PM’s party forcibly recruiting members in Shan State
The newly formed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) led by Prime Minister Thein Sein is conducting a recruiting campaign in Shan State North and Shan State East using power of its parent organization known as the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA), sources from the border said.
All village and village tract headmen in Shan State North’s Namkham Township and Kengtung, Shan State East are pressured by local ruling military junta officials and USDA officials to collect household lists starting early this month.
Namkham alone has to provide at least 5,000 members for the party, said a Namkham USDA member.
Namkham Township is a homeland for ethnic nationalities such as Lisu, Shan, Palaung and Kachin as well as people of different religions especially Christians and Buddhists.
The township chairman therefore ordered on 19 May that each quarter must send 50 members for the party, he said. “They started collecting names yesterday.”
Likewise, in Shan State East’s Kengtung Township, every youth age above 15 years old must apply for membership. If not they all would be put in a blacklists for high treason [Naing Ngan Taw Pone Kan Thu], said a member of USDA in Kengtung.
Local USDA officials are now conducting census and collecting family lists in areas all around the town including outskirts, he said.
Chairman of Kengtung USDA is Sai Long Hseng Leng. He is also a general secretary of Kengtung Tai Khun literature association.
“The USDA say we should become PM Thein Sein’s party members because he had developed our town and built pagodas for us,” a female resident said. “But we don’t see any development in our town.”
Prime Thein Sein with 20 other senior officials retired from their military positions in late April and came to lead the UNDP. The UNDP was directly formed from the state backed organization, the USDA. It applied for party registration to the Union Election Commission on 29 April.
It is expected to contest all constituencies in Burma in the coming election later this year.
