Once among the most thriving markets in Naypyitaw Union Territory—the seat of the Myanmar junta’s national administration—the Pyinmana Market now looked like a ruin, largely under rubble from buildings that collapsed during an earthquake at the end of March.
There is still a strong odor of decomposition emanating from underneath the broken bricks and debris, where the bodies of an unknown number of victims who could not be saved from the quake—nor reached during subsequent rescue missions—are still lying.
However, as survivors continue to wander the city with weary faces, uncertain of where they will find water or their next meal, the smell is the least of their concerns.
Some are salvaging what they can from the ruins, loading the scraps they can lift on their own into vehicles. Some are able to buy food and supplies, while others are struggling even to find drinking water under the hot sun.
Pyinmana, which has a population of around 18,000, is an old town whose existence predates the construction of Naypyitaw under Myanmar’s previous military junta. Most of the houses in Pyinmana Township, some of which were hundreds of years old, have collapsed and are now lying in ruins after the quake.
After the destruction of hospitals and clinics; pagodas, stupas, and other religious buildings; and hundreds of civilian homes, residents of Pyinmana have said that the military regime has focused chiefly on restoring its administrative machinery rather than on relief efforts or the rehabilitation of people dispossessed by the disaster.
The quake damaged ministry buildings in Naypyitaw that had been built since the year 2000, even leaving hundreds of structures cracked or leaning off their foundations.
Offices and halls of government that have been instrumental to the military’s exertion of control over the country—such as the houses of parliament and ministries of foreign affairs, defence, information, industry, energy, and labour—have been damaged beyond functionality.
According to junta-controlled media, the quake also caused damage to the cyber security department, the military command headquarters, the home affairs ministry, the Myanma Railways office, the transport and communications ministry, and the Central Bank of Myanmar building, along with large housing complexes for civil servants.
Pressure to return
Notwithstanding the widespread destruction of civil servants’ housing and even the deaths of some departmental staff, the junta is already pushing survivors to return to work, according to some administrative employees.
Staff of the Ministry of Union Government Office, Ministry of Defence, Ministry of Home Affairs, and the General Administration Department reported being pressured to go back to their jobs.
A Ministry of Defence staff member said the authorities had called for Ministry of Defence and General Administration Department employees to attend work on alternating days, working in temporary shacks set up in open fields since their offices were unusable.
“The military council’s [Ministry of Union] Government Office is pushing people to come to work no matter what,” a woman employed at the General Administration Department said. “They’re making us do office cleaning work rather than actual office work. Some people didn’t come.”
She added that the places where they were being pressured to work lacked basic amenities like toilets or clean water, and that employees trying to use the toilets in the precariously leaning staff housing buildings would be endangering their own safety.
“There’s nowhere to relieve ourselves, we have to risk our lives to go. At least there’s still water, but tomorrow that will be gone too,” she said.
Junta-controlled ministries are also enforcing requirements to submit requests for leave or give the office advance notice of an absence, even for employees impacted by the earthquake, according to staff members.
“They’ve now given us support only in the form of snacks, instant noodles, and canned fish. They said if we can’t come to work, we should apply for leave,” a woman working at the Myanma Railways office said. “Some people aren’t coming because they’ve returned to their hometowns and can’t be reached, for various reasons.”
“We can’t really do our work now,” said a man who works at the General Administration Department. “Departments that weren’t affected are operating at full capacity. They want to show their superiors that government work is ongoing. But some departments are only calling staff in to clean the office.”
With the impact of the quake on residential neighbourhoods and government housing complexes forcing people to relocate, rental prices in Naypyitaw have soared.
According to a real estate dealer providing free assistance to impacted people, the monthly rent for single-family homes in Dekkhinathiri and Ottarathiri townships has risen from between 600,000 (US $136) and 1 million kyat (US $226) to between 800,000 (US $181) and 1.5 million (US $339).
In Pyinmana and Zabuthiri townships, homes that previously rented for 400,000 kyat (US $90) now start at a minimum of 1 million, he said.
“People who are rich enough are paying 700,000 kyat [US $158] for homes that used to cost 400,000, so the market has been upended. There are so many people wanting to rent that there just aren’t enough places to meet demand,” he said. “Some wards have electricity again, but medicine, water, and food are still needed.”
The missing and dead
International rescue teams, volunteers, and firefighters have been leading clearance and rescue operations at earthquake-damaged buildings using excavators and other earth-moving machines. The operations have continued past 5pm each day.
The junta has announced that international philanthropic workers and Myanmar Fire Department staff have been tasked with earthquake rescue and are dealing with damaged houses and buildings.
A total of more than 50 organisations, including groups from abroad as well as United Nations agencies, are rendering assistance to impacted people in Myanmar. However, civilians have noticed a lack of participation by Myanmar soldiers in these relief and rescue efforts.
“The army is just putting on a show,” a Pyinmana resident said.
“The people’s militias set up bamboo barriers for security, but around 3 o’clock, soldiers come back in cars and take them away,” he added, referring to the Pyu Saw Htee civilian militias armed and trained by the military. While power outages and interruptions of water service used to be rare in Naypyitaw, most of the capital’s residents are now without adequate electricity or water. Electricity has only been restored to some of the wards in Dekkhinathiri, Ottarathiri, and Zayathiri townships, where the generals live.
“When your house collapses and there’s no electricity, no water, and you can’t even buy food, it’s extremely difficult,” said a man in his 40s, who said he had lost most of what he owned when his administrative housing building collapsed.
At the administrative staff housing complexes, some ministries have begun to deliver water rations in trucks, but residents say that they have mostly relied on water supplies from donors and wells dug by hand. For food, they say they have had to cook over wood fires and eat the prepared rice meals that the donors have been distributing.
“When they come to hand out food, if they bring eggs and noodles, we cook them on wood stoves,” said a female administrative staff member in her 50s. For electricity, she said some charitable groups have set up generators in areas where earthquake victims have gathered so they can charge their phones and rechargeable light bulbs.
While there is an urgent need to meet people’s basic needs, to clear and search through the rubble of collapsed homes and buildings, and to rebuild, the junta has only shown neglect, Naypyitaw residents said.
With available machinery inadequate to match the scale of destruction, bodies have begun to decompose under the rubble after more than a week.
A man in his 50s who works at the Pyinmana Town Market said the military’s ineffectual response is evident even in areas of the city where soldiers are stationed.
“Both rescue and aid operations in Pyinmana are minimal. Three days after it happened, there were still many unrecovered bodies and you could smell them decomposing,” the man said.
According to the latest reports as of April 6, the total death toll from the earthquake has reached 3,564, with more than 600 deaths recorded in Naypyitaw, including Pyinmana.
