The State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, during her meeting with  Union Ceasefire Joint Monitoring Committee recently, 28 April, said “I always urge, when you do a job, there is give and take. It can be more productive if every one of us considers what we can give. It will be more difficult if you consider what you can take.”

Give and take mantra is easily said than done.

When Aung San Suu Kyi talks about compromise between the non-Bamar ethnic nationalities and Bamar-dominated military there are points that one needs to ponder and answer them in an honest and straight forward manner.

• Who are being cheated from the promises of Panglong Agreement (1947) that the then newly setup political entity, called Union of Burma, was to be a genuine federal form of government with equality, rights of self-determination and Democracy?
• Who is bullying who and who is intruding and occupying whose homeland militarily?
• What sort of compromise would Suu Kyi and NLD would suggest to the ethnic nationalities, who were being robbed and cheated, in order to right the wrong?
• Finally, should the oppressed, militarized ethnic nationalities be satisfied with token compromises of giving back their stolen birthrights sovereignty, bit by bit, in a piecemeal manner and still have to entertain the military’s heavy-handedness and occupation of their homelands?

If Suu Kyi and NLD could give earnest answers and see the above mentioned points in a clear and transparent manner, they would be able to make use of the give and take preposition in a constructive way, not just an utterance of a mantra in resolving a corporate-like dispute. As ethnic conflict could not be treated like a corporate disagreement. Otherwise, it will only be another tricky game, where the ethnic nationalities will lose out again, where restoring  their birthright sovereignty and self-determination are concerned.