New Hope in Rangoon

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24985, 20 September 1946, Page 6

New Hope in Rangoon

For the last eight months Burma has been governed by an Executive Council whose members do not represent the political temper of the country, and it has become increasingly and even dangerously unpopular. The news that the Council has resigned does not mean that the gap between the administration and the mass of the politically minded classes is closed or narrowed; but it holds that promise. Sir Hubert Ranee has accepted the resignation, but has asked the members to remain in office until he can reconstitute the" Council on a broader basis—thjt is, until he

can bring the Anti-Fascist People’s Independence League into it—That task, in which Sir, Dorman-Smith failed last October, is made easier for the new Governor by the fact that he is known and liked by the political leaders opposed to his Government. His association with Burma began less than. 18 months ago, with his appointment as Admiral Mountbatten’s Chief Civil Affairs Officer; and it fell to him to work out the “Kandy Agreement” made between his chief and the Burmese resistance leader, Aung San, head of the Anti-Fascist People’s Independence League. The restoration of civil government in the Rahgoon area last October limited his duties. The extension, in January, of civil government to the whole of Burma , ended them. But in those, fesy months he'made a considerable impression as a forceful but sympathetic administrator, keenly interested in the social and economic problems of the people. and uncommonly' diligent to inform himself; and among the Burmese, who liked him for his open mind and easy accessibility, he made many friends. The translation, last month, of this 48-year-old regular soldier from the comparative obscurity of a colonelcy to the most important Governorship in the British Empire offered the long-delayed hope that the stalemate in Rangoon wquM be broken. The gesture now made improves that hope, and with it accordingly the prospect that the urgent work of reconstruction and rehabilitation will really begin. It cannot begin successfully until it is supported by the most energetic and patriotic elements of the population, and it is precisely these elements which have for the last 11 months been alienated from the Administration. ,