Burma’s Tomb Raiders

“My great grandmother was a very determined woman. She was against colonialism all her life,” says Devi Thant Zin, the daughter of the late politician Tawphayalay Aung Zay, grandson of the queen. In her view, the late queen’s greatest achievement was to bring monogamy to the palace.

In her last days, the queen’s closest adviser was Kodaw Hmaing. The queen respected him as a strong nationalist and he revered her. He played a leading role as a writer and activist in resisting British colonialists. He was later dubbed Burma’s Peace Laureate after dedicating the latter part of his life to restoring peace to Burma following the civil war after 1948.

He died in 1964, aged 89, soon after peace talks between the late Gen Ne Win’s regime and underground political parties failed. His last words were: “Before I die, I would like to see our country attain peace and unity.” But it was not to be.

In 1976, university students used the 100th anniversary of Kodaw Hmaing’s birth to gather at his tomb. More than 100 students were arrested during the peaceful anti-government demonstration.  

Since then, Thakin Kodaw Hmaing has become anathema to the military regime. His writings have been censored and even mention of his name banned from time to time. Now his tomb is facing the same fate. Even members of his family are banned from visiting it, according to o­ne relative.

When U Thant died in 1974, after serving as UN secretary-general for 10 years, his body was brought home from New York to Rangoon. But the then Burma strongman Gen Ne Win was not ready to give a deserved burial place to the international leader. In his view, U Thant had supported U Nu, whom Ne Win overthrew to take power. Ne Win denied a request by U Thant’s family for a burial place at the foot of the Shwedagon.

Outraged students snatched U Thant’s coffin and took it to Rangoon University Convocation Hall, where they buried it and built a mausoleum o­n the site of the students’ union building that was demolished by Ne Win in 1962. The army stormed the campus to remove the coffin and rebury it beside the Shwedagon. In the process many students were killed.

The last shunned tomb is that of Khin Kyi, Gen Aung San’s widow. It was her sickness that led to her daughter Aung San Suu Kyi returning to Burma in 1988 and becoming involved in the democracy campaign then under way.