Golden Jubilee of Shan State Army founding to be held at SSA HQ

The 50th anniversary of the founding of the Shan State Army (SSA) in 1964 is to be observed at the Shan State Progress Party/Shan State Army (SSPP/SSA) base in Wanhai, Kehsi  township, Southern Shan State, according to invitations issued and distributed on the Thai-Burma border.

Sao Hearn Hkam and Chao Tzang Yawnghwe

The festivities will be held for 3 days, 23-25 April.

“It will be a big event,” predicted a Thai border based Shan activist in Maesai, who added that representatives from the Restoration Council of Shan State/Shan State Army (RCSS/SSA), Shan Nationalities League for Democracy (SNLD) and Shan Nationalities Democratic Party (SNDP) will be among those participating in the event.

The SSA was formed with 4 of the Shan resistance movements on 24 April 1964: Shan State Independence Army (SSIA), Shan National United Front (SNUF), Kokang Revolutionary Force (KRF) and Shanland United Army (SUA). (The latter two however broke away later).

The founder was none other than Sao Hearn Hkam, the Mahadevi of Yawnghwe and former MP of Hsenwi, who was immortalized in The White Umbrella published in 1999.

Other prominent leaders include Gawn Zerng, Sao Seng Suk, Chao Tzang Yawnghwe  and Jimmy Yang, all of whom have passed away. One of the noted survivors of that period is Lt-Gen Hso Ten, 78, who is currently serving as the patron for the SSPP/SSA.

The SSA later split into two groups: the pro-Communist SSPP/SSA and the anti-Communist Shan United Revolutionary Army (SURA) that in later years emerged as the RCSS/SSA, led by Lt-Gen Yawd Serk. The former, after the fall of the Communist Party of Burma (CPB) in 1989, concluded a ceasefire with the Burmese government. The present SSPP/SSA, led by Lt-Gen Pang Fa, is its offshoot.

Both have signed ceasefire with the present government, but still engage in sporadic fighting with the Burma Army. The planned Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA) signing is purportedly designed to end the armed conflict, both on paper and at the ground level.