USDA Promises Big Spending in Rangoon

Originally appeared in The Irrawaddy

By Aung Thet Wine

The pro-junta Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) will spend more than 12 billion kyat (US $12 million) this year to implement public utilities and services in Rangoon, according to Rangoon mayor Brig-Gen Aung Thein Lin.

Aung Thein Lin told local media at the Rangoon Municipal Office headquarters on Feb. 16 that the USDA will be spending billions of kyat on activities to support the public, including paving roads.

However, according to sources in the former capital, the large expenditure is specifically aimed at boosting the USDA’s image prior to this year’s election campaign.

Head of the USDA office in Rangoon Division, and also the chairman of Rangoon municipal committee, Aung Thein Lin is widely tipped to run as the USDA candidate in Rangoon at the election.

The USDA is focused on public utilities and services in Rangoon without requiring the general public to contribute money to its activities, Aung Thein Lin reportedly said, adding that people can bring complaints directly to him if they were asked to contribute money while the road-paving project was carried out in Rangoon neighborhoods.

“Under the banner of the USDA, the municipality is catering to a wide range of activities such as roadworks, pipe-laying for waterworks, and opening free health care clinics and free funeral service agencies,” said a Rangoon journalist.

The mayor also reportedly said that Insein Government Technical Institute is now being rebuilt as a USDA-financed public hospital. The building has previously been the hotbed of anti-government student demonstrations and was used as a detention center during the 2007 Saffron Revolution.

As the matriculation exams draw near, the USDA are also providing free tuition to high school students, a Rangoon municipal source said.

The regime has repeatedly said that the election will be held this year, though it has not set a date nor issued election laws.

Analysts say that the delay in promulgating the election law makes it possible for the regime to continue to impose tight restrictions on activities by political parties while allowing USDA members to run pre-election activities all over the country.

“There is no doubt that the USDA will win the election,” said a retired university lecturer in Rangoon. “It has now taken up the activities that government departments are supposed to do.”

This post is in: 2010 Elections, Campaign Updates