By Lun Min Mang / Myanmar Times | January 25, 2017

The nationwide ceasefire groups are showing increasing anxiety and impatience over the brass tacks of the peace process.

The eight ethnic armed groups party to the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement met with the state counsellor and the commander-in-chief separately in Nay Pyi Taw this week, trying to steer both back onto the charted course: having all groups sign the NCA, then implementing the post-NCA agenda.

“We would like to urge the government and the Tatmadaw to halt all military operations and to start talking about finding solutions for peace, which must include building trust,” General Saw Mutu Say Poe, chief of the Karen National Union, said in a speech released after the January 23 meetings.

The KNU chief said recent military conflicts in northern Myanmar have not only hindered the efforts for peace, but have also harmed the government and Tatmadaw’s reputation within the ethnic communities, making it harder to establish trust and bring all groups to the negotiating table.

“If the fighting is prolonged, we are concerned that achieving peace will become harder. Therefore, we would like to urge the government and the Tatmadaw to take a softer stance

[toward non-signatory groups] and to find a way to break down the current standstill [of the peace process],” he said.

The government has made signing on to the NCA a precondition for ethnic armed organisations’ participation in the peace process. But no additional groups have inked the pact since the October 2015 signing.

The NCA is neither a typical, nor comprehensive ceasefire – leaving many of the military and political issues to be determined later. Worked out over four years of negotiations, the deal includes clauses to prevent parties from attacking or recruiting in ceasefire groups’ territories and also establishes a joint ceasefire monitoring body to enforce the provisions. The NCA is supposed to be followed by a period of political dialogues that serve as the foundations for legislative and constitutional amendments as the country adopts a federal system.

Read highlights from the October 2015 NCA

Due to the elections held shortly after the NCA signing, and subsequent transition period as the National League for Democracy-backed government took office, the political dialogues did not get underway until earlier this month.

The first national-level political dialogue was held just last week in Kayin State’s capital Hpa-an.

Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who chairs the National Reconciliation and Peace Centre, said she was pleased with the public participation at the dialogue, and termed the initial meeting a success.

But not all the post-NCA processes have gone so smoothly, and the NCA signatories are starting to get restless.

In particular, KNU chief Saw Mutu Say Poe pointed out that provisions regarding demining and resettling internally displaced persons (IDPs) have both not yet started.

According to the NCA, matters of humanitarian assistance, such as aid to IDPs, are supposed to be handled jointly by the signatory groups and the government. Saw Mutu Say Poe said the government’s one-sided decision-making over parcelling out assistance to IDPs stands to harm what little trust remains among the eight NCA signatories.

“In order to strengthen peace building, NCA signatory groups need guarantees from the government concerning the tasks which are supposed to be implemented during the interim period according to the NCA provisions,” he said in the post-meeting statement.

The signatory groups have also expressed concerns over the arrest and prosecution of some of their members from the Arakan Liberation Party and All Burma Students’ Democratic Front.

U Min Htay, a central executive committee member of the All Burma Students’ Democratic Front, was arrested in December in Kachin State and is now facing charges under section 17/1 of the Unlawful Association Act. He stands accused of assisting a non-signatory group – the Kachin Independence Army.

U Than Ge, chair of the ABSDF, told The Myanmar Times that his organisation met with Union Attorney General U Tun Tun Oo at the state counsellor’s suggestion.

“The attorney general told me that he would do the best he could for the case of our comrade U Min Htay,” he said.

On January 23, U Min Htay appeared at a court hearing in Momauk township. The next hearing is scheduled for February 6.

Ahead of the second 21st-Century Panglong Conferenece, scheduled for next month, Saw Mutu Say Poe urged the state counsellor and the Tatmadaw chief to open doors for all groups to come to the negotiation table. Leaving out the non-signatory groups will only cause delays, he said.

In his own statement after the meeting, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing urged the signatory groups to stick to the provisions of the NCA, but agreed to make overtures to groups that have not yet signed on.

U Than Soe Naing, a political commentator, said the NLD-led government should be seriously reconsidering its approach to peace if it wishes to see success.

“If she continues to follow the path set by the Tatmadaw, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s goal of achieving peace will be hopeless,” he said.

A rigid timeframe, escalating conflicts: The NLD’s 2016 peace process

Concerning the KNU chief’s call for the government to speed up the NCA implementation, U Maung Maung Soe, another political commentator, said there has been “little progress” following the 2015 signing, which has prompted the groups to get pushy.

“There has not been a single political dialogue from which we can observe real outcomes since the groups signed the NCA. And the recent arrests may have caused signatory groups’ leaders to fear what is to come,” he said.

This article originally appeared on Myanmar Times on January 26, 2017.

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