Villagers accuse Ponnagyun admin of misappropriating govt cash assistance

By Hnin Nwe 05 Oct 2020

Hnin Nwe  | DMG
5 October 2020, Sittwe   

A brawl broke out in the village of Kywe Htoe, Ponnagyun Township, this week after the village administrator allegedly misappropriated funds provided by the government for low-income families in the village.  

While there are 330 households in the village and the government has ostensibly provided cash assistance for all of the households, just over 100 families received the money — K25,000 per household, according to 100-household administrator U Hla Maung.   

“The government granted the money for the whole village. But only his family members, relatives and friends got the money. When they [villagers] complained to the administrator, he said they may complain to anywhere if they were not happy with what he had given to them. This resulted in a brawl,” U Hla Maung said.  

The government has provided cash assistance for the village twice previously, and local residents said they only received K10,000 per household on both of those occasions. 

“He did not give us the money, saying we own farms. But he gave the money to his relatives who have large farm acreage,” said local resident Daw Ma Myint Aye.  

Village administrator U Shwe Aung Sein said he had only sought cash assistance for 230 low-income families out of 330 households in the village. The Union government provided K20,000 and the Arakan State government provided K6,000 per household, he said.  

“At the instruction of the township General Administration Department, we gave K25,000 per household, and deducted K1,000 [per household] for transportation costs,” he said.   

“I distributed the cash assistance to the whole village in previous times, not because the government has granted financial assistance for the whole village, but because I wanted all households to get the money. But this time, if I had done it again, low-income families would have only received K15,000 instead of K25,000,” said U Shwe Aung Sein.  

Local villagers said they had complained to the district and township General Administration Departments about U Shwe Aung Sein’s alleged misappropriation of the funds, but there had as yet been no response. 

U Hla Maung said U Shwe Aung Sein forged the signatures of 100 villagers and presented a receipt with the fake signatures to the township General Administration Department.  

“Government officials asked me if I signed the receipt. I said I didn’t. We villagers were not asked to sign when we withdrew the money. The receipt stated that each household received K20,000. The administrator faked signatures and misappropriated the money,” he alleged.  

U Shwe Aung Sein said: “I can’t tell the authorities that I had given K10,000 per household to the entire village while authorities had granted money only for households that were on the list. So, I had to fake signatures and said all those on the list received K20,000,” he said.