Aung San Suu Kyi: a principled activist
Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi is the daughter of Myanmar’s independence hero, General Aung San. He was assassinated when she was only two years old, just before Myanmar gained independence from British colonial rule in 1948.
In 1960 she went to India with her mother Daw Khin Kyi, who had been appointed Myanmar’s ambassador in Delhi. Four years later she went to Oxford University in the UK, where she studied philosophy, politics, and economics. There she met her future husband, academic Michael Aris.
After stints of living and working in Japan and Bhutan, she settled in the UK to raise their two children, Alexander and Kim, but Myanmar was never far from her thoughts.
When she arrived back in Yangon in 1988 – to look after her critically ill mother – Myanmar was in the midst of major political upheaval.
Thousands of students, office workers, and monks took to the streets demanding democratic reform.
“I could not as my father’s daughter remain indifferent to all that was going on,” she said in a speech in Yangon on 26 August 1988. She went on to lead the revolt against the then-dictator, General Ne Win.
The demonstrations were brutally suppressed by the army, which seized power in a coup on 18 September 1988. Ms. Suu Kyi was placed under house arrest the following year.
The military government called national elections in May 1990, which Ms. Suu Kyi’s NLD convincingly won – but the junta refused to hand over control.
Ms. Suu Kyi remained under house arrest in Yangon for six years, until she was released in July 1995.
She was again put under house arrest in September 2000, when she tried to travel to the city of Mandalay in defiance of travel restrictions.
She was released unconditionally in May 2002, but just over a year later was imprisoned after a government-backed mob set upon her entourage in the north of the country. She escaped because of the swift action taken by her driver, but many of her supporters were savagely beaten and a number died.
She was later allowed to return home – but again under effective house arrest.
At times she was able to meet other NLD officials and selected diplomats, but during the early years, she was often in solitary confinement. She was not allowed to see her two sons or her husband, who died of cancer in March 1999.
The military authorities had offered to allow her to travel to the UK to see him when he was gravely ill, but she felt compelled to refuse for fear she would not be allowed back into the country.
As the result, she was placed under house arrest for 15 of the following 25 years, making her one of the world’s political prisoners of longest standing.
In her now-famous “Freedom from Fear” speech in 1990, she pointed out that oppressors are motivated by fear:
“It is not power that corrupts, but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.”
Aung San Suu Kyi 1991
She knows persecution well. She is the only daughter of Aung San. She echoed his well-known courage in this speech, using his memory to motivate her listeners:
“Fearlessness may be a gift but perhaps more precious is the courage acquired through endeavor, courage that comes from cultivating the habit of refusing to let fear dictate one’s actions, courage that could be described as ‘grace under pressure’ – grace which is renewed repeatedly in the face of harsh, unremitting pressure.”
Aung San Suu Kyi, from Freedom from Fear
The words are poignant because she might well have been speaking of her own
persistence in the face of persecution.
Here’s what we can learn from her famous speech:
Start strong: The words “It is not power that corrupts, but fear” come right at the start of this speech, rather than after a long build-up of arguments–and these are the most-quoted words in this speech. It’s the one-two punch, the throwing down of a gauntlet, the bold statement that grips the listener from sentence word. And, from a woman who was prevented from using her time as she might have wanted to, it ensures that her speech doesn’t waste a moment getting to the point.
Share innermost feelings: Emotion and inner feelings form a strong thread that connects this speaker to her audiences around the world. She speaks of grace under pressure, fear and fearlessness, humiliation and peace, giving voice to the unseen forces that shape the oppressors and the oppressed, rather than relying on descriptions of the physical actions and surroundings of that oppression. This helps underscore her point that revolutions must include “revolutions of the spirit,” as well as the physical overthrow of individuals and offices.
Give everyone something they can do: In an oppressive regime, and her situation, not every listener can take up arms or storm the capital. Instead, Aung San Suu Kyi directs them to something they can do: Rid their minds of fear, and embrace courage and grace under pressure. It’s consistent with her peaceful approach to protest, and also a practical call to action for her listeners.
Sources:
- https://youtu.be/S27LMEmp_04
- https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-pacific-11685977
- https://denisegraveline.org/2012/06/famous-speech-friday-aung-san-suu-kyis.html
- https://us-east-2.console.aws.amazon.com/polly/home/SynthesizeSpeech