Kachin News Group

The Manau Festival news department being monitored by the military junta from Naypyitaw has finally been permitted to publish its daily newspaper on Friday. It is in a mixture of Burmese and ethnic Kachin language and was heavily censored and edited by regime officials.

Manau Festival, which is celebrating the 62nd Kachin State Day in northern Burma on January 10, started functions from January 5, which will continue till January 11 in Myitkyina the capital of the state. It has faced severe restrictions, was disturbed and tight security imposed. The junta created hurdles in freely publishing the newspaper with daily events of the festival.

The daily Manau Festival newspaper known as "Jinghpaw Mungdaw N-sen" started being distributed on Friday at 2 p.m. in Kachin and Burmese languages.  It was forced to publish the junta’s propaganda on the front page said a source close to the news department.

“The Manau news department could not do anything for the junta forced them to toe its line to discriminate against the Kachin language and also pressurize Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) to transform the Burmese army-controlled Border Guard Force,” said Manau festival officials.

The junta put in place three Burmese news agents to closely monitor the Manau Festival news department and they have been fluently speaking and writing the Kachin language, said the source.

The regime’s media agents are U Tin Win, agent leader based in Naypyitaw, U Khin Maung Kyaw photographer from Naypyitaw and U Ne Linn Way, senior journalist based in Rangoon (Yangoon), according to the Manau newspaper team.

One of the biggest cultural festivals for ethnic Kachin people the Manau Festival Dance is held every year on Kachin State Day since the KIO signed a ceasefire with the junta in 1994.  Last year the daily newspaper reported the events and could be published and distributed in Kachin Language without any restriction imposed by the junta, said the Manau officials.

The regime has been increasingly restricting culture, tradition and the religion of the ethnic Kachin people this year. But such discrimination is on since Burma received independence from the British on January 4, 1948.

The Kachin State Day was first held on January 10, 1948 after Burma got independence from British colonial rule.