The leaders of the Myanmar coup have appealed to hundreds of thousands of government officials – doctors, garbage collectors, electricity workers – to put their “emotion” aside, abandon their protests against the military and get back to work.
But on Monday, even after the army put armored vehicles on the streets in an overnight show of power, workers showed little interest in returning to their jobs.
Work stoppages, which appear to be growing, are undermining ruling generals, who are trying to assert their authority over the population after taking power two weeks ago.
The strikes were especially notable among government officials, including the nationwide energy ministry, tax breaks and the Department of General Administration, which oversees a wide range of public services and government functions.
“There is no way we can work under a dictatorship,” said Dr. Kyaw Zin, a surgeon who led one of the country’s first strikes at the government-run Mandalay General Hospital. “I’m sure we can overthrow the regime.”
The civil disobedience movement, or CDM, as it is known, has broad support across the country. It targets the broad commercial interests of the military and government functions essential to the military regime, as well as covering street demonstrations and a new noisy nighttime ritual of hitting pots and pans.
The huge demonstration of support is even more impressive given the military’s brutal history of shooting pro-democracy protesters in 1988 and 2007. An expert on the government’s public service system estimated that the country had about a million civil servants and that about three. their quarters had quit their jobs. Many are essential to keep the country running.
On Monday morning, soldiers began to appear on the streets of Yangon, the largest city in Myanmar, and Mandalay in the place of police in prominent locations, including near the headquarters of the Yangon Central Bank.
During the night, the military parked armored vehicles in downtown Yangon, apparently to intimidate protesters. Instead, people put posters on vehicles with slogans like “We don’t want military government” and posed with them for group photos.
To prevent the police from reaching a protest site on Monday, drivers parked their cars on the street and lifted the hood as if to signal that they had engine problems, creating congestion.
General Min Aung Hlaing, leader of the February 1 coup, called on government officials to return to work last week, saying they were prompted by “unscrupulous people”.
“We will never go back to work until he leaves office,” said Dr. Kyaw Zin, the surgeon who led one of the first strikes. “He has no right to send us to work, because nobody recognizes him as a leader. He must resign. This must be the last blow in Myanmar. We will fight for that. “
The doctor also noted that his patients could visit him for free at a private hospital.
Yangon residents started taking their household waste to the neighborhood’s dumps after the collection at home was interrupted by the garbage pickers’ strike.
Consumers have also started to boycott businesses owned by the military, including the once popular Myanmar beer and a chain of gold and jewelry stores owned by a member of the military’s new governing body, the State Board of Administration.
At the Ministry of Electricity and Energy, the country’s energy supplier, about 60% of employees joined the movement and quit their jobs, said U Pyae Sone Ko Ko, an attacker who stopped working.
A large number of officials are meter readers, he noted, and if they do not do their job, the ministry will not be able to submit accounts.
Some ministry officials who have stopped working have positioned themselves in their offices at night to prevent authorities from turning off electricity before leading the nightly searches and arrests.
Other ministry officials have encouraged customers not to pay their bills, noting that the ministry cannot legally turn off electricity for three months without payment.
“We have to participate in the CDM to stop the regime and overthrow the dictatorship,” said Pyae Sone Ko Ko.
Likewise, in private banks, many workers quit their jobs in hopes of bringing the regime to its knees by preventing transactions and slowing the economy.
“If we stop working, the economic sector will stop working,” said Daw Thandar Kyaw, a bank employee who joined the strike. “Min Aung Hlaing and the military dictators are concerned about the economy because they love money. I strongly believe that we can overthrow the dictators if all bank employees join the CDM ”
In Mandalay, on Monday afternoon, hundreds of protesters gathered outside the offices of the State-run Myanmar Economic Bank, and asked officials to join the strike. Soldiers and police stopped the protest, chasing some protesters to nearby houses and beating them.