Dragon turning south

Two years ago, I first crossed the Mekong River and landed in Houayxay, a small Laotian town bordering Thailand. It was during the Lunar New Year period and, to my surprise, I ended up celebrating the festive season with a small group of engineers from Guangxi province, China.

They were sent there to work on a major road construction and, due to the poor transport links between the two countries, simply could not find a quick way to go home for the most important festival in the Chinese calendar.

“We get paid 3000 reminbi (Chinese dollar) per month, which is not much considering the distance that we have to travel. But our government does provide lodging and other benefits like health insurance.

“I think we are already much better off than the Laotian workers here. Many of them earn as little as 300 reminbi per month. For the first time in my life, I feel like a king.” One of them said, looking contented.

Touring the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMC) and the once notorious Golden Triangle, I also made use of the opportunity to spend a couple of nights in Tachileik, a Shan-Burmese town just a stone’s throw away from Maesai, Thailand. I was amazed by the presence of the large number of shops and factories owned by mainland Chinese business people. Among them, a Burmese Chinese lady, married to a Shanghaiese, was enjoying brisk business selling a variety of Burmese tea.

“How much is this?,” I pointed at a 250g pack of the famous Burmese green tea.

“Only 1000 Thai Baht,” she said with a sweet smile.

“That is a lot of money by local standards,” I almost screamed.

“Yes. But we have the processing and packaging done by Chinese experts, you know. My husband has invested huge amounts of money into this business; we create jobs for the poor Burmese and Shan workers also. And we don’t target the locals anyway. We mostly sell it to tourists and business people from China and Taiwan. Where are you from actually?”

“So how much do you pay the workers here?,” I probed further.

She lost her friendliness at hearing this and I simply grinned and turned away.

Assistance without conditions

What I experienced in Laos and Burma reminded me of a conversation that I had with Zhuang Guotu, director of the Institute of Malaysian Studies at Xiamen University, China, some years ago at a conference organised by Universiti Malaya. As he was talking profusely on the economic opportunities presented by his country and the great potentials for Chinese state and private enterprises in Southeast Asia, I interrupted his enthusiasm by saying business expansion and economic cooperation are just part and parcel of Beijing’s soft-power approach to create a sphere of influence in the region.

Naturally, our brief exchange of views did not end amicably and Zhuang was rather puzzled by my scepticism. Like many a scholar from China, he found it unfathomable that a Malaysian of Chinese origin should hold opinions that were (and still are) not too favourable to the Beijing authorities.

For them, exploitation and economic dominance can only come from the developed world, be it the United States, Europe, Japan or even Russia and India; whatever Beijing does must be benign and benevolent.

China’s adroit use of bilateral aid, soft loans and technological cooperation has indeed charmed many Southeast Asian leaders, especially those of the under developed nations such as Laos, Cambodia and Burma. More importantly, Beijing, perceiving itself to be a past victim of colonial humiliation, never adopts hawkish tone as heard in Washington and Tokyo, but articulates its willingness to “prosper” the poorer south with empathy and sympathy, bereft of the issues of human rights and democracy.

Precisely because China offers assistance without the conditions of democratic reform, market restructuring or environmental protection, it goes down extremely well with the neighbours. But there is no disguise that the ultimate goal of the Chinese government is to seek to put in place a structure and mechanism in the region that is more compatible to Beijing’s strategic interests.

The presence of Chinese nationals in the GMS is unmistakably staggering. In Mong La, located in northeastern Shan state of Burma and in proximity to Yunnan province, thousands of Chinese citizens cross the border on a daily basis to come here to gamble and to trade illegally, from tea, guns, daily foodstuffs to even drugs. Public gambling is banned in China, and Mong La survives and thrives on it. The Chinese yuan is most welcome here.

The unbridled human trafficking has also created the serious problem of illegal prostitution, subjecting increasing numbers of Shan-Burmese and Yunnanese women to sexual exploitation and harm. To their credit, both Yangoon and Beijing made concerted effort to curb the vice trades, but the measures have been largely ineffective due to corruption and the lack of political will.

People-oriented development

I did try to venture into Shan state, but failed. Recently, I met Ah Long (not his real name) by chance in Kuala Lumpur. He is a Shan Chinese from a village near Mong La and provides me with vivid account of the daily happening there. He became orphaned when his parents died during forced labour by the Burmese junta in 2005 and he was forcibly seized by soldiers to work on a dam construction thereafter. He managed to escape and fled all the way to Malaysia.

“Do you know who funded the dam?” I asked.

“Yes, of course. A lot of construction projects in Burma are now funded by the Chinese government.” He sighed and I was silent too. Since 1988, China has been the largest source of economic assistance to Burma, having pledged as much as $5bn in loans, plants, mineral exploration, hydropower and other energy productions, in addition to $1.5bn or so in weaponry to the military junta.

As for the relatively more prosperous and developed economies like Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand, bilateral trade holds sway and these countries can now hardly survive without the lucrative Chinese market. Cooperation also takes the form of energy-related projects. In May 2007, two Chinese firms announced their plans to invest $343m in an oil refinery and a gas processing plant in Pahang, Malaysia.

I do not necessarily see the greater engagement of China in Southeast Asia as something negative. After all, the region had long been a centre of international trade hosting business people from around the world long before the arrival of western colonialism. Still, the tricky issues, historical or present, between Beijing and the regional capitals will likely come back to haunt the relations if they remain unresolved.

China is yet to face up to its disastrous support for the Pol Pot regime in Cambodia in the 1970s, and the unrestrained capitalism advocated by greedy businesspeople in the poorest parts of Southeast Asia can only breed more resentment and bitterness among the local populaces.

Development is good, but it has to be people-oriented. Beijing is only looking at the short-term gains for strategic considerations, but may one day find itself in the dock being accused of all the historical wrongs committed by the colonial powers in the past.