Asia World Company has been contracted by the government for another six years, which means that Naypyidaw will remain under construction until at least 2012. And for the 80,000 workers enlisted to build the
The International Labour Organization received reports that at least 2,800 people from the surrounding area were forced to build camps for three army battalions and an air force battalion to secure Pyinmana ahead of construction. “In addition to labor, each village had to provide roofing and construction materials and transport for the project,” an ILO report from March 2005 said. The government has denied the allegations.
The ILO has not received any verifiable evidence of forced labor since then, and says it is reluctant to draw attention to labor complaints from Naypyidaw for fear that the government might punish complainants for “spreading false information,” as it has in numerous other cases. The government agreed to a moratorium on such prosecutions in July.
The lowest-paid laborers in Naypyidaw make 1,500 kyat (US $1.10) a day. Some have travelled from distant parts of
Many of these laborers are required to work seven days a week, from dawn until nightfall. on the main roads leading into Naypyidaw, they can be seen at all hours pressing partly-set tarmac into potholes by hand.
Reporting on such developments in Naypyidaw can be dangerous, as two Burmese photojournalists discovered in March. Each was sentenced to three years in jail for taking photographs—strictly forbidden since the relocation was announced.
The burden of a capital relocation on a country’s human resources is predictably heavy—perhaps more so under a military dictatorship—but the financial burden can also be staggering, says Ed Schatz, a political scientist from the
“First, tremendous financial resources must be available for the move.
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