30 June
IT is 8pm in the evening; yet the town is bustling with activities. Located on the side of the mountain’s edge, the town is quite eventful at this time of the day as people are coming back from work, some having dinner at home or drinking with work buddies at the local beer station while the sounds of rocks escape from the temporary tents as women break them apart.
“I earn enough money here to feed my whole family. In middle Myanmar, it’s not easy to survive on 2-3 thousand Kyats per day. I have to think about their future too and right now, I can’t support them,” declares Ma Aye, an artisan miner who earns mon-ey from separating the tin/tungsten from rocks. Ma Aye (names have been changed to protect the identity of the interviewee) used ot be a school teacher in Kyaut Town in middle Myanmar.
Mawchi Mine, Hpasawng Township, Bawlake District, Kayah State is known to be one of Myanmar’s largest tin and tungsten mine. It is also one of the biggest revenue-generating ventures in the remote area of Middle Myanmar where unemploy-ment runs high.
From the residential town, you can see the view of the mountain range with one demolished next to the ever intimidating one that stands. At night, among its re-mains, are small miners visible with their headlamps contrasting the brown earth beneath.
“I’m scared. I don’t sleep well at night since I have to have my ears open -especially when it rains,” says the frail 40 year old Ma Aye.
Mawchi area was blacklisted until 2012 due to conflicts between the insurgents and the Myanmar Tatmadaw. Most of the local residents are from the Karen minority group. After the peace and reconciliation agreements between the Karenni National Progressive Party and the Tatmadaw, mi-grants came flooding into the area in hopes of finding employment and business in the area inviting entrepreneurship and labor.
The main source of income for the res-idents (both migrants and local) has been mining. There are up 700 acres with over 100 adits spread out over the area. Even though the law prohibits women in mining grounds, this does not prohibit the women of Mawchi from earning their living in the mines.
Women in Mawchi
There currently six tin-tungsten mine under the Department of Mines with others under joint ventures between foreign and lo-cal governments. Among the privately owned ines, Ye Htut Kyaw company have the most acres under their license. There are over 100 adits over the area operated either by the companies themselves or companies in collaboration with the locals. Most are daily artisan miners who go into the mine area every day and earn around 10,000 Kyats per day while other are contractors. For women who are prohibited from mining, they work outside of the mine by separating tin/tungsten from the material and/or breaking apart rocks. Women prefer to sift for minerals from the soil bought illegally from the daily workers. “Go really early in the morning to get some soil to work with and in the evenings, you can try to get the scraps from other people’s car-riers. You can even earn around 20,000-30,000 Kyat per day. The work days usually go from 4am to 9pm non-stop though. Sometimes, you get more minerals and sometimes, you get so little so you lose money. But it’s free if you’re getting the scraps from other people’s carriers,” explains Ma Aye. It seems women are the main bread winners in the area. How-ever, it is not always smooth sailing as some are only able to earn 20,000 -30,000 per week for the whole family.
A Land of Widows?
Men generally are able to earn more, especially if they are able to work in the drill-ing areas where they are paid on how much they are able to drill with a small minig drill. Earnings can go from 80,000 Kyats per day. Unfortunately, most earnings are spent on alcohol and gambling as well as medical bills for treating liver diseases. Earlier deaths from high alcohol consumption are not often uncommon in the area. Another cause of death is usually from lung failure among the small mining drill machine operators also known as “gunning” amongst the lo-cals, says the local women villages. Often times, the recoil from the drill machines hit the rib cage area and destroy the lungs slowly. Most deaths are from the “gunners”, leaving their widows struggling with the remaining family. “When he passed away,
The story isn’t an isolated incident. Ms. Naw Pay Tu, a Karen lady, also lost her husband to lung failure 20 years ago and has been raising her 5 children alone -her youngest was 3 months old with the eldest not older than 10. She recalls her toughest days where she had to be a porter for the army during the fighting. “I was scared but I had to work. How would my family eat otherwise?” comments Ms. Naw Pay Tu.
There are also lives lost due to mining accidents. Local authorities are working with the mining companies for compensa-tion and responsibility for the worker’s safe-ty. A documentary by Democratic Voice of Myanmar’s Close Up program interviewed Ye Htut Kyaw Company Director Daw Ei Su Kyaw where she claims that her company does take care of the worker’s safety as well as the responsibility that arises from accidents such as compensation and hospi-tal fees. The Women’s Group Leader, Daw Margerat Sein, have an alternative view, “Since there isn’t really a worker’s union in the area, when there is a death in the mines, some companies pay accordingly. However, there are still some that don’t.” There is still a long way for the companies to take responsibility in such matters, especially for the widows left behind with the children. “There is no separate program for widows for the government. So we have to really talk to the company since there is really no support system for the single mothers and their living when their husband dies,” states Representative Nan Htwe Thu, from the Par Saung and Mawchi district in the Pyithu Hluttaw. Some residents would like the focus to be on worker’s safety instead of the compensation process. A Karen women suggests “Why not have programs that tell people the dangers and precautions workers can take so that the effect is lessen for the workers so we don’t have that many causalities. Why not focus on prevention?”
Uncertain FutureThe main worry for the residents is “How do we survive?”. As technology gets more advanced and are able to cover more area, residents fear that the mine will get deplet-ed sooner and leave the residents/migrants unemployed. There are also worries about landslides and the future generations. “How can my children live? If the mines run out of minerals, how will they eat?” says 60-year-old Karen woman that has been working on the mines as long as she can remember. The government still have a long way to go creat-ing social security blankets for marginalized societies such as the widows of Mawchi. How will it take care of the children that have been raised in the mines with absent, alcoholic and/or sick fathers?
Translated by Myat Thu(The original story in Myanmar is from www.hiburma.net)
