Interview with Byron Rushing (corre

[maung@xxxxxxxxxxx]

((Democratic Voice of Burma Correspondent Thein Htike Oo 
Interview with Mr. Byron Rushing, Representative of the House of 
Representatives of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the 
architect of the "Act Regulating State Contracts with Companies 
Doing Business With Or In Burma."   The legislation came into 
force when Massachusetts Governor Weld signed it into law on 
June 25, 1996))

//Begin Interview//

Q.	Congratulations, Mr. Byron Rushing. I am a Burmese student 
working at the NCGUB ((National Coalition Government of the 
Union of Burma)) office in Washington, DC. I am also a reporter 
of the Democratic Voice of Burma based in Oslo, Norway. I intend 
to broadcast this interview from DVB.
First, could you explain the basic aim of this legislation ?

A.	What this legislation attempts to do is to join the 
movement that is going on around the world, to get  foreign 
investment out of Burma, to keep the dollars that the military 
government is trying to attract to Burma, to stop that flow of 
dollars to the military government of Burma, so that the 
military government of Burma will become weak enough, that the 
democratic forces will be able to gain control of the country.

Q.	Do you know which companies will be affected and how they 
will be affected by this legislation?

A.	Well, we won't know exactly all the companies which will 
be affected by this legislation. The way the legislation works 
is  that a company will not be able to do business with the 
State of Massachusetts; so  it's like, if the State of 
Massachusetts is the customer.... and we are going to boycott 
buying any goods or services from a company that does business 
in Burma. So we will make up a list of all the companies that we 
know of that are doing business in Burma and those companies 
will be notified, any time they try to sell something to 
Massachusetts,  that we cannot buy their product because they 
are in Burma.

Q.	Do you know the amount of business and revenue they will 
lose ?

A.	We don't know that either yet because we don't have a list 
of all of the products that these companies have been offering 
to Massachusetts, since we are talking about goods and services 
that people want to sell to us  it will change from year to 
year, how much will be boycotted in terms of amount of money.  
But, right now, we are saying that we think about --if  it 
happens right this moment -- about four million dollars in goods 
and services will not be purchased from companies doing business 
in Burma, but that might change. I believe that they are 
probably states in the United States that do more business with 
companies that are in Burma than Massachusetts does.  So, what 
is important for us, like the governor said, the governor said 
he's going to send a copy of this legislation now to all the 
governors in the United States. We will be sending copies of 
this legislation to all our colleagues and all the state 
legislatures, so that they will also pass similar legislation. 
As more and more states pass more legislation, then you will 
have... you will reach a point where it becomes more expensive 
for a company to be in Burma than not to be in Burma. They will 
lose more business in the United States than they will gain in 
Burma, then they will leave.

Q.	So you believe other states will follow Massachusetts ?

A.	We absolutely believe that others states will follow 
Massachusetts. We believe that the point we are in right now is 
comparable to the point we were in 14 years ago in regard to 
South Africa, that the movement to divest and to have selected 
purchase programs concerning South Africa began in Massachusetts 
and Connecticut in 1982 and 1983, and it took a while for more 
and more states to pass similar legislation, but eventually that 
happened and we were able to put pressure to those companies. 
Let me also point out that when we do this kind grassroots 
foreign policy, we are also putting pressure on our own national 
government because the major kind of sanctions that keep 
companies out of a country, all the kinds of sanctions that only 
the United States Congress can pass.  And we believe that as 
more and more states pass legislation toward a free Burma then 
you will gather more support in the United States Congress for 
sanctions regarding Burma.

Q.	Mr. Rushing, you sponsored this legislation. How do you 
succeed in getting the endorsement of  the legislators who 
passed that legislation, including Governor Weld ?

A.	Well, as I said earlier during the signing ceremony, this 
was brought to my attention by a statement that was issued in 
support of Aung San Suu Kyi by people who had received the Nobel 
Prize. After she received the Nobel Prize for Peace, a group of 
Nobel laureates signed the statement.  Among the people who 
signed that statement was a person that I respect very much, and 
that was Archbishop Desmond Tutu from South Africa.  And that 
brought it to my consciousness and I began to read about the 
situation in Burma and  then began to notice that there were in 
Massachusetts advocates for democracy in Burma.  I met those 
advocates, we talked about what kinds of strategy we can have in 
legislature and we decided to create this bill and to work for 
this bill. I think the bill was able to reach .... for us ... 
this bill was first filed in 1994 and did not win in 1994 and we 
refiled it in 1995 and now it has been passed and signed into 
law.   This for us, in this legislature, that's a very short 
period of time for legislation to go;  two years is a very short 
period of time. This happened very quickly from the point of 
view of a legislature.  And I think that was possible .. this is 
happened because of two things; one, is that the story about  
Burma is so clear that people who don't know about Burma, when 
you explain it to them, they understand it immediately. They 
understand a democratic movement where that has been repressed, 
when you talked about the demonstrations of 1988, they can 
understand that. When you talked about the election that was won 
by the democratic forces in Burma in 1990, they understand that. 
They understand that the leader of democratic movement who 
explains herself and the situation in Burma so clearly. So we 
had a story that was clear and could be understood. Then we had 
just an amazing amount of advocates and lobbyists. I think that 
the lobbying around this bill has been some of the finest 
lobbying I have seen in my career here in the legislature.  And, 
so, we could easily... very quickly get communications to 
various legislators in the State, so that they heard from people 
who are living in their districts, who are interested in this 
and heard from advocacy groups on an on-going basis, and that's 
what it takes.  So, it's really an education process as much as 
a lobbying process, and both of those were done very well.

Q.	Now that the Burma Freedom and Democracy Act is still 
pending in the congress,  do you think the Massachusetts 
legislation will have a favorable impact to that bill ?

A.	I think that it is going to give a lot of support to this 
bill in Congress. I am not sure that means it is going to be 
able to pass this year.  But I think that it is going to 
certainly move it to the front of a lot of people's 
consciousnless in Congress.  And, the other thing that is going 
to happen is you are going to see other states and other cities 
taking a look at their policy in regard to companies those are 
doing business in Burma.

Q.	How do you feel  today when the governor signed your bill 
?

A.	Well, I am happy about it. I am especially happy that we 
are able to get publicity  for the situation in Burma. I  think 
More people know about Burma in Massachusetts than knew about 
Burma a week ago. That is very important.

Q.	Do you believe that the legislation will discourage some 
companies from investing in Burma and some companies that are 
still investing in Burma to divest?

A.	I think the first thing it is going to do, I think, it is 
going to encourage companies who are thinking about investing 
Burma  not to do it.  The ones who are not in, it's, of course, 
easy for someone who is not in to make a decision not to go in. 
I think we are going to see a lot of that.  Of course, some of 
them, we won't even know about because unless they publicize it, 
we won't know that this bill has had that influence. Then, of 
course, it is going to mean that companies are going to start to 
leave. I think that first, you will see companies doing what 
PepsiCo did, which is to have a .... work out some kind of 
compromise, so they could say that they are not going to do any 
future investment but they are going to maintain the investment 
and connections that they have right now but they are not going 
to expand them. And, I think that you will see more of that 
American companies, and then eventually, you will see the 
American companies leaving.

Q.	Thank you very much, Mr. Rushing.  So, finally what 
message would you like to send to the Burmese democratic forces, 
including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the Burmese people ?

A.	Well, my first message is really one of .... to 
congratulate the democratic forces in Burma. And to especially, 
send a message of solidarity to the Burmese in Burma who are 
struggling for the restoration of democracy.  And to let them 
know that there are people all over the world who really are 
concerned about establishing democracy in Burma and as soon as 
they hear the story of  what is going on in Burma, they'll find 
that they can relate to that story, and that they can ... and 
they want to support the work that is going on there.  I think 
that you know that we're really... I think that we look forward 
to the time when we can all come and visit Burma.  ((laughs)) 
And come and visit Burma like when we were able to go back to 
South Africa; to come for the next elections. We are looking 
forward to the time when we can come to the next elections in 
Burma.

Q.	Thank you very much. 

//End Interview//