Youth Call Off Mon Revolution Day Commemoration Due to COVID-19
By NETWORK MEDIA GROUP (NMG)
Monday, August 25, 2020
Mon youth leaders have said that they will not be commemorating that 73rd anniversary of the Mon Revolution Day on September 2 because of concerns surrounding the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
The day is remembered on the full moon day of the month of Wagaung on the Burmese calendar, and the events typically take place on the grounds of the Win Sein monastery in Mon State’s Mudon Township, home to the tombs of ethnic Mon leaders, to whom the Mon community pays respect annually.
“Thousands of people attend the commemoration every year. We are unable to organize the commemoration this year. We plan to broadcast a livestream of a discussion about the Mon revolution,” Min Htaw, who is working with Mon youth organizations, told NMG. “We will organize a poetry composition competition about the revolution online. We will also post banners in villages.”
The New Mon State Party (NMSP) also held its own commemoration in its headquarters every year on revolution day, and in Mawlamyine, Thaton and Dawei in NMSP-controlled territory.
“Even though we cannot commemorate Mon Revolution Day, we will organize it online because we need to not forget that the Mon revolution matters,” Min Zar Ni Oo, who organized the commemoration in 2019, told NMG.
The ethnic Mon people demanded rights to self-determination from the Burmese government after Burma gained independence from the British in 1948. Their demands were ignored, leading Mon revolutionaries to raid Zathapyin police station in eastern Mawlamyine on the full moon day of Wagaung, and also attack government forces along the Jai River, marking the start of the Mon armed struggle.
