A new op-ed of mine is out at DVB. After Aung Kyaw Moe resigned, I sent six questions to 15 people. They included Rohingya figures, academics and former diplomats. I also sent three questions directly to AKM. At least one of his allies forwarded him the full set of six, and I was informed that this had happened.
AKM chose not to answer me. He said he would soon make a public statement and that I could take my answers from that. Then, lo and behold, he gave an exclusive interview to DVB. The interview follows my three questions remarkably closely. What did he achieve? Why can he serve the Rohingya better outside the NUG? Was his appointment symbolic? My questions look very much like the blueprint for his interview.
I have not asked DVB’s team about the mechanics of their interview. Perhaps AKM passed the themes to DVB, requested the interview or whatever... But the content and sequence are too close to dismiss as coincidence. Even then, the answers are pretty thin. Holding office is offered as an achievement. Departure becomes a “strategic transition.” And tokenism is waved away by saying he was qualified and had equal authority. That is a defence of sorts, but it ducks the hard bit, no? That is, what did the Rohingya actually gain?
Readers now have both sides - the judgement of others in my op-ed and AKM’s half-hearted answers in his interview. And then came the final twist. On 21 August, the NUG announced that his former Ministry of Human Rights had been dissolved ( see the images below), supposedly to make way for an independent Union Human Rights Commission. AKM walked away, defended his record at a safe distance, and then the ministry itself vanished. Quite the coda.
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