History Behind the property dispute

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History Behind the property dispute

Protesters are worried about the lawsuit over Gen. Aung San's house. If
his son wins, his half of the property will go to the Myanmar junta.
Aoung San Suu Kyi May be evicted or sent to prison. GRACE BRADBERRY
reports

The Statesman (New Delhi)
January 30, 2001

Aung San Suu Kyi is a woman of whom people do not like to ask personal
questions. For one thing, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize has been
all but canonized, and one does not quiz saints about their private
lives. For another it would seem that she has no private life.

Before 1988, when she returned to Yangon to nurse her dying mother and
became leader of the National League for Democracy, the Opposition
party, she was a housewife in Oxford with a husband and two sons. After
1988, she was an international human rights heroine, who was allowed
little contact with her family. It was as if from that time on her
private life came to a halt and was replaced by a public one. But nobody
is without a private life.

Last November, Mrs Suu Kyi's resurfaced. A brother, whose name barely
appears in the index of books written about her, filed a lawsuit
demanding half of the property in Yangon where she has lived, often
under house arrest, for the past 12 years. Property is divided equally
between children under Myanmarese law.

Reports said Mrs Suu Kyi and her brother were estranged. Why would
anyone, let alone a brother, do such a thing to a revered woman who is
so revered? The move was inexplicable because her brother is a US
citizen and under Myanmarese law, a foreigner cannot own property in the
country.

The answers to these questions lie with 54 University Avenue, the
shuttered house by Lake Inya that has become something of a shrine for
human rights campaigners. The house that seems to be owned by history
and by politics was given by the state to Mrs Suu Kyi's mother in
recognition of her late husband, General Aung San, who won independence
from the British. Yet the truth is that for both Mrs Suu Kyi and her
brother, Aung San Oo, it is a house where the personal is embedded in
every cranny. It was here that brother and sister grew up together, in
the shadow of their father's reputation and became locked in a complex
sibling rivalry that has continued for 50 years. The rift is deep, kept
open by perceived slights and wounding disagreements of a personal
nature.

Compared to Mrs Suu Kyi's moral fight, it seems petty and yet it could
have led to her losing the house and with it a crucial powerbase for the
Myanmarese Opposition.

The furniture at the house is the same that both siblings remember from
their childhood. The house is unchanged, though neglect has taken its
toll a layer of moss has crept across peeling plasterwork.

In most other cities it would be a property developer's dream, located
in the town's best neighbourhood and in need of work. Even on Yangon's
less than buoyant property market, the estate has been variously valued
by commentators at between £4 million and £40 million.

Eight thousand miles away stands a house that could not be more
different. Built in 1962, it covers a mere 1,200 sqft, has three
bedrooms, two bathrooms and is located on an unassuming street in San
Diego. Its value is about £200,000. It is here that Mrs Suu Kyi's
brother, a 57-year-old computer engineer for the US Navy, lives with his
wife Lei Lei New Thein, a university administrator. They moved there in
1990. A year later, Mrs Suu Kyi won the Nobel Peace Prize. Only last
November, his neighbours discovered the connection.

They were alerted to it by leaflets posted through doors that denounced
Aung San Oo, and condemned the lawsuit he had filed claiming half the
Yangon property. Members of the Myanmarese-American community held up
placards outside Aung San Oo's house.

What had incensed the protesters were the possible consequences of the
lawsuit. If Aung San Oo won, his half of the property would probably be
handed over to Myanmar's military government. Some feared that Mrs Suu
Kyi would be evicted, perhaps even moved to prison. On the Internet,
Myanmarese-Americans speculated on the brother's motivations: he was
anti-democracy, in league with Myanmar's junta, he had been pushed into
it by his wife, he hated his sister. There were ugly e-mails about
"genetic mutation" implying Aung San Oo had betrayed his father's
legacy.

Aung San Oo was the eldest of three children born to Gen. Aung San and
Khin Kyi, a former nurse who had looked after him when he became sick.
In July 1947, just six months before independence, General Aung San was
assassinated.

His eldest son was four, his youngest son three and his daughter two.
Mrs Suu Kyi grew up unable to remember her father. Aung San Oo was old
enough to miss him. He is recalled as a withdrawn child and there is
speculation that he was traumatized by his father's death. It might have
helped to have his mother on hand. But she accepted a government job and
became, immersed in it.

In her book Freedom From Fear, Mrs Suu Kyi recalls that she was closer
to her other brother, Aung San Lin, than to Aung San Oo. tragically,
Aung San Lin died when he was eight. He drowned in an ornamental lake on
the grounds of the house. Of the two children, Aung San Oo was the least
psychologically robust. "He was always jealous of his sister," recalls a
family friend. "There was a definite rivalry. He hadn't his sister's
charm, though he was able in other ways."

Dr Alice Khin, a Myanmarese expatriate who now lives in Canada, says
Aung San Oo "is said to have felt lonely and depressed". He was also
judged to be less good looking than his sister. "She also had
confidence. He did not." Both children, though brought up as Buddhists,
attended Catholic schools in Myanmar. But while Mrs Suu Kyi was educated
in Myanmar and then, from 15, in India, Aung San Oo was dispatched to
Dover College in England for the sixth form. Living with her mother in
Delhi, Mrs Suu Kyi took flower arranging classes, learned to ride, and
acquired a wide circle of Indian friends, including Indira Gandi's sons
Rajiv and Sanjay. Returning from Dover College, and later from Imperial
College, Aung San Oo would have found himself an outsider to this
circle. Mary Trevellyan, an old family friend, was appointed his
guardian while he was at Imperial. But despite this support, it seems
that he felt isolated during his student days.

His wife has complained that the Myanmarese community in London
abandoned him. While Mrs Suu Kyi met her husband, Michael Aris, at
Oxford, Aung San Oo felt few ties to Imperial, and later moved to
America.

But it was an event years later that would lead to the greatest rancour
between brother and sister.

Before their mother's death, Aung San Oo married Lei Lei New Thein, his
junior by about 10 years.

His mother disapproved of his choice. Mrs Suu Kyi asked her brother not
to take his wife to the funeral. He went alone.

Lei Lei New Thein seems to provoke bile. Rumours abound in the Internet
chat rooms frequented by Myanmarese-Americans. One is that before she
emigrated to America, she dated men from the American embassy in Yangon.

Mrs Suu Kyi's sister-in-law is also accused of being manipulative and
there are unsubstantiated rumours that her family is connected to the
military regime. Lei Lei New Thein denies all this. "On the Internet
people are swearing about me, saying that I am the one making this
claim," she fold a Myanmarese-language radio station. So was it true
that her father enjoyed "some sort of close relationship" with Gen. Khin
Nyint, part of Myanmar's military regime? "My father?," Lei Lei New
Thein replied. "He is dead, so how can he have some relationship with
Gen. Khin Nyint? My father was never a government servant. He never
behaved humbly to anyone to get opportunities. He never stole government
money. How could he have a relationship with Gen Khin Nyint?"

She also rejects the idea that she encouraged her husband to pursue the
lawsuit. "My husband is not a weak man. He is like stone and nobody can
change his desire." So why did he bring the lawsuit? "It is just to
legalise his share of the property. But it has been blown out of
proportion. This is just a family affair, not a public one." According
to Lei Lei New Thein, her husband was trying to follow his mother's
wises, she said, and turn the house into a memorial. It is known that
Khin Kyi intended the house to become an educational trust or museum.
But then she died before she knew the role that her daughter would play
in Myanmarese politics.

"We have never thought about living in the house," Lei Lei New Thein
told the Radio Free Burma journalist. "Khin Kyi wanted it to be opened
up as a memorial. You all know, this is a state house. The state gave it
to the family."

She also cited a Myanmarese statute of limitation which gave her husband
only 12 years from his mother's death in which to file the suit. "If
not, Oo will lose his property. This is just to make sure that we own
half of the house. The only thing she (Mrs Suu Kyi) has to do is accept
this. Her refusal causes all kinds of trouble." The trouble has landed
at the San Diego door of Aung San Oo and his wife. Last week, a
Myanmarese court threw out the lawsuit, ostensibly on technical grounds.

Observers see this as a softening of the junta's stance towards Mrs Suu
Kyi and her party. Those who have heard from Mrs Suu Kyi over the past
few months say that she has not been concerned about the property
dispute.

Aung San Oo last visited Myanmar in July, to attend the 53rd anniversary
of his father's death. He went to the house at university Avenue. The
two siblings did not speak.

-- The Times, London.




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<html>
<b><font size=+2>History Behind the property dispute</font></b>
<p><b><font size=+1>Protesters are worried about the lawsuit over Gen.
Aung San's house. If his son wins, his half of the property will go to
the Myanmar junta. Aoung San Suu Kyi May be evicted or sent to prison.
GRACE BRADBERRY reports</font></b>
<p>The Statesman (New Delhi)
<br>January 30, 2001
<p>Aung San Suu Kyi is a woman of whom people do not like to ask personal
questions. For one thing, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize has been
all but canonized, and one does not quiz saints about their private lives.
For another it would seem that she has no private life.
<p>Before 1988, when she returned to Yangon to nurse her dying mother and
became leader of the National League for Democracy, the Opposition party,
she was a housewife in Oxford with a husband and two sons. After 1988,
she was an international human rights heroine, who was allowed little contact
with her family. It was as if from that time on her private life came to
a halt and was replaced by a public one. But nobody is without a private
life.
<p>Last November, Mrs Suu Kyi's resurfaced. A brother, whose name barely
appears in the index of books written about her, filed a lawsuit demanding
half of the property in Yangon where she has lived, often under house arrest,
for the past 12 years. Property is divided equally between children under
Myanmarese law.
<p>Reports said Mrs Suu Kyi and her brother were estranged. Why would anyone,
let alone a brother, do such a thing to a revered woman who is so revered?
The move was inexplicable because her brother is a US citizen and under
Myanmarese law, a foreigner cannot own property in the country.
<p>The answers to these questions lie with 54 University Avenue, the shuttered
house by Lake Inya that has become something of a shrine for human rights
campaigners. The house that seems to be owned by history and by politics
was given by the state to Mrs Suu Kyi's mother in recognition of her late
husband, General Aung San, who won independence from the British. Yet the
truth is that for both Mrs Suu Kyi and her brother, Aung San Oo, it is
a house where the personal is embedded in every cranny. It was here that
brother and sister grew up together, in the shadow of their father's reputation
and became locked in a complex sibling rivalry that has continued for 50
years. The rift is deep, kept open by perceived slights and wounding disagreements
of a personal nature.
<p>Compared to Mrs Suu Kyi's moral fight, it seems petty and yet it could
have led to her losing the house and with it a crucial powerbase for the
Myanmarese Opposition.
<p>The furniture at the house is the same that both siblings remember from
their childhood. The house is unchanged, though neglect has taken its toll
a layer of moss has crept across peeling plasterwork.
<p>In most other cities it would be a property developer's dream, located
in the town's best neighbourhood and in need of work. Even on Yangon's
less than buoyant property market, the estate has been variously valued
by commentators at between &pound;4 million and &pound;40 million.
<p>Eight thousand miles away stands a house that could not be more different.
Built in 1962, it covers a mere 1,200 sqft, has three bedrooms, two bathrooms
and is located on an unassuming street in San Diego. Its value is about
&pound;200,000. It is here that Mrs Suu Kyi's brother, a 57-year-old computer
engineer for the US Navy, lives with his wife Lei Lei New Thein, a university
administrator. They moved there in 1990. A year later, Mrs Suu Kyi won
the Nobel Peace Prize. Only last November, his neighbours discovered the
connection.
<p>They were alerted to it by leaflets posted through doors that denounced
Aung San Oo, and condemned the lawsuit he had filed claiming half the Yangon
property. Members of the Myanmarese-American community held up placards
outside Aung San Oo's house.
<p>What had incensed the protesters were the possible consequences of the
lawsuit. If Aung San Oo won, his half of the property would probably be
handed over to Myanmar's military government. Some feared that Mrs Suu
Kyi would be evicted, perhaps even moved to prison. On the Internet, Myanmarese-Americans
speculated on the brother's motivations: he was anti-democracy, in league
with Myanmar's junta, he had been pushed into it by his wife, he hated
his sister. There were ugly e-mails about "genetic mutation" implying Aung
San Oo had betrayed his father's legacy.
<p>Aung San Oo was the eldest of three children born to Gen. Aung San and
Khin Kyi, a former nurse who had looked after him when he became sick.
In July 1947, just six months before independence, General Aung San was
assassinated.
<p>His eldest son was four, his youngest son three and his daughter two.
Mrs Suu Kyi grew up unable to remember her father. Aung San Oo was old
enough to miss him. He is recalled as a withdrawn child and there is speculation
that he was traumatized by his father's death. It might have helped to
have his mother on hand. But she accepted a government job and became,
immersed in it.
<p>In her book Freedom From Fear, Mrs Suu Kyi recalls that she was closer
to her other brother, Aung San Lin, than to Aung San Oo. tragically, Aung
San Lin died when he was eight. He drowned in an ornamental lake on the
grounds of the house. Of the two children, Aung San Oo was the least psychologically
robust. "He was always jealous of his sister," recalls a family friend.
"There was a definite rivalry. He hadn't his sister's charm, though he
was able in other ways."
<p>Dr Alice Khin, a Myanmarese expatriate who now lives in Canada, says
Aung San Oo "is said to have felt lonely and depressed". He was also judged
to be less good looking than his sister. "She also had confidence. He did
not." Both children, though brought up as Buddhists, attended Catholic
schools in Myanmar. But while Mrs Suu Kyi was educated in Myanmar and then,
from 15, in India, Aung San Oo was dispatched to Dover College in England
for the sixth form. Living with her mother in Delhi, Mrs Suu Kyi took flower
arranging classes, learned to ride, and acquired a wide circle of Indian
friends, including Indira Gandi's sons Rajiv and Sanjay. Returning from
Dover College, and later from Imperial College, Aung San Oo would have
found himself an outsider to this circle. Mary Trevellyan, an old family
friend, was appointed his guardian while he was at Imperial. But despite
this support, it seems that he felt isolated during his student days.
<p>His wife has complained that the Myanmarese community in London abandoned
him. While Mrs Suu Kyi met her husband, Michael Aris, at Oxford, Aung San
Oo felt few ties to Imperial, and later moved to America.
<p>But it was an event years later that would lead to the greatest rancour
between brother and sister.
<p>Before their mother's death, Aung San Oo married Lei Lei New Thein,
his junior by about 10 years.
<p>His mother disapproved of his choice. Mrs Suu Kyi asked her brother
not to take his wife to the funeral. He went alone.
<p>Lei Lei New Thein seems to provoke bile. Rumours abound in the Internet
chat rooms frequented by Myanmarese-Americans. One is that before she emigrated
to America, she dated men from the American embassy in Yangon.
<p>Mrs Suu Kyi's sister-in-law is also accused of being manipulative and
there are unsubstantiated rumours that her family is connected to the military
regime. Lei Lei New Thein denies all this. "On the Internet people are
swearing about me, saying that I am the one making this claim," she fold
a Myanmarese-language radio station. So was it true that her father enjoyed
"some sort of close relationship" with Gen. Khin Nyint, part of Myanmar's
military regime? "My father?," Lei Lei New Thein replied. "He is dead,
so how can he have some relationship with Gen. Khin Nyint? My father was
never a government servant. He never behaved humbly to anyone to get opportunities.
He never stole government money. How could he have a relationship with
Gen Khin Nyint?"
<p>She also rejects the idea that she encouraged her husband to pursue
the lawsuit. "My husband is not a weak man. He is like stone and nobody
can change his desire." So why did he bring the lawsuit? "It is just to
legalise his share of the property. But it has been blown out of proportion.
This is just a family affair, not a public one." According to Lei Lei New
Thein, her husband was trying to follow his mother's wises, she said, and
turn the house into a memorial. It is known that Khin Kyi intended the
house to become an educational trust or museum. But then she died before
she knew the role that her daughter would play in Myanmarese politics.
<p>"We have never thought about living in the house," Lei Lei New Thein
told the Radio Free Burma journalist. "Khin Kyi wanted it to be opened
up as a memorial. You all know, this is a state house. The state gave it
to the family."
<p>She also cited a Myanmarese statute of limitation which gave her husband
only 12 years from his mother's death in which to file the suit. "If not,
Oo will lose his property. This is just to make sure that we own half of
the house. The only thing she (Mrs Suu Kyi) has to do is accept this. Her
refusal causes all kinds of trouble." The trouble has landed at the San
Diego door of Aung San Oo and his wife. Last week, a Myanmarese court threw
out the lawsuit, ostensibly on technical grounds.
<p>Observers see this as a softening of the junta's stance towards Mrs
Suu Kyi and her party. Those who have heard from Mrs Suu Kyi over the past
few months say that she has not been concerned about the property dispute.
<p>Aung San Oo last visited Myanmar in July, to attend the 53rd anniversary
of his father's death. He went to the house at university Avenue. The two
siblings did not speak.
<p>-- The Times, London.
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