Yangon, November (24)
The military council labelled some neighborhoods in Yangon’s Mayangone and Mylangadom townships as “land encroachment” and evicted residents, who are now having difficulty renting houses, the sources told Than Lwin Times.
The evicted are finding it difficult to find housing because of the military council’s new requirement, which asks for a letter of recommendation from the administrator of the previous ward.
An evicted squatter said that he is having trouble renting a house in some neighborhoods because the administrator where he lived before did not give him a letter of recommendation.
Currently, neighborhoods that have been given eviction notices have been cleared by the military using bulldozers and earth-moving machines. Similarly, the authorities arrested those who did not demolish their houses before the deadline and those who came to take their belongings from their homes.
Most of the residents of the neighborhoods where their homes were demolished are low-income and manual laborers, and they are having difficulty moving and renting.
The squatters lived for many years without understanding the type of land on which they lived, and because they did not change the type of land, they had to be removed when there was a lack of humanity during the coup d’état, a lawyer said.
On November 22, the military council forcibly removed around 10,000 households from five neighborhoods such as Santhamardi, Myaemyanaung, Gonnyinni, Dharmapala, and Myawaddy in Mingaladon Township’s Phinmapyin village tract on November 22.
However, at 6:00 am the following day, the authorities allowed the squatters only 30 minutes to leave and demolished the houses with earth-moving machines and bulldozers.
Under the NLD government, Yangon Region Chief Minister U Phyo Min Thein also ordered the demolition of those neighborhoods in Mayangon Township, but the residents said that they were demolished only after the coup.
News-Than Lwin Times
