One of the aspects of the upcoming census in 2014 that will more or less keep the non-Burman leaders’ adrenaline flowing less than a year from now is the question: How miner are we population-wise?
The answer is clear: the results of a proper head count could very well be part of the crucial indicators of the outcome of the 2015 elections.
If they have doubts about the post. Independence censuses conducted so far, there should be no blames attached to them. No census experts have placed much reliability on them anyway.
Just take a look at the population estimates that appeared in the Working People’s Daily (the forerunner of today’s New Light of Myanmar) in January 1993.
According to them, there were 28.25 million Burmans out of the total population of 41.204 million, which made:
Burmans 68.56%
Non Burmans 31.44%
But if you look at the 1944 Burma Handbook published by the (British) Government of Burma, the difference in quite striking.
“The Burmese proper (as Burmans were also known) in 1931 numbered 8,596,031” (P.14) out of a total of 14,647,756 (P.6), which made:
Burmans 58.68%
Non-Burmans 41.32%
It is also interesting to note that the 1931 census did not include the Wa States that had a population of 82,614 in 1941. Details by races in the 1941 census were lost due to the Japanese invasion in 1942. The Dorman-Smith government, then in exile in Simla, noted briefly that “only a statement of the total population by districts has survived.”
Today, estimates have gone as high as 75:25 between the Burmans and non-Burmans. The only “guesstimate” that seems to go hand in hand with the 1931 census is the one made by the Ethnic Nationalities Council (ENC) which says the ratio is 60:40.
Of course, it doesn’t mean that any results that came out of next year’s census that are not in line with the 1931 census (already 82 years old) should be discounted.
But it certainly means that it is high time Naypyitaw stops playing its cards close to its chest and starts laying them on the table for all to see and understand: Details of its projected census taking next year. At least to ensure the people, both Burman and non-Burman alike, that there’ll be no funny business involved come April 2014, if not anything else.
