Discrimination against the ethnic minority groups to access citizenship in Myanmar

Abstract

Some small ethnic minorities are unable to achieve their full citizenship status like the ethnic majorities despite recognition of 135 national races. The lack of citizenship status leads to the infringement of some of their fundamental rights including right to education and right to employment which are associated with direct and indirect discrimination based on race, religion and language. This thesis focuses on eleven individual interviews with the minorities among young-aged population, and officials from the townships and regional department of Ministry of Labor, Immigration and Population who are providing services to the public at the time of interview. The interview process probes on how the different classifications of citizenship based on the 1982 Citizenship Law affect the accessibility to social rights. The 1982 Citizenship Law discriminates some ethnic minorities in the conflict areas and deters them from enjoyment of the citizenship rights. This research finds that the ethnic minorities are stopped to achieve the citizenship rights due to poor law enforcement, improper management of citizenship law implementation, corruption, lack of awareness of citizenship application process, and administrative violence. Therefore, the research suggests that the government amend the current citizenship law to become more effective for prevention of discrimination against the ethnic minorities in terms of citizenship status.