Officials move before capital done

YANGON, Myanmar — The government workers received two days' notice to pack up their offices and be ready to move. The military regime that rules this impoverished country had decided to move its capital to the remote, dusty town of Pyinmana.

On Nov. 6, the morning of the move from this longtime capital, hundreds of workers gathered at their offices, according to some accounts, and chanted "Out, out, out!" before they left. When the civil servants arrived in Pyinmana, 200 miles to the north in central Myanmar, they found a construction zone.

For more than a month now, many of the country's civil servants have been living like refugees in the concrete shells of unfinished buildings, often without running water or electricity. Offices and residential buildings are still being built, and major roads remain unpaved. Malaria is rampant. Many have asked to quit, but none has been allowed to, said a former civil servant who stays in touch with old colleagues.

Even for a populace accustomed to arbitrary decrees from the country's brutal military regime and its leader, Sr. Gen. Than Shwe, the sudden move from bustling Yangon to secluded Pyinmana has struck many as bizarre.

"This is a very strange country, a very strange government," said one veteran journalist who could not be identified by name for fear of government reprisal. "Even the most senior civil servants are angered by the move, and they dismiss it as the work of a fanatic. Pyinmana is a small country town. It cannot accommodate a capital."

Many people in Myanmar, also known as Burma, attribute the hasty move to Than Shwe's faith in astrologers, who recently began predicting that his government would fall if he did not quickly set up a new capital.

The astrologers have warned that Than Shwe's star is in decline and will reach its nadir in April. The only way the ruling general can save the regime, according to their predictions, is to move the capital from Yangon, also known as Rangoon.

Myanmar officials have said that Pyinmana provides a more central location as the military government tries to consolidate its hold on northern border areas dominated by ethnic groups. Some suspect that the decision to move the capital from the coastal city of Yangon also was prompted by Than Shwe's desire to isolate the government and protect it from possible threats, such as a popular uprising or a U.S. invasion.

Either way, the regime's decision to spend its money building a new capital while most of the population lives in abject poverty indicates that the military has a firm grip on power.

"All of this shows how irrational this regime is," said a senior Western diplomat who declined to be identified by name or nationality.

Myanmar has been ruled by the military since 1962. In a rare election in 1990, the opposition National League for Democracy won 80 percent of the vote but was not allowed to take power. The party's leader, Nobel Peace Prize-winner Aung San Suu Kyi, has been under house arrest or imprisoned for 10 of the last 16 years. The government recently extended her detention for six months.

Than Shwe, 74, a onetime specialist in psychological warfare, has headed the regime since 1992 and ruthlessly suppressed dissent. Regarded as one of the world's most repressive regimes, the Myanmar government is holding more than 1,000 political prisoners.

Despite a wealth of resources, Myanmar has become one of Asia's poorest countries.