An article on CSB president in the "Ithaca Journal" 12/30/98

Text from the article (typos were left in):

In 1988 Htun Aung Gyaw (pronounced Tun On Zhoe) walked for one month through his country, Myanmar (formerly known as Burma), to escape over the border to Thailand and to safety.

An activist and former student political leader, Gyaw, 45, was involved in nationwide protests for democracy that culminated on Aug. 8, 1988. He fled the country to escape arrest and possible death by the military regime that has ruled the country since 1962.

"People were shot dead," Gyaw said. "My house was surrounded by the military for days. They were trying to find me. I was lucky because at the time I was not at home."

In 1989 Peter Kareithi left his native Kenya after eight years of arrests and threats by the military police for the investigative stories he wrote about the government of President Daniel arap Moi. Former vice president Moi came into power ] 7 years ago by taking what at the time was supposed to be temporary control of the country. Moi remains in power today.

The last straw came when Moi's government banned Kareithi's weekly newspaper, Financial Review, making it illegal for Kareithi, his wife Akendo, and anyone else to publish or distribute it. Kareithi was also prohibited from publishing anything else under his or any other name.

Gyaw and Kareithi are among a special class of immigrants: They're refugees, people persecuted in their home countries, and granted a status in the United States that makes it easier to move here.

Gyaw initially fled to Thailand and Kareithi to Britain before making their individual ways to the United States. Both have settled in Ithaca and started new careers in academia, but neither has forgotten the horror from which they escaped. Today Kareithi, a communications professor at Ithaca College, and Gyaw, a library worker at Cornell University, continue the work they started by teaching Americans about the political situations in their countries and helping new refugees adapt.

Both maintain Web sites that explain the history and recent developments of the political situations in their respective countries. Kareithi also talks about his experiences to his students. Gyaw, as president of the Civil Society for Burma, an organization he helped found, helps other pro-democracy groups by creating support networks for them and other Burmese refugees by helping them adapt and settle in their new country.

Information Sharing

Karithi used to include current news from Kenya on his Web site but he stopped after several Kenyan newspapers began publishing on the Internet. He keeps up with his native country by reading those papers and staying in touch with friends, colleagues and family still living there. He often relates to his students his experiences as a journalist in Kenya and Wales, where he got his master's degree and taught, to give them a different perspective.

"We're brought up to believe news is objective, but different countries approach the same information, the same news, in different ways," Kareithi said. "Having been a media educator on three different continents, I can teach them the different ways that other countries would approach a certain story."

Kareithi usually shares information informally during class, but after two U.S. embassies in Africa were bombed Kareithi and another professor organized a special seminar for communications students.

"We talked about why the bombing happened in Africa and about the politics of the Middle East," Kareithi said.

Civil Society

In 1988 the Burmese army was singling out student leaders and activists involved with nationwide demonstrations that took place on Aug. 8 of that year. The demonstrations protested the repressive regime of the Burmese government, called the State Peace and Development Council. Gyaw at the time was active in the pro-democracy movement and the 8-8-88 demonstrations (the name that Gyaw and other expatriates call the August protests) and therefore in danger of being arrested and executed by the military.

After the army staged a coup against participants in the demonstrations, Gyaw left Rangoon and his entire family including his wife and two children, by taking a bus to another state in Myanmar and then a train. When it became unsafe to travel on public transportation, Gyaw began walking. It took him a month to reach the Thailand border. After spending some time on the border helping rebel groups by bringing food, giving speeches, gathering supporters and coordinating conferences, Gyaw was arrested as an illegal immigrant in Thailand.

With the help of the U.S. embassy he was able to pay a fine, get released and seek asylum. One month later he was a political refugee living in Ithaca. He now works at the Olin Library at Cornell, where he recently earned a master's degree in Asian studies.

Gyaw's family rejoined him in Ithaca six years later, but he does not forget the activists, student leaders and ethnic groups still in Myanmar. Several years ago he founded the Civil Society of Burma and through its Web site, launched in August, Gyaw hopes to educate Americans on the current situation in Myanmar and get university student groups in this country to support and encourage Burmese students to once again hold nationwide demonstrations on Sept. 9, 1999, in honor of the 8-8-88 demonstrations. Since those demonstrations almost 11 years ago, student unions have been banned, Gyaw said.

A Hutu tells her story

Fidela Sindihebura, 38, does not have a Web site, but she's getting her story out and informing people one by one about the struggle she and other Hutus have undergone in Rwanda and Burundi, two small east African nations. Sindihebura was born in Burundi, but like many educated Hutus lived as a refugee in Rwanda since 1972 to avoid arrest or death.

The Hutus and the Tutsis are the two main ethnic groups in Burundi and Rwanda. Since the 14th century, these groups have struggled for power, which the Tutsis have maintained most of that time. Hutus, who are primarily farmers in both countries, make up about 85 percent of the population and the Tutsis make up 15 percent.

Sindihebura escaped with three of her four sons in 1994 to join her husband, Sophonie Nshinyabakobeje, then a student at Syracuse University. She says the news reports coming from her country inaccurately portray Hutus as the primary aggressors in a civil war which continues today.

International news reports, while acknowledging the Tutsi contribution to ongoing violence in both countries, have usually pointed to the Hutus as the primary participants in massacres in 1994 in which thousands of Tutsis were killed.

Sindihebura said the Hutu side of the conflict hasn't been reported because foreign correspondents and United Nations workers in Burundi and Rwanda lack historical perspective and rely too heavily on the Tutsi army and government for information.

According to Sindihebura, the origin of the most recent civil war can be traced back to Rwanda in 1959 when Hutus, weary of years of Tutsi rule, rose in rebellion and fought the Tutsis for power. Hutus remained in control in Rwanda until April 1994 when the Tutsis invaded. Half a million people were killed and more than 2 million exiled.

In Tutsi-controlled Burundi between 1972-1993, Tutsis killed thousands, primarily educated and professional Hutus, to avoid a rebellion like previous ones in Rwanda, said Sindihebura.

"The day I came to America, I said I will tell everyone I meet the truth,"; Sindihebura said.

Which is precisely what she has done at Alternatives Federal Credit Union, where she works as an accountant and what her husband does at Cornell University, where he is a statistician. Sindihebura also gave a talk recently to the Tikkun v'Or Jewish congregation about her past struggle getting her family out of Rwanda and her current one of getting her 18-year old son Emmanuel Giraneza out of a refugee camp in Rwanda."

Even exchange

For Kareithi, Gyaw and Sindihebura, the exchange of information and other resources has not been one sided. While each brings a unique and different perspective to the political strife in their countries, so have the people they've met.

"I've learned a lot from other students from the way they frame their questions," Kareithi said. "They've helped me look at my culture in a different way by showing me how others see it. It's goes two ways. You make the students question their own culture and they make you question yours."