Incident Location (Village, Township and District)

Around April 21st 2019, three people from the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation (the Ministry) and the Meh Tha Lut village administrator, U[2] Aung Myint Kyine, came to K--- to survey the area for a road construction project to improve connectivity between K--- and L--- village. At the same time, villagers were also informed of this project and promised that they would each be allocated a plot of land measuring 40 x 60 feet [approximately 12.20 x 18.30 metres] in K---. The village administrator also extorted money from villagers by asking them to pay between 10,000 to 20,000 kyats [USD 6.64 and 13.28, respectively][3] to cover the cost of the road construction activities.

On May 1st 2019, U Aung Myint Kyine forced 87 villagers from 13 households in K--- to relocate. Many villagers have lived in the area since 2009. Although they do not possess any land titles, they obtained consent from the Karen National Union (KNU)[4] to live there. On the same day, the three people from the Ministry and the village administrator started the construction activities with bulldozers. Although the villagers did not want to leave, they dismantled their houses and built huts on other villagers’ nearby paddy fields as they had no ability to oppose the project.

The dismantled houses valued at a range of 50,000 to 300,000 kyats [USD 33.19 to 199.13]; and 25% of the houses were destroyed during the dismantling process. Ma S--- stated: “We were afraid that our houses were going to be destroyed by the bulldozer if we failed to move out from our place. Actually, it was not necessary to dismantle the houses. Because of this, we faced difficulties as we are a big family. They [the village administrator] intentionally forced us to relocate from this place […].”

While road construction activities were carried out, U Chan Nyein Aye, the Hpapun Township administrator, came to the area to monitor the situation.  He, U Aung Myint Kyine, and the three personnel from the Ministry told the villagers that they would reconstruct the houses that were destroyed and told them not to worry as it was a temporary relocation.

Many villagers faced difficulties at the relocation site as they had inadequate housing equipment and the newly built huts were too small for large families. Ma S--- elaborated on this problem: “These people are poor. They [the village administrator] should not have done that to them […].” Ma S--- testified that she spent 50,000 kyats [33.19 USD] to build a tent there, and elaborated on the difficulties she faced in relation to the high-cost of building the tent: “When we built it, it cost us 50,000 kyats. I had to sell goods [snacks] at the school to save money. It was for buying leaves [to make a] roof for my tent.”

In August 2019, villagers were allowed to return to K---. Although villagers were allocated lands in K--- after the road construction activities ceased, houses that were destroyed were not reconstructed, as promised. As of December 17th 2019, five households had returned to the village, while the others remained at the relocation site because they could not afford to rebuild their houses.