and violate into their rights and space. We do not want them to intrude into our space and rights.  We do not want to impose anything against their will. We do not want them to impose on us anything against the will of the Chin people.
(3). We can achieve this by becoming a sovereign independent nation as a member of the United Nations or to share some of our sovereign power with other people as a constituent state of a federal Union. Our fore fathers have signed in the chore of Panglong Agreement to be free from any colonialism. Thus we are now choosing to join the Federal Union of Burma as a constituent state of the Federal Union.
(4). If there is any problem with our neighbor states or among us we want to settle it peacefully according to the  law we all together could agree with. We can achieve this through the principles of democratic constitution in federalism.

5. People who are against the four principles above are the enemy of all  people who want to live in peaceful co existence. It is now the  Burmese military regime that has against these principles.  They have been our common enemy. The enemy of the Chin people and the enemy of all the people who want to live in peaceful coexistence according to the democratic principles.  So the democratic principles, which will guide us to achieve our common aim and objective in the statement of the Chin National Consensus Building Seminar are:
(a). Declaration of the Burmese military Regime as the insurgent government who has formed the government against the will of the Chin people and the people of the Union of Burma and intrude into our space and rights and thus they have been our common enemy with whom to deal with by all means.
(b). We have now also chosen to negotiate with that enemy by having dialogue with them to restore peace and democracy in the country.  The power they have in hands now is not given to them by the people. The ranks and files they are having as generals and the post of the Presidency and Prime-ministership are not given to them by the elected representatives and government of the citizens of the Union of Burma. They are illegitimate government and insurgent government.  We are to see now how to transform this illegitimacy into legitimacy. This could be done with the consent of the representatives of the people elected in 1990 general election.

6.   The proposed transitional procedure thus is:
(a). To have the tripartite dialogue of the representatives of NLD, the non Burman ethnic group and the military regime together at the same time. The three groups to have dialogue together at the same time is certainly essential; because to let the military regime has the dialogue with any one as the only two groups will be the same as to allow them to have compromise between the two neglecting the third which could create doubt  that they would care for the third after the two could get compromise between them.
(b) What to compromise in the Tripartite dialogue will include :-
1). .to convene Parliament so that it will give democratic legitimacy to any decision it makes as the voice of the people being elected just and fair by the people in 1990 general election.
2).  To form interim legitimate governments of the existing states and the Union government
3). The states to draft and adopt their respective state constitutions
4).To convene national convention on constitutional principles of the Union
5).To arrange Union constitution drafting and adoption
6).To held general election according to the new constitutions
7).To form new governments according to the new constitutions.

Thank you,

Lian Uk
(Member of Parliament-elect Haka Constituency of the Capital city of Chin State)

By  Pu Lian Uk

Chinland Guardian
April 20, 2004(Camp Victoria)