Advancing Parliamentary Responsibilities through Youth Engagement in Myanmar

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Khaing Khaing Shwe (Public Policy, NUS)

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Advancing Parliamentary Responsibilities through Youth Engagement in Myanmar

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Starting from the third week of March 2026, the mornings are returning as a meaningful moment that would open a new page in Myanmar’s political history. Throughout Myanmar’s long political journey, the parliament has played an important role as an institution representing the people. For some time, our parliamentary buildings remained silent and still, and now appear to be eagerly awaiting the moment when they will come alive once again.
The magnificent parliamentary halls, which were once filled with the echoes of parliamentary debates and deliberations, had remained quiet for a period of time. Yet now they seem ready to welcome the footsteps of representatives who will arrive from various constituencies. The wide roads, magnificent corridors and suspension bridge that once stood empty, the systematically constructed buildings, and the well-organized chambers all seem to proudly welcome the return of the people’s representatives.
Within the calm grandeur of the parliamentary buildings, the sight of people’s representatives entering one after another from different constituencies can be seen as a symbol of the revival of political processes. These scenes suggest not only the effective implementation of parliamentary responsibilities but also the increasing importance of cooperation with the public, especially with young people.
Thus, the parliamentary sessions that will resume starting from the third week of March 2026 accommodate discussions related to politics and the public interest, and parliamentarians’ hopes for important decisions, and policies that will benefit the people and the nation. Therefore, this article will discuss, from a policy perspective, how parliamentarians can cooperate with younger citizens in carrying out their responsibilities effectively.

Cooperation with Youth in Carrying Out the Responsibilities of Parliamentarians
The 2008 Constitution of Myanmar defines the important role of parliament and outlines the duties and powers of parliamentarians to represent the interests of the people. In implementing these responsibilities, cooperation with young people is a very important factor for the development of our society and our nation.
First, one of the primary duties of parliamentarians is to propose and enact policies and laws that prioritize the interests of the people. In order to make this process successful, meaningful participation of the public, especially attention to the voices and perspectives of the youth, is essential. Incorporating their experiences, views, and ideas into the legislative process can lead to policies that better address the social needs of future generations and respond to emerging trends. This approach also helps create a strong foundation for a positive social environment in our country.
Second, parliamentarians serve as a bridge between the government and the people. They must present the needs and challenges of their constituencies in parliament and seek timely solutions. In performing this duty, issues related to youth, such as education, employment, human trafficking, environmental protection, etc., can be addressed more effectively when parliamentarians work together with youths. By holding consultations and discussions with the youth of the country and youth organizations, their concerns, needs, and suggestions can effectively contribute to finding durable solutions.
Third, parliamentarians are responsible for the development of their constituencies. In carrying out this responsibility, cooperation with young people is essential for the successful implementation of development activities. Parliamentarians should encourage youth, together with community members, to participate in the planning, implementation, monitoring, and reporting of development projects. Nowadays, younger generations are particularly skilled in the use of technology, and they are proficient in digital platforms and social media. They can help parliamentarians collect public opinions and present them to parliament, as well as communicate more effectively with the public and media, and promote development initiatives to a wider audience.
Finally, parliamentarians can help young people gain a deeper understanding of citizens’ rights, responsibilities, and the principles of public accountability. Organizing training programmes, discussions and youth forums within their constituencies is important for promoting awareness of social values, the rule of law, and civic responsibility. However, direct coaching and mentorship are even more valuable in shaping informed and responsible future citizens.
Demonstration of good examples by a parliamentarian today will help create good leaders for the future. It is also important to make younger generations understand the fundamental values of leadership. In guiding emerging leaders, it is important to remember the old saying: “One must first be a good follower to become a good leader.” To become a good leader, individuals must first learn how to listen, collaborate, and take responsibility as followers.
Such experiences and guidance will enable youths of today to become responsible leaders capable of guiding and nurturing their future generations.
However, it should be noted that Gen Z are generally more independent, more analytical, and easier to disengage. They are more willing to challenge or resist unethical behaviour and practices. Therefore, parliamentarians who wish to lead by example should uphold strong ethical standards and cultivate accountable mindsets.

Acting with Ethical Standards
Parliamentarians are human beings, and like anyone else, they may find it difficult to resist the influence of power, position, and brown-nosers who constantly flatter them. There have been cases where parliamentary assistants were informally appointed and gradually became proxy parliamentarians. In some situations, these assistants appeared to hold more influence than the elected representatives themselves and even made decisions on their behalf. While the parliamentarians were attending sessions in parliament, these shadow figures often acted like the real authority in the constituencies, exercising power as if they were the king or queen of the area. Therefore, the existence of clear and well-enforced codes of conduct is crucial for parliamentarians.
Parliamentarians are human beings and, like anyone else, may find it difficult to resist the influence of power, position, and individuals who constantly flatter them. In previous parliamentary terms, there were cases where parliamentary assistants have been informally appointed and gradually assumed the role of proxy parliamentarians. In certain situations, these assistants appeared to hold more influence than the elected representatives themselves and even made decisions on their behalf. While parliamentarians were attending sessions in parliament, these proxy figures sometimes acted as the real authority in the constituencies, exercising power as if they were the king or queen of the area. Therefore, the existence of clear and well-enforced codes of conduct is crucial for parliamentarians.
Section 120 of the 2008 Constitution of Myanmar and the Election Law define the qualifications required for parliamentarians. In addition, there are fundamental standard codes of conduct and ethical principles which are commonly practised by parliamentarians in many countries around the world. By applying these codes and principles in performing their duties throughout their elected term, parliamentarians can make significant contributions to the country and provide exemplary role models for youths.

This article seeks to highlight these codes and principles underneath:

1. Integrity and Honesty: Parliamentarians must act in the public interest rather than for personal gain. They must avoid bribery and corruption.

2. Accountability: Parliamentarians must be accountable to the public and to voters. They must be able to explain their actions honestly.

3. Transparency: Reports, budget decisions, and policy decisions should be openly presented to the public and voters. They must avoid participating in decisions that involve personal interests.

4. Avoidance of Conflict of Interest: Position as a representative of people must not be used for the benefit of family members, friends, or business partners. If a conflict of interest exists, it must be declared, and the member should withdraw from the decision-making process.

5. Proper Use of Public Resources: Government funds, staff, offices, and travel expenses must only be used for official parliamentary duties.

6. Respect: Parliamentarians must treat fellow members, staff, and citizens with respect. Insults, harassment, and disruptive behaviour must be avoided.

7. Confidentiality: Confidential information obtained through official duties must not be disclosed.

8. Compliance with Laws, Rules and Regulations: Parliamentarians must follow laws, rules, regulations and directives.

9. Commitment to Public Service: They must actively participate in parliamentary sessions, debates, and committee work on behalf of their constituents.

10. Reporting Misconduct: Any unethical or illegal behaviour should be reported to the appropriate authorities.
In conclusion, the responsibilities of parliamentarians extend beyond lawmaking to representing public interests, promoting constituency development, and guiding future generations. Fulfilling these duties effectively requires both strong ethical standards and meaningful engagement with youths. By upholding principles such as integrity, accountability, transparency, and respect, parliamentarians can build public trust and set positive examples for society and youth. At the same time, collaborating with the youth – by listening to their perspectives, involving them in community development, and mentoring them in civic values – can strengthen public participation and produce more responsive policies. When parliamentarians engage and lead the youth with integrity, they not only improve governance today but also help cultivate responsible leaders for tomorrow. Such cooperation lays a strong foundation for sustainable national development and a more inclusive and democratic society in the future.

(Ref: Codes of Conduct for Parliamentarians, A Comparative Study by King Prajadhipok’s Institute for UNDP)

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Complementing case detection, TPT for high-risk individuals prevents new cases before they develop. Environmental measures — ensuring adequate ventilation in homes, hospitals, and congregate settings, implementing respiratory hygiene practices, and applying the WHO FAST strategy (Find cases Actively, Separate safely, Treat effectively) in healthcare facilities — reduce nosocomial and community transmission.Ultimately, sustainable TB prevention requires multisectoral action on poverty, malnutrition, housing, and social protection. These upstream determinants create the conditions in which TB flourishes. A health system capable of delivering universal TB services is itself a prerequisite — meaning that ending TB demands political will far beyond the confines of the health ministry. 9. World TB Day 2026: WHO Call to Action and the Path to Ending TBWorld TB Day 2026, observed on 24 March carries the resounding theme: “Yes! We Can End TB: Led by Countries, Powered by People.” WHO and the Stop TB Partnership call on every Member State to translate political commitments into concrete, measurable action — and on every community, healthcare worker, civil society organisation, and citizen to be part of the solution.WHO’s specific 2026 Call to Action centres on several urgent priorities. First, Member States are urged to fast-track the rollout of newly WHO-recommended near point-of-care TB diagnostics — the first of their kind — that will extend early detection to the community level and reduce the diagnostic delays that cost lives. Second, countries must increase domestic and international TB financing, protect essential services from budget cuts, and ensure accountability for the commitments made at successive United Nations High-Level Meetings on TB. Third, accelerated uptake of new WHO recommendations — including shorter MDR-TB treatment regimens and TPT scale-up — is imperative. Finally, WHO calls for stronger primary health care integration, so that TB services are accessible, stigma-free, and delivered as close to patients as possible.To end TB in Myanmar, these global priorities must be grounded in local reality. Every stakeholder has a role: community members must know TB’s signs and break the culture of stigma surrounding the disease; healthcare workers must actively screen high-risk populations and offer TPT; policymakers must prioritise and fund the National TB Strategic Plan 2026-2030; civil society must extend services to conflict-affected and hard-to-reach communities; and every person who has ever experienced TB must be empowered as an advocate rather than silenced as a patient.The economic case is clear: every dollar invested in TB control generates up to US$ 43 in economic and health returns. Myanmar’s TB programme has proven its resilience through years of crisis. With renewed political will, strengthened country ownership, and communities at its centre, the goal of ending TB — fewer than 10 cases per 100,000 by 2035 — is not a distant dream but an achievable reality.“Yes! We Can End TB — Led by Myanmar. Powered by Our People.” Top 5 References1. World Health Organization. Global Tuberculosis Report 2025. Geneva: WHO; 2025. Available at: https://www.who.int/teams/global-programme-on-tuberculosis-and-lung-health/tb-reports2. World Health Organization. World TB Day 2026: “Yes! We Can End TB: Led by Countries, Powered by People.” Campaign page. Geneva: WHO; 2026. https://www.who.int/campaigns/world-tb- day/20263. Stop TB Partnership. World TB Day 2026 Theme Announcement. Geneva: Stop TB Partnership; 2026. https://www.stoptb.org/news/world-tb-day-2026-theme-announcement4. WHO South-East Asia Regional Office. Fourth National TB Prevalence Survey, Myanmar 2017– 2018. New Delhi: WHO SEARO; 2019. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10021272/5. WHO South-East Asia Regional Office. South-East Asia Leads Global TB Cases — WHO Urges Swift Action. New Delhi: WHO SEARO; November 2025.https://www.who.int/southeastasia/news/detail/18-11-2025-south-east-asia-leads-global-tb-casesgnlm
The Two Sides of Myanmar’s Moral Compass in Vessantara’s Gift and The Stitched Penny
The Two Sides of Myanmar’s Moral Compass in Vessantara’s Gift and The Stitched Penny
In this article, I look at two Myanmar sayings — “Giving like Vessantara”, which praises boundless generosity epitomized by the legendary prince, and “Prying one cent as if it were two”, a witty rebuke of extreme stinginess.I wrote this article for foreign readers who are studying the Myanmar language, so I have presented it in a bilingual format using both Myanmar and English.“ဝေသန္တရာ လှူသလို လှူနိုင်မှ”“ဒါနအရာမှာ ဝေသန္တရာ”မြန်မာတွေ ပြောလေ့ရှိတာကတော့ အလှူအတန်း ရက်ရောလွန်းတဲ့သူကိုတွေ့ရင် ‘ဝေသန္တရာ’ လို့တောင် တင်စားကြတာ ပါ။ ကိုယ့်မှာရှိတာလေးတင် မဟုတ်ဘဲ အားလုံးကို စွန့်လွှတ်ပြီး လှူခဲ့တဲ့သူလို့ ဆိုလိုပါတယ်။အလှူအတန်းလုပ်တဲ့နေရာမှာတော့ ဝေသန္တရာမင်းကြီးဟာ နံပါတ်တစ် (စံပြ) ပဲ။ နှမြောတွန့်တိုမှု မရှိဘဲ ရက်ရက်ရောရော ပေးကမ်းတတ်သူတွေကို ချီးမွမ်းတဲ့အခါ “သူကတော့ ဝေသန္တရာ လှူသလိုပဲ” လို့ ပြောလိုက်ရင် အလှူအတန်းမှာ လက်ဖွာလိုက်တာ (စေတနာကောင်းလိုက်တာ) လို့ ဆိုလိုတာပါ။ဝေသန္တရာမင်းကြီးက သားတော် ဇာလီ၊ သမီးတော် ကဏှာဇိန်နဲ့ မိဖုရား မဒ္ဒီဒေဝီတို့ကိုတောင် မနှမြောဘဲ လှူခဲ့ပါ တယ် ။ အစွန်းကုန် စွန့်လွှတ်အနစ်နာခံတာမျိုးကို ပြောချင်တဲ့အခါ သုံးပါတယ်။မဒ္ဒီဒေဝီဟာ ခင်ပွန်းဖြစ်သူ ဒါနပါရမီဖြည့်တာကို ကြည်ကြည်ဖြူဖြူ ခွင့်ပြုပေးခဲ့ပြီး နောက်ဆုံးမှာ ပြန်ဆုံစည်းခဲ့ရပါတယ်။ ဒါကြောင့် “နောင်ဘဝ အဆက်ဆက် ခင်ပွန်းနဲ့ မကွဲရပါစေနဲ့” ဆိုတဲ့ ဆုတောင်းမျိုးကို မဒ္ဒီဆုတောင်းလို့ ခေါ်ကြပါတယ်။ဝေသန္တရာမင်းလောင်းဟာ ငယ်ငယ်ကတည်းက အလှူပေးရတာကို အရမ်းဝါသနာပါပြီး နန်းတက်လာတဲ့အခါမှာလည်း အလှူမဏ္ဍပ်ကြီးတွေဆောက်ပြီး နေ့တိုင်း လှူဒါန်းခဲ့ပါတယ်။တစ်နေ့မှာတော့ မိုးခေါင်နေတဲ့ တိုင်းပြည်တစ်ခုက ပုဏ္ဏားတွေက တိုင်းပြည်ရဲ့ ရတနာဖြစ်တဲ့ ဆင်ဖြူတော်ကို လာအလှူခံပါတယ်။ မင်းကြီးက ရက်ရက်ရောရော လှူလိုက်ပေမဲ့ တိုင်းသူပြည်သားတွေက စိတ်ဆိုးပြီး နန်းတော်ကနေ နှင်ထုတ်ခိုင်းလို့ တောထွက်ခဲ့ရပါတယ်။တောထဲသွားတဲ့ လမ်းမှာလည်း မြင်းတွေ၊ ရထားတွေကို လှူခဲ့သေးတာပါ။ တောထဲမှာ ရသေ့ဝတ်နဲ့ နေနေတုန်း ဇူဇကာပုဏ္ဏားက သားတော် ဇာလီနဲ့ သမီးတော် ကဏှာဇိန်ကို အလုပ်အကျွေးပြုဖို့ လာတောင်းပြန်တော့လည်း စိတ်မပြတ်ပေမဲ့ ပါရမီအတွက် လှူလိုက်ပြန်ပါတယ်။ နောက်ဆုံး သိကြားမင်းက ပုဏ္ဏားယောင်ဆောင်ပြီး မိဖုရားကိုပါ လာအလှူခံတဲ့အခါမှာလည်း မတွန့်မတို လှူခဲ့သူပါ။ဇာတ်သိမ်းမှာတော့ ခမည်းတော်မင်းကြီးက မြေးတော်တွေကို ပြန်ရွေး၊ သားတော်ကိုလည်း နန်းတော်ကို ပြန်ပင့်ဆောင်ခဲ့ပါတယ်။ ဝေသန္တရာမင်းကြီး နန်းတော်ပြန်ရောက်တဲ့အခါမှာတော့ နတ်တွေရွာသွန်းတဲ့ ရတနာမိုးတွေနဲ့အတူ တစ်သက်လုံး အလှူအတန်းတွေလုပ်ပြီး တိုင်းပြည်ကို အေးအေးချမ်းချမ်း အုပ်ချုပ်သွားခဲ့ပါတယ်။ဗုဒ္ဓလောင်းလျာဟာ ဘုရားဖြစ်ဖို့အတွက် ဖြည့်ကျင့်ရတဲ့ ပါရမီ (၁၀) ပါးထဲမှာ ဒါနပါရမီဟာ အခြေခံအကျဆုံးဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဝေသန္တရာမင်းကြီးဟာ မိမိပိုင်ဆိုင်တဲ့ ပစ္စည်းဥစ္စာတင်မကဘဲ မိမိအသက်ထက်ချစ်တဲ့ သားမယားကိုပါ စွန့်လွှတ်နိုင်ခဲ့တာဟာ “အနုတ္တရ ဒါန” (အတုမရှိသော အလှူ) ကို ပြသခဲ့တာပါ။ ဒါဟာ သာမန်လူတစ်ယောက်ရဲ့ လောဘ၊ မောဟကို ကျော်လွန်ပြီး သဗ္ဗညုတဉာဏ်တော်ရဖို့အတွက် အမြင့်မြတ်ဆုံး ပေးဆပ်မှုဖြစ်ပါတယ်။“ဒါ ငါ့သား၊ ဒါ ငါ့မယား၊ ဒါ ငါ့စည်းစိမ်” ဆိုတဲ့ ငါစွဲကို အကုန်ဖြတ်တောက်နိုင်မှသာ သံသရာက လွတ်မြောက်နိုင်တယ်ဆိုတဲ့ သဘောကို ဖော်ညွှန်းပါတယ်။ ဝေသန္တရာမင်းကြီးရဲ့ စွန့်လွှတ်မှုဟာ ရက်စက်ခြင်းမဟုတ်ဘဲ လောကသားအားလုံးကို ကယ်တင်မယ့် ဘုရားအဖြစ်သို့ ရောက်ရှိဖို့အတွက် အနှောင်အဖွဲ့အားလုံးကို ရဲရဲဝံ့ဝံ့ ဖြတ်တောက်ခဲ့ခြင်း ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။“Giving like Vessantara”“Vessantara is the gold standard for charity.”This means that when it comes to generosity, King Vessantara is the ultimate role model. People use these phrases to praise someone who is incredibly generous – someone who gives away everything they have, even the things they love most, without any hesitation.Because King Vessantara gave away his children and his wife, this story is used as a metaphor for making the ultimate sacrifice. It’s used when someone gives up their most precious belongings or comforts for a higher goal.“The Prayer of Maddi” Queen Maddi willingly supported her husband’s journey of generosity, even when it meant losing her children. Because they were eventually reunited, “Maddi’s Prayer” refers to the wish for a couple to never be apart and to find each other again in every future life.The Story BackgroundPrince Vessantara loved giving since he was a child. When he became King, he set up donation halls and gave to the poor every day.One day, brahmins from a drought-stricken country asked for his White Elephant, a sacred royal treasure. The King gave it away freely. This made his citizens so angry that he was banished from the kingdom.While travelling to the forest with his family, he gave away his horses and carriage. Living as a hermit, he was approached by an old man named Jujaka, who asked for his children to be his servants. The King, focused on his spiritual perfection, gave them away. Later, the King of Gods (Sakka) disguised himself as a brahmin and asked for the Queen; the King gave her away too, without hesitation.In the end, his father (the old King) rescued the grandchildren and invited Vessantara back to the throne. When he returned, a rain of jewels fell from the sky, and he spent the rest of his life practising charity and ruling the country in peace.The Spiritual LessonsThe Perfection of Charity (Dana)In Buddhism, “Dana” or giving, is the foundation of the ten perfections needed to become a Buddha. Vessantara’s act of giving away his family isn’t seen as cruelty, but as “The Peerless Charity.” It represents the highest level of sacrifice to overcome human greed and reach enlightenment.The Power of Non-attachmentThe story teaches us to let go of the idea of “mine” – my kids, my wife, my wealth. This “attachment” is what keeps us stuck in the cycle of suffering. By bravely cutting these emotional ties, Vessantara showed the path to spiritual freedom for the sake of all living beings.“တစ်ပြားကို နှစ်ပြားမှတ်လို့ ခွာ”“တစ်ပြားကို နှစ်ပြားမှတ်လို့ ခွာ” ဆိုတဲ့ မြန်မာဆိုရိုးစကားဟာ တန်ဖိုးမရှိသလောက် သေးငယ်တဲ့ အရာလေးကိုတောင် အဆမတန် တွယ်တာပြီး နှမြောတွန့်တိုတတ်သူတွေကို ထိထိမိမိ တင်စားထားတာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒီနေရာမှာ “ခွာ” ဆိုတဲ့ အသုံးအနှုန်းက အစွန်းရောက် ကပ်စေးနှဲမှုကို ပေါ်လွင်စေပါတယ်။ ဒီလိုလူမျိုးတွေဟာ ကြွယ်ဝချမ်းသာနိုင်ပေမဲ့ စိတ်ဓာတ်ပိုင်းဆိုင်ရာမှာတော့ အမြဲတမ်း ပူလောင်ကျဉ်းမြောင်းနေတတ်ပြီး ကိုယ်ကျိုးကိုပဲ ရှေ့တန်းတင်လွန်းတာကြောင့် မိတ်ဆွေကောင်း ရှားပါးတတ်ပါတယ်။စီးပွားရေး ရှုထောင့်ကနေ အပြုသဘောနဲ့ ကြည့်မယ်ဆိုရင်တော့ ဒီစိတ်ဓာတ်ကို “Cost Optimization” လို့ ခေါ်တဲ့ ကုန်ကျစရိတ်ကို အထိရောက်ဆုံး လျှော့ချခြင်းအဖြစ် မြင်နိုင်ပါတယ်။ အသေးအဖွဲလေးတွေကနေ အမြတ်ထုတ်နိုင်ဖို့ ကြိုးစားတာ (Marginal Gains) ဟာ လုပ်ငန်းကြီးတွေ တိုးတက်ဖို့အတွက် မဟာဗျူဟာတစ်ခု ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ ဒါပေမဲ့ အသေးအဖွဲလေးတွေအပေါ်မှာပဲ အာရုံစိုက်လွန်းရင်တော့ “Penny wise, Pound foolish” ဆိုသလို တစ်ပြားကို နှစ်ပြားမှတ်ပြီး လိုက်ခွာနေရင်းနဲ့ ပိုပြီးအရေးကြီးတဲ့ တစ်ကျပ်တန် အခွင့်အရေးတွေကို လက်လွတ်မိမှာ ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။စပိန်နိုင်ငံ၊ ဘာစီလိုနာမြို့မှာ ပုလိပ်ရောဂါ ဖြစ်ပွားစဉ်က ကပ်စေးနှဲသူဌေးကြီးတစ်ဦးရဲ့ သင်ခန်းစာယူဖွယ် ဖြစ်ရပ်မှန်တစ်ခု ရှိခဲ့ပါတယ်။ ပရဟိတသမားတွေက သူဌေးကြီးထံကနေ ငွေကို တိုက်ရိုက်မတောင်းဘဲ သူ့ရဲ့ ဘဏ်ချက်လက်မှတ်ကို တစ်ရက်ခဏငှားဖို့ နည်းဗျူဟာမြောက် တောင်းခံခဲ့ပါတယ်။ “ဒီလောက် စေးနှဲတဲ့သူဌေးတောင် လှူနေပြီ” ဆိုတဲ့ သတင်းကြောင့် လူထုကြားမှာ လှုံ့ဆော်မှုဖြစ်ပြီး အလှူငွေတွေ အများကြီး ရရှိခဲ့ပါတယ်။ နောက်ဆုံးမှာတော့ သူဌေးကြီးဟာ သူ့ရဲ့ ချက်လက်မှတ်ကြောင့် အလှူဒါနတွေ အောင်မြင်တာကို မြင်ပြီး “ပေးကမ်းခြင်းရဲ့ ပီတိ” ကို ပထမဆုံးအကြိမ် ခံစားလိုက်ရကာ ချက်လက်မှတ်ကို အမှန်တကယ် လှူဒါန်းလိုက်ပါတော့တယ်။ကပ်စေးနှဲခြင်းဟာ လူကို စိတ်ဆင်းရဲစေပြီး ပူလောင်ကျဉ်းမြောင်းစေပေမဲ့ ပေးကမ်းစွန့်ကြဲခြင်း (Giving) ရဲ့ အရသာကို တစ်ကြိမ်တစ်ခါ မြည်းစမ်းကြည့်လိုက်ရရုံနဲ့တင် လူတစ်ယောက်ရဲ့ စိတ်ဓာတ်ကို အကြီးအကျယ် ပြောင်းလဲပစ်နိုင်ပါတယ်။ဗုဒ္ဓဘာသာတွင် အလှူဒါနပြုခြင်း (ဒါန) ဟာ စိတ်ထဲမှာ ကပ်ငြိနေတဲ့ “လောဘ” နဲ့ “ငါစွဲ” တွေကို တိုက်ဖျက်ပေးပါတယ်။ မိမိပိုင်ဆိုင်မှုကို သူတစ်ပါးအတွက် စွန့်လွှတ်လိုက်တဲ့အခါ စိတ်နှလုံးဟာ ပေါ့ပါးသွားပြီး ပေးကမ်းရခြင်းကြောင့် ဖြစ်ပေါ်လာတဲ့ “ဒါနပီတိ” ကို ခံစားရပါတယ်။ ဒီပီတိဟာ စိတ်ကို တည်ငြိမ်အေးချမ်းစေရုံတင်မကဘဲ သူတစ်ပါးအပေါ် ကိုယ်ချင်းစာတဲ့ “မေတ္တာ” နဲ့ “ကရုဏာ” စိတ်တွေကိုပါ ပိုမိုခိုင်မာလာစေပါတယ်။ဒုတိယအနေနဲ့ ကံတရားဆိုင်ရာ အကျိုးကျေးဇူး ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။ “စိုက်သလောက် ရိတ်ရမည်” ဆိုတဲ့ ကမ္မနိယာမအရ ဒါနကောင်းမှုဟာ နောင်သံသရာခရီးမှာ ရုပ်ဝတ္ထုပစ္စည်း ပြည့်စုံကြွယ်ဝခြင်း၊ ဘေးအန္တရာယ် ကင်းဝေးခြင်းနဲ့ အများ၏ ချစ်ခင်လေးစားမှုကို ရရှိခြင်း စတဲ့ အကျိုးရလဒ်တွေကို ရရှိစေပါတယ်။ ဒါ့အပြင် အလှူရှင်ဟာ မိမိပြုခဲ့တဲ့ ကုသိုလ်ကြောင့် စိတ်လုံခြုံမှုရှိပြီး သေခါနီးအချိန်မှာပင် ကြောက်ရွံ့ခြင်းမရှိဘဲ အေးချမ်းစွာ အဆုံးသတ်နိုင်တဲ့ အကျိုးကျေးဇူးကို ရရှိမှာဖြစ်ပါတယ်။အရာရာကို “ငါ့ဟာ” လို့ မစွဲလမ်းတော့ဘဲ စွန့်လွှတ်နိုင်တဲ့ အလေ့အကျင့်ဟာ သံသရာဝဋ်ဆင်းရဲက လွတ်မြောက်ဖို့အတွက် အဓိကကျတဲ့ ရိက္ခာထုပ်ကြီး ဖြစ်ပါတယ်။အလှူတစ်ခုဟာ အကျိုးထူးဖို့အတွက် (၁) လှူဒါန်းတဲ့ပစ္စည်းဟာ တရားသဖြင့် ရရှိထားခြင်း၊ (၂) လှူဒါန်းစဉ်မှာ သန့်ရှင်းတဲ့ စေတနာရှိခြင်းနဲ့ (၃) အလှူခံပုဂ္ဂိုလ်ဟာ သီလ၊ သမာဓိ၊ ပညာနဲ့ ပြည့်စုံခြင်း စတဲ့ အချက်တွေကလည်း အလွန်အရေးကြီးပါတယ်ခင်ဗျာ။“Prying one cent as if it were two”The Myanmar saying “Prying one cent as if it were two” describes someone who is extremely stingy and unwilling to part with even a very small amount. The word “pry” suggests they must struggle hard to give away even a little, showing how tightly they hold on to their possessions. People like this may have plenty of material wealth, but they are often poor in spirit. Their minds are narrow, always tense, and they often lose friends because they care only about their own interests.The Business ViewIn business, this kind of carefulness can sometimes be seen positively. It’s called “Cost Optimization,” or paying close attention to small savings – what experts call “Marginal Gains”.Many successful companies grow by looking after small costs. But there is also a danger: if you focus too much on the tiny details, you might miss bigger opportunities. In other words, you could become “penny-wise and pound-foolish”, saving cents but losing dollars because you fail to see the big picture.A Story from BarcelonaDuring a plague in Barcelona, Spain, there lived a very stingy millionaire. When charity workers asked for donations, they didn’t request money directly. Instead, they cleverly asked to “borrow” his bank check for a single day so they could show others that he was donating. When people saw that “even this famous miser was giving,” they started donating as well. The campaign became a huge success. Seeing this, the millionaire felt respected and experienced the happiness of giving for the first time. He then decided to make an actual donation. The story shows that once a person discovers how good generosity feels, it can transform their heart completely.The Buddhist View of Giving (Dana)In Buddhism, giving – known as Dana – is a powerful way to heal the mind.When you learn to give, you reduce greed and ego. Letting go of things makes the mind feel lighter and brings a deep kind of happiness known as Dharmic joy, or Mudita.According to the law of cause and effect, generosity brings future success, safety, and respect. It also creates peace of mind, helping a person face death without fear.The habit of letting go of “mine” is an important step toward liberation from suffering.The Three Keys to Meaningful GivingTo truly matter, an act of giving must involve a righteously earned gift, a sincere heart from the giver, and a virtuous recipient.gnlm
Advancing Parliamentary Responsibilities through Youth Engagement in Myanmar
Advancing Parliamentary Responsibilities through Youth Engagement in Myanmar
Starting from the third week of March 2026, the mornings are returning as a meaningful moment that would open a new page in Myanmar’s political history. Throughout Myanmar’s long political journey, the parliament has played an important role as an institution representing the people. For some time, our parliamentary buildings remained silent and still, and now appear to be eagerly awaiting the moment when they will come alive once again.The magnificent parliamentary halls, which were once filled with the echoes of parliamentary debates and deliberations, had remained quiet for a period of time. Yet now they seem ready to welcome the footsteps of representatives who will arrive from various constituencies. The wide roads, magnificent corridors and suspension bridge that once stood empty, the systematically constructed buildings, and the well-organized chambers all seem to proudly welcome the return of the people’s representatives.Within the calm grandeur of the parliamentary buildings, the sight of people’s representatives entering one after another from different constituencies can be seen as a symbol of the revival of political processes. These scenes suggest not only the effective implementation of parliamentary responsibilities but also the increasing importance of cooperation with the public, especially with young people.Thus, the parliamentary sessions that will resume starting from the third week of March 2026 accommodate discussions related to politics and the public interest, and parliamentarians’ hopes for important decisions, and policies that will benefit the people and the nation. Therefore, this article will discuss, from a policy perspective, how parliamentarians can cooperate with younger citizens in carrying out their responsibilities effectively.Cooperation with Youth in Carrying Out the Responsibilities of ParliamentariansThe 2008 Constitution of Myanmar defines the important role of parliament and outlines the duties and powers of parliamentarians to represent the interests of the people. In implementing these responsibilities, cooperation with young people is a very important factor for the development of our society and our nation.First, one of the primary duties of parliamentarians is to propose and enact policies and laws that prioritize the interests of the people. In order to make this process successful, meaningful participation of the public, especially attention to the voices and perspectives of the youth, is essential. Incorporating their experiences, views, and ideas into the legislative process can lead to policies that better address the social needs of future generations and respond to emerging trends. This approach also helps create a strong foundation for a positive social environment in our country.Second, parliamentarians serve as a bridge between the government and the people. They must present the needs and challenges of their constituencies in parliament and seek timely solutions. In performing this duty, issues related to youth, such as education, employment, human trafficking, environmental protection, etc., can be addressed more effectively when parliamentarians work together with youths. By holding consultations and discussions with the youth of the country and youth organizations, their concerns, needs, and suggestions can effectively contribute to finding durable solutions.Third, parliamentarians are responsible for the development of their constituencies. In carrying out this responsibility, cooperation with young people is essential for the successful implementation of development activities. Parliamentarians should encourage youth, together with community members, to participate in the planning, implementation, monitoring, and reporting of development projects. Nowadays, younger generations are particularly skilled in the use of technology, and they are proficient in digital platforms and social media. They can help parliamentarians collect public opinions and present them to parliament, as well as communicate more effectively with the public and media, and promote development initiatives to a wider audience.Finally, parliamentarians can help young people gain a deeper understanding of citizens’ rights, responsibilities, and the principles of public accountability. Organizing training programmes, discussions and youth forums within their constituencies is important for promoting awareness of social values, the rule of law, and civic responsibility. However, direct coaching and mentorship are even more valuable in shaping informed and responsible future citizens.Demonstration of good examples by a parliamentarian today will help create good leaders for the future. It is also important to make younger generations understand the fundamental values of leadership. In guiding emerging leaders, it is important to remember the old saying: “One must first be a good follower to become a good leader.” To become a good leader, individuals must first learn how to listen, collaborate, and take responsibility as followers.Such experiences and guidance will enable youths of today to become responsible leaders capable of guiding and nurturing their future generations.However, it should be noted that Gen Z are generally more independent, more analytical, and easier to disengage. They are more willing to challenge or resist unethical behaviour and practices. Therefore, parliamentarians who wish to lead by example should uphold strong ethical standards and cultivate accountable mindsets.Acting with Ethical StandardsParliamentarians are human beings, and like anyone else, they may find it difficult to resist the influence of power, position, and brown-nosers who constantly flatter them. There have been cases where parliamentary assistants were informally appointed and gradually became proxy parliamentarians. In some situations, these assistants appeared to hold more influence than the elected representatives themselves and even made decisions on their behalf. While the parliamentarians were attending sessions in parliament, these shadow figures often acted like the real authority in the constituencies, exercising power as if they were the king or queen of the area. Therefore, the existence of clear and well-enforced codes of conduct is crucial for parliamentarians.Parliamentarians are human beings and, like anyone else, may find it difficult to resist the influence of power, position, and individuals who constantly flatter them. In previous parliamentary terms, there were cases where parliamentary assistants have been informally appointed and gradually assumed the role of proxy parliamentarians. In certain situations, these assistants appeared to hold more influence than the elected representatives themselves and even made decisions on their behalf. While parliamentarians were attending sessions in parliament, these proxy figures sometimes acted as the real authority in the constituencies, exercising power as if they were the king or queen of the area. Therefore, the existence of clear and well-enforced codes of conduct is crucial for parliamentarians.Section 120 of the 2008 Constitution of Myanmar and the Election Law define the qualifications required for parliamentarians. In addition, there are fundamental standard codes of conduct and ethical principles which are commonly practised by parliamentarians in many countries around the world. By applying these codes and principles in performing their duties throughout their elected term, parliamentarians can make significant contributions to the country and provide exemplary role models for youths.This article seeks to highlight these codes and principles underneath:1. Integrity and Honesty: Parliamentarians must act in the public interest rather than for personal gain. They must avoid bribery and corruption.2. Accountability: Parliamentarians must be accountable to the public and to voters. They must be able to explain their actions honestly.3. Transparency: Reports, budget decisions, and policy decisions should be openly presented to the public and voters. They must avoid participating in decisions that involve personal interests.4. Avoidance of Conflict of Interest: Position as a representative of people must not be used for the benefit of family members, friends, or business partners. If a conflict of interest exists, it must be declared, and the member should withdraw from the decision-making process.5. Proper Use of Public Resources: Government funds, staff, offices, and travel expenses must only be used for official parliamentary duties.6. Respect: Parliamentarians must treat fellow members, staff, and citizens with respect. Insults, harassment, and disruptive behaviour must be avoided.7. Confidentiality: Confidential information obtained through official duties must not be disclosed.8. Compliance with Laws, Rules and Regulations: Parliamentarians must follow laws, rules, regulations and directives.9. Commitment to Public Service: They must actively participate in parliamentary sessions, debates, and committee work on behalf of their constituents.10. Reporting Misconduct: Any unethical or illegal behaviour should be reported to the appropriate authorities.In conclusion, the responsibilities of parliamentarians extend beyond lawmaking to representing public interests, promoting constituency development, and guiding future generations. Fulfilling these duties effectively requires both strong ethical standards and meaningful engagement with youths. By upholding principles such as integrity, accountability, transparency, and respect, parliamentarians can build public trust and set positive examples for society and youth. At the same time, collaborating with the youth – by listening to their perspectives, involving them in community development, and mentoring them in civic values – can strengthen public participation and produce more responsive policies. When parliamentarians engage and lead the youth with integrity, they not only improve governance today but also help cultivate responsible leaders for tomorrow. Such cooperation lays a strong foundation for sustainable national development and a more inclusive and democratic society in the future.(Ref: Codes of Conduct for Parliamentarians, A Comparative Study by King Prajadhipok’s Institute for UNDP)gnlm
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