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New army check point extorts money from TPP villagers
Mon 09 Apr 2007,
Joi Htaw, IMNA
Villagers are being fleeced in the name of paying taxes by a new Burmese Army check point by the Three Pagoda Pass (TPP) based battalion N0. 18. They are being asked for money for anything they carry across the gate, a villager said.
Battalion No.18 split a small section at the entry of the village called Tom –dot-poit village (Kwan Gyi Pyai) about a kilometer from TPP town on March 23 to stop people migrating to Thailand and to check the narcotic drug trade in the town.
There were two gates manned by the Mon National Liberation Army (MNLA) and the Karen Peace Force (KPF) at the edge of Tom –dot-poit village even before a Burmese Army check point was set up. Tom –dot-poit village is on the road to TPP town.
Soldiers, who are in charge of the check point, tax the villagers for whatever they carry across the gate whether it is consumer goods coming from the town, vegetables from villages to be sold in the town or paddy being transported to rice processors in TPP town.
"They (soldiers manning the new check point) take five to 20 Baht for one pack. They even take five Baht for a pack of charcoal", the villager said. The soldiers tax 100 Baht for one vehicle which sells grocery in the village.
Even though one of the reasons to have the check point is to stop people going to Thailand illegally, the soldiers take 100 Baht for one person from the human traffickers, a villager said. When they (Burmese Army) set up the checkpoint, they struck a deal with the Mon and Karen cease-fire groups for security on Armed Forces Day on March 27.
There are bout 100 households in Tom–dot-poit village and the villagers earn by growing vegetables and hill crops. Most of them are poor and have to work very hard to survive.
Sometimes the villagers arrive late to the town market because they are stopped by the soldiers to check what they are carrying. And soldiers ask for vegetables for their own consumption.
Because the soldiers do not allow crossing the gate without paying, the villagers tell them the material they are carrying is for household purposes.
The villagers are unhappy and keep asking how they will survive under such circumstances, a villager said.
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