Myanmar's Muslims out in the cold during Ramadan

Hardliners close madrasahs, which doubled as places for Muslims to pray at

Muslims queueing at a mosque during a monsoon downpour in Yangon, for a portion of rice and curry to break fast during Ramadan. Madrasahs in eastern Yangon have been closed by a Buddhist nationalist mob.
Muslims queueing at a mosque during a monsoon downpour in Yangon, for a portion of rice and curry to break fast during Ramadan. Madrasahs in eastern Yangon have been closed by a Buddhist nationalist mob. PHOTO: AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

YANGON • Huddled under umbrellas to escape a monsoon downpour, dozens of Muslims stood in line at a Yangon mosque for a small portion of rice and curry to break their Ramadan fast.

Many would have normally prayed at Islamic schools, or madrasahs, that for six decades - mostly spent under Myanmar's former military government - doubled as a place for Muslims to come together for worship.

But last month, the madrasahs in eastern Yangon were closed down by a Buddhist nationalist mob, one of a growing number of raids by resurgent hardliners intent on silencing the maligned minority.

At the mosque, old bearded men used wooden paddles to stir steaming vats of daal, which was portioned into tiffin carriers with rice and handed to waiting families.

Muslims make up only some 3 to 4 per cent of Myanmar's population, including the Rohingya minority from western Rakhine state, but the religion traces its roots in the country back centuries.

Now many are feeling unwelcome in their own homeland.

"We have faced more discrimination over the last few years," said Mr Hussein, who like many of Myanmar's Muslims goes by one name. "When I was young, there was no discrimination. We were very friendly (with Buddhists), so we would eat at their homes and they would eat at ours," he added. "Now... we are not free to practise our religion."

  • 3%-4% Proportion of Muslims in Myanmar, including the Rohingya minority from western Rakhine state.

Mr Aung Htoo Myint, secretary of the mosque in Yangon's poor Thaketa township, said they had struggled to accommodate the hundreds forced to join their congregation after Islamic schools were closed. Many from the mainly Muslim neighbourhood braved the monsoon rains to pray in the street when this year's holy month of Ramadan began, but the local authorities swiftly banned those gatherings as well.

Mr Bo Gyi, a teacher at the madrasahs, said they had been given no details of when the schools would reopen or what would happen to the 300 children who studied there. "We have written letters to the President and Yangon chief minister as well," he said, but there has been no reply.

Myanmar has faced growing criticism for how it treats Muslims, who now face curbs on who they can marry and even how many children they can have under the 2015 Race and Religion laws.

The young civilian government of Ms Aung San Suu Kyi has struggled to contain anti-Muslim sentiment since militants claiming to represent the Rohingya attacked police posts late last year.

Since then, the hardliners have become increasingly vocal, shutting down Islamic events, forming a political party to stand in the 2020 elections and clashing with Muslims on Yangon's streets.

Police have arrested ringleaders behind the violence, while the country's top Buddhist body has banned the prominent ultra-nationalist group Ma Ba Tha - which responded by simply changing its name.

But ordinary Muslims fear they are now becoming targets in their own country. Mr Haroon, 57, who has spent his whole life in Yangon, where he works selling chapatis, says he is increasingly worried about the nationalists.

"There is only one group creating this situation," he said inside the house where he lives with his wife and three children, unwilling to say the name Ma Ba Tha out loud.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on June 24, 2017, with the headline Myanmar's Muslims out in the cold during Ramadan. Subscribe