Part 1- Violation of Freedom of Expression by Government
Under the civilian government’s two-and-half-year rule, following cases of freedom of expression violation are documented.
(a) Failure to Abolish Article 66 (d) of Telecommunications Law
The abuse of Telecommunications Law, enacted in October 2013 has been infamous since 2015 when the competing political parties traded accusation against each other in election campaign on Myanmar digital platform and social media. The Telecommunications Law become a threat to internet users who expressed their voice online.
The contagious and excessive use of Telecommunications Law was triggered by a charge filed by Tatmadaw against a citizen for his criticism of Tatamadaw in 2015 election campaigns. The Law was then increasingly used to sue criticism and expression on social media. The law was eventually amended by parliament in August 2017 following a push by the civil society organizations, legal experts and activists. But the amendment was superficial and fell short of the CSOs’ recommendation for change. As far as ATHAN’s count is concerned, there have been 150 cases under the Telecommunications Law in which 11 cases were under previous government, 91 cases under the NLD-led government before the amendment and 48-cases after the amendment.
Amendment of the Law
There were only three effective changes in the bill amending the Telecommunications Law (amendment bill) which was passed by Amyotha Hluttaw (Upper House of Parliament) on August 29th 2017. The amendment reduced the number of grounds to file complaint from seven to four, reduced the maximum prison term and banned third party plaintiff from filling complaints unless he or she is granted official legal power. The defamation is retained as one the grounds to file a complaint. The three other grounds are “extortion, disturbing or intimidation”.
Defamation
The provision and punishment for defamation is already stated in Section 500, Chapter 21 of Penal Code. According to the Evidence Act, enacted in 2015, an individual who convicts a criminal defamation with intention to damage reputation of a person or an organization on social media can be sued under defamatory provision of Penal Code. Including the defamation provision in Telecommunications Law is repetitious, resulting in conflicts of Laws. Moreover, the procedural complaint process has several steps under the Telecommunications Law. Even if the plaintiff and defendants agree to settle a case, it takes several steps to withdraw a charge, resulting in negative impact for both plaintiff and defendant. ATHAN found it takes about one year in procedural process of building a case and at least six months to withdraw a charge.
Case Study
In 2016, Daw Khaing (fake name) posted a photo of her sister-in-law’s daughter and her boyfriend with a caption saying “Look! Whose daughter is she from Ma Kyee Cho village?” she was sued by her sister-in-law. They had the settlement a few days later but waited for more than 30 months to get the permission letter of Ministry of Transportation and Communications to withdraw the charge.
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