This Is What It Looks Like When a City of 5 Million People Goes on Strike

The wide, usually traffic-clogged streets of downtown sit empty. Once-bustling markets are silent, and shops shuttered. The occasional passing car, cyclist or pedestrian offers only fleeting reminders that these metropolises remain occupied.

This wasn’t a return to the harsh lockdowns experienced at the onset of the pandemic early last year; these were the scenes from Myanmar’s major cities Yangon and Mandalay, as well as smaller towns, as millions protested the country’s military government. 

A hush descended upon Yangon, a densely populated city of 5.2 million people, on Friday as its citizens engaged in a “silent strike” that brought the country’s commercial capital to a standstill. 

“Silence is the loudest shout. We want our rights back. We want revolution. We express sadness for our fallen heroes,” protest leader Khin Sandar told the media. 

Images and video emerged of empty highways and vacant market stalls as the breadth of discontent felt by millions in Myanmar was illustrated in the almost complete absence of people and economic activity on its streets. Similar scenes were found in Mandalay, Myanmar’s second-largest city of 1.7 million people, as protestors aimed to demonstrate the lack of control the junta wields wields over their daily lives.

“We own our town. Staying active or silent is our choice. They [the regime] shall absolutely never be allowed to rule,” one slogan associated with the protests declared.

The strike was organised by anti-junta protest groups, formed in the wake of the Feb. 1 coup that toppled Aung San Suu Kyi’s democratically elected government. The Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM) has blossomed nationwide since February, utilising acts of defiance including the banging of pots and pans out of windows, boycotting military-associated businesses and refusing to pay bills. 

“Video of Yangon and Mandalay being turned into ghost cities by massive #SilentStrike. People are displaying power and that they own the cities,” the CDM’s official Twitter account posted on Friday, with an accompanying video showing eerily empty streets.

This is the second protest of its kind, with the streets of major cities also emptied in March in the aftermath of the coup to refute military claims that the situation had normalised.

Tensions have ramped up once again in Myanmar the past week. On Dec. 5, video emerged of a military vehicle mercilessly running down peaceful protesters. At least five people died when it plowed into the back of marchers in Yangon, before soldiers opened fire and arrested people. 

Deposed leader Aung San Suu Kyi was then sentenced to four years in prison on Monday for alleged incitement, immediately reduced to two years, before disturbing footage emerged on Wednesday showing the smoking corpses of 11 people shot and burned by junta soldiers in a rural village.

Follow Alastair McCready on Twitter