The government has reportedly provided full citizenship to few of the Rohingyas who had accepted the National Verification Form (NVC), according to multiple sources in Maungdaw township. The move is seen by many as another endevour to stall repatriation of more than a million refugees in Bangladesh and ensure the Rohingyas can never again return to Arakan.
Over the last few months, La Wa Ka and their agents had been spreading the message in all townships of Northern Arakan that any Rohingya who accepts the NVC will be given the pink card i.e. full citizenship. Rohingyas had always rejected the NVC as it requires them to identify as Bengali instead of Rohingya.
The government and much of the Buddhist population claim the Rohingya is a term coined by illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. Though Muslims had lived in Arakan for centuries, especially in the area west of the Kaladan river, Burma has been adamant that they are settlers from the Chittagong region of Bangladesh.
The move if taken will be exceptional in the sense that Bengali is not identified as one of the 132 races recognised under the controversial 1982 citizenship law that stripped the Rohingyas of their citizenship in the first place.
Much of the Rohingya population has been driven out to Bangladesh during the military operations of 2017 when approximately 25,000 including women and children were killed.
The state capital Akyab where Rakhines held a slim majority over their Muslim counterparts was made virtually Muslim free in 2012 with many being killed and others crammed in the ghetto of Aung Minglar which is now surrounded by barbed wire and heavily armed security forces.
Since World War 2, Rohingyas were driven out from townships west of Kaladan river until Rakhines and Na Ta La (Buddhist settlers from outside Arakan)backed by state forces took over the once Muslim majority regions. Maungdaw and Buthidaung were the only Muslim majority townships in 2017. The area now lies eerily empty as the vast majority of the population was driven out last year.
The genocide has however created an international uproar and Myanmar, is reeling under diplomatic pressure led by the Muslim world and Western countries. Activists say that in an unprecedented move, the government is considering taking the extremely unlikely and shrewd move to grant some Rohingyas full citizenship if they agree to fill the NVC form and identify themselves as Bengalis.
This will naturally kill repatriation as neither Rohingya refugees nor Bangladesh will agree that Rohingyas should be identified as Bengalis.
It will create confusion among the beleaguered Rohingya populace still remaining in Arakan, and in any case their numbers are too low to make a difference. Last but not least, it will be another step in wiping out the Rohingya race cementing an ultimate victory for the Buddhist nationalists over the Arakanese Muslim.
Some activists say the pink card and full citizenship will not result in minimal improvements for the life of the Rohingya. They point out that Kaman Muslims, who have long held the pink card are facing the same fate as the Rohingyas. In fact the minority community, numbering around a few thousands are mostly housed in IDP camps where living conditions have been described by the international media as the ‘worst in the world’, a fate similar to the Rohingya Muslims.
Citizenship in this case would make little difference and is being considered as an eyewash devised by the Myanmar diplomatic community, playing a game at which they seem to be getting better with time, allege many Rohingya activists.
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