Mrauk U: The authorities of the Burmese government in Mrauk U, the ancient city in western Burma’s Arakan State, have allegedly taken revenge on the local residents by reducing electricity supply in the town, in response to their failure to take away the religious antiques from the town to the capital Naypyidaw, due to the residents’ protests.
An elder from the town said the power being supplied in the town was cut for many hours a day and for whole 24hour periods on three alternative days. “We got the power supply from 8 am to 3 pm during the day and from 7 pm to 12 am at night every day before. Just few days after the authorities failed to take the ancient golden Buddha image and other religious antiques from the town for the second time, the electric power was reduced to just 3 hours from 7 pm to 10 pm a day”, said the elder.
The government had privatized the power generation and supply in the town to the Taw Win Htoo Linn Company in June 2011, in order to increase the power supply in the town.
The elder however said the company has been playing around with the power supply in the town so as to show their close association with the local authorities, who could not save face in front of the higher authorities when they repeatedly failed to take away the valuable religious antiques from the town.
“When we complained to the company, they (the company staff) told us that they had to reduce the power supply as their company had suffered from losses. But there is no reason their company would suffer from losses because they have been collecting 500 Kyat for each unit of electricity and they have also received the necessary oil for power generation with the official rate from the government”, he said.
He said that they reduced the power supply just few days after President U Thein Sein had visited to the town and allowed the residents to keep the religious antiques used for their devotional offerings in the town. There is a committee being formed with the town people for monitoring the regularity of electric lights in the town.
The committee said it has already warned the company to hand over their tender to another other company if it is not able to supply regular electricity in the town, but the company has told the committee and the residents that no one would be able to withdraw their tender for the power supply as it has local authorities and state ministers on it's side.
In particular industrial businessmen and students are troubled by the irregular power supply in the town and the prices of kerosene and candle sticks are going up as a result.
