ISSUE 21: Term 4 Week 1, 11 September AESTHEHumanities! Weekly Exclusively brought to you by the AES Humanities Department The secret of crisis management is not good vs. bad, it s preventing the bad from getting worse. ~ Andy Gilman ~ ALL ABOUT THE BIG WORLD WE LIVE IN EXCLUSIVE NEWS TODAY How Burma s Rohingya crisis went from bad to worse Who are the Rohingya? In a way, it depends on whom you ask and that itself may be at the core of the conflict. To most of the world (and the minority themselves), the Rohingya are a Bengali-speaking and mostly- Muslim minority in Burma, the Buddhist-majority nation in Southeast Asia also known as Myanmar. But the Burmese government says the Rohingya do not exist. In fact, they object to the very use of the word Rohingya at all, instead arguing that they are Bengali and entered what is now Burma during the time of the British Empire or later as illegal immigrants after Bangladesh's war for independence in 1971. More than 1 million Rohingya are estimated to live in the country, mostly in the northern part of Rakhine state
along the border with Bangladesh and India, and almost as many live outside of it. Why does this cause problems? This dispute over the identity of the Rohingya has big consequences in Burma. The Rohingya is not among the 135 officially recognized ethnic groups in the country, and despite their considerable numbers and local roots in Burma, they are not considered citizens and are denied access to government services. A growing Buddhist nationalism in Burma, where 90 percent of the population identify with Buddhism, has led to a number of laws on religion, including restrictions on interfaith marriage. There has also been major ethnic violence in Rakhine; most notably in 2012, when riots after the rape of a woman in the state led to large-scale displacement of Muslims, with many moving into squalid camps for internally displaced people Why are so many Rohingya fleeing Burma now? Rohingya have fled across the border into Bangladesh for decades, while some took even riskier journeys on rickety boats to reach countries farther away. However, the surge in those escaping Burma now is unprecedented: The U.N. refugee agency said this week that a total of 123,000 refugees have fled western Burma since Aug. 25. 2
The catalyst for this is a sudden surge in insurgent violence, in turn prompting a massive response from the Burmese government. The first signs of this came in October 2016, when nine police officers were killed by armed men who were said to be Muslims. In the ensuing violence, scores were reported dead and tens of thousands displaced. Things grew worse still on Aug. 25, after a militant group called the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) mounted unusual coordinated attacks on security forces in northern Rakhine. The Burmese army said in response that it had killed 370 fighters tied to the group, though Rohingya activists said that many were not fighters. There have also been significant attacks on property in the Rohingya areas of northern Rakhine. Human Rights Watch released satellite images last week that appeared to show mass destruction of buildings in Muslim areas, though the Burmese government has said ARSA burned these villages themselves. How has the world responded? The angst has been hardest felt in Muslim-majority nations: Malaysia recalled its ambassador to Burma, while Maldives announced it would break trade ties with Burma. There have also been major protests in a number of places, including Indonesia and the Russian Republic of Chechnya. 3
At a supranational level, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres has also responded, warning that the violence could slip into a humanitarian catastrophe in a letter to the Security Council. 4
The Life and Love of Yusof Ishak The Institute of Southeast Asian Studies was renamed Iseas-Yusof Ishak Institute on the 105th anniversary of the birth of S'pore's first President. His portrait is on the currency note, but who is the man? He was a president for all Singaporeans... Encik Yusof showed that, in Singapore, you can rise to the top if you work hard. - Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong paying tribute to Singapore's first President In his National Day Rally speech in 2015, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong announced three ways the country will pay tribute to Mr Yusof Ishak, who was appointed Singapore's Yang di- Pertuan Negara six months after it gained self-government in 1959 and named the first president of an independent Singapore in 1965. The new mosque in Woodlands will be named Masjid Yusof Ishak; the Institute of South East Asian Studies (Iseas) in the National University of Singapore will now be known as Iseas - The Yusof Ishak Institute; and a Yusof Ishak Professorship in Social Sciences will be started at NUS. We look back at the milestones in the life of Mr Yusof, who died in 1970 at age 60. 5
1. Yusof Ishak was born in Perak on Aug 12, 1910, the oldest of nine children of a civil servant, Ishak Ahmad. His father was transferred to Singapore in 1923 to be Assistant Inspector of Fisheries. 2. He attended Victoria Bridge School (now Victoria School) for his primary education before entering Raffles Institution, where he was one of 13 students and the only Malay in the Queen s Scholarship class. He missed out on the scholarship by a few points. 3. Mr Yusof not only excelled in his studies but he was also a good athlete, representing RI in many games including hockey, cricket, swimming, water polo, basketball, boxing and weightlifting. As a boxer, he won the Aw Boon Par cup in 1932. In weightlifting, he became the national lightweight champion in 1933. 4. He got a taste of politics from his father who was an active member of the Singapore Malay Union, where the future president of Singapore would later become a youth leader. 5. In 1938, together with 20 Malay leaders in Singapore, he started Utusan Melayu, a newspaper dedicated to Malay issues, and which championed the need for the community to modernise and focus on education. Utusan Melayu, first published in 1939, was the first paper to be owned and financed by the Malays. 6. In 1948, he wed Noor Aishah Mohd Salim in an arranged marriage when she was just 16 years old and he was 39. They had three children - two daughters and a son. 7. After the war, Utusan Melayu, which had been closed during the Japanese occupation, reopened in 1945. In 1957, Mr Yusof 6
moved from Singapore to live in Kuala Lumpur, and the Utusan Melayu headquarters also shifted there. 8. In 1959, he resigned from the newspaper and moved back to Singapore to take up the position of chairman of the Public Service Commission of Singapore, at the invitation of Mr Lee Kuan Yew, then Prime Minister. 9. After the PAP won the 1959 election and Singapore achieved self-government, Mr Yusof was appointed the Yang di-pertuan Negara of Singapore, or Head of State. 10. When Singapore gained independence on Aug 9, 1965, he became the first President of the Republic of Singapore. 11. As president of the newly independent Singapore, he reached out to the people to reassure citizens stunned by the country's ejection from Malaysia. He visited constituencies around the island, standing in an open Land Rover, walking for hours in the hot sun. 12. On July 29, 1966, Mr Lee declared open Yusof Ishak Secondary School at Jubilee Road. It is the only school to be named after a Singapore president. 13. In his 1968 New Year message, Mr Yusof said: No man need feel that to belong to a particular religion puts him at a disadvantage or gives him an advantage... This is how things are in Singapore and this is how things must always be in our 7
country. Only in this way can a multiracial society like Singapore live in peace and prosperity. 14. His health started to fail in 1968 and he was hospitalised for heart trouble and other illnesses. He died of heart failure in Nov 23, 1970, while still in office, and was buried at the Kranji State Cemetary. 15. His portrait appears on the Singapore Portrait Series currency notes introduced in 1999. Sources: First Article: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/09/06/howburmas-rohingya-crisis-went-from-bad-to-worse/?utm_term=.4b23b806a373 Second Article: http://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/life-and-times-ofyusof-ishak-singapores-first-president http://www.tnp.sg/news/singapore-news/life-love-yusof-ishak 8
Minion President s Message: Dear students of AES, I am utterly disappointed that you have captured all my fellow Minions, myself included. However, while we are behind bars now, we are planning another escape. Watch out for it! The student who foils our escape plans this time round will be crowned the winner of the Humanities Minion Challenge! Yours Sincerely, The Minion President [To foil the Minion s plans, check out the instructions in the next page!] 9
Instructions to foil the Minions escape plan and win this Humanities Minion Challenge: 1. Find the place marked X on the map below. This is the location where the minions are hiding out to make their plans. 2. Once you ve found the secret location, take a selfie with the photograph of the Minions (pasted on the wall). 3. Send your selfie to your Humanities teachers psst. Fastest fingers first! 4. Remember only ONE student stands to win this challenge, so remove the picture of the minion and keep as evidence to pass to your Humanities teacher after you have taken the selfie. 5. Have fun! 10