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Editorial

The Whistler – April 2011

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Aung San Suu Kyi
EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED

Aung San Suu Kyi, this year’s Brighton Festival guest director, sends a message to the festival:

“We all think about the Brighton Festival as an occasion for festivities, for diversity, for creativity, for expression, for freedom of expression. This is especially important to us in Burma, who have been deprived of this right of freedom for very many years. We look to you to use your freedom of expression to let the world know what it is like in our country.
There is connection between all kinds of expression and because everything is connected we think that what you do there, half way across the world from us, can help us here a great deal.”

Last year The Whistler wrote about the Burmese comic Zarganar who has been jailed by the military junta for 35 years. This May, Brighton & Hove comes alive with a powerful and exciting programme of cultural events in celebration of this year’s Guest Director, Aung San Suu Kyi, the courageous Burmese leader, human rights advocate and Nobel Peace Prize winner, who has fought peacefully for democracy and, taken to the heart of this year’s Festival, is her message, “use your liberty to promote ours”. West Hill Hall is a Festival Fringe venue and has been used as a rehearsal space for festival shows.

Structural changes are in the news too – the long running campaign to save the Royal Alexandra Hospital buildings has been won. Taylor Wimpey responded to the majority of local feeling and withdrew the demolition option prior to the Council planning committee meeting. The plan to convert and restore the main building was unanimously approved. The Brighton Station gateway project is looking at ways to improve access and facilities at the station and the only way that a great scheme can be developed is with the input and ideas of users of the area. Let us know your views so we can feed them into the planning process.

The Annual General Meeting of the West Hill Community Association, at which the accounts will be adopted and the officers and committee elected, will be held on Tuesday 31 May 2011 at the West Hill Hall. Nominations for the committee must be seconded and sent with the written consent of the nominee to the Hall. The business of the meeting will be followed by our perennial favourite, the Quiz, set and presented by David Perrett. Refreshments and bonhomie free. All welcome.

The Arts

Free Zarganar

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The Whistler looks at the case of Burmese comic Zarganar which demonstrates the dangers faced by performers across the world

The King’s Theatre, Glasgow has a reputation daunting to comedians but while performers might get the bird there, they don’t have to do bird. In a nation ruled by a military junta, with a history of ruthless oppression of opposition, the comic Zarganar has been imprisoned four times in Burma. In 1990, during the democratic elections, won by Aung Sun Suu Kyi but annulled by the ruling junta, he was convicted for four years for making political speeches.

In 2006 he was banned indefinitely from performing in public or taking part in any kind of entertainment. Then, in May 2008 Cyclone Nagris devastated the Irrawaddy Delta. A million people were made homeless, up to 200,000 were missing or dead, and one of Burma’s most populace and important agricultural regions was shattered. Despite the scale of the disaster, judged the worst in the nation’s history, the SLORC (State Law & Order Restoration Council) government blocked World Health Organisation and United Nations relief efforts.

Inside Burma Zarganar organised 400 members of the entertainment industry to provide disaster relief to the cyclone-hit region. His teams of volunteers brought aid to 42 villages, some of which received no other aid. Following the disaster he was approached by foreign journalists to talk about the Irrawaddy. On June 4 2008 he was arrested for what he said to the journalists. For speaking against the government’s actions Zarganar was convicted of “public order offences”. Such convictions normally have a maximum prison term of 2 years. In November 2008, Zarganar was sentenced to 59 years in jail. An appeal succeeded in reducing the sentence, but the comedian is facing 35 years in jail.

His humour was directly critical of the government, eg an American, an Englishman and a Burmese meet in a pub and boast “An American climbed Everest with no legs”. “That’s nothing. An English woman swam across the Pacific without arms, twice”. Then, the Burmese said “Your efforts are nothing. Our country has been governed without a brain for 18 years.” It’s only a joke. A lucky Burmese chap managed to get a passport and travelled to India. He visited a dentist for treatment. “Why not wait until you are home again and visit your dentist there?” he was asked. “Don’t you have dentists in Burma?” “Oh, yes” said the patient, “but we’re not allowed to open our mouths.”

The International Committee for Artists’ Freedom has taken up his cause and is working to raise the profile of his situation across the world. Zarganar won the Freedom to Create prize for Imprisoned Artists and the financial assistance that came with the award has supported his family and provided him with food and medication in prison, but his health is suffering. In April 2009 his family got word out that he is seriously ill. He is in Myitkyina prison in the northern Kachin state, 1400km from his family, deliberately and maliciously isolated. ICAF is campaigning for his relief, arguing that his imprisonment is in contravention of the UN Declaration of Human Rights, and they want your help.

Express your concern/disgust/support to Louise McMullan at Equity, tel: 0207 670 0226 or email lmcmullan@equity.org.uk