Hsan Sint ( my, ဆန်းဆင့်, also spelt San Sint) is a Burmese politician and former government minister and army general. He was appointed as Minister of Religious Affairs by President

Thein Sein Thein Sein ( my, သိန်းစိန်; IPA: ; born 20 April 1944) is a Burmese politician and retired general in the Myanmar Army who served as the eighth President of Myanmar from 2011 to 2016. He previously served as Prime Minister ...

in January 2013. At the time, he was the speaker for the Ayeyarwady Region Hluttaw who concurrently serves as one of two Hluttaw members representing

Yegyi Township Yegyi Township ( my, ရေကြည်မြို့နယ်) is a township of Kyonpyaw District in the Ayeyarwady Region of Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require in ...

. Before retiring to contest the

2010 Burmese general election General elections were held in Myanmar on 2010, in accordance with the new constitution, which was approved in a referendum held in . The election date was announced by the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) on . The elections were the ...

, Hsan Sint served in the

Myanmar Army The Myanmar Army ( my, တပ်မတော်(ကြည်း), ) is the largest branch of the Tatmadaw, Armed Forces (''Tatmadaw'') of Myanmar (Burma) and has the primary responsibility of conducting land-based military operations. The My ...

. He previously held posts as a Military Appointment General and deputy commander of the Yangon Command.

Corruption scandal

Hsan Sint was dismissed as Minister of Religious Affairs on 19 June 2014, for his alleged poor handling of the Mahasantisukha Monastery raid in

Yangon Yangon ( my, ရန်ကုန်; ; ), formerly spelled as Rangoon, is the capital of the Yangon Region and the largest city of Myanmar (also known as Burma). Yangon served as the capital of Myanmar until 2006, when the military government ...

, and disagreements with other members of the government. That same day, he was charged with corruption, for allegedly mishandling in state funds to be used toward the construction of a pagoda in

Lewe Township Lewe Township ( my, လယ်ဝေးမြို့နယ်) is one of eight townships of Naypyidaw Union Territory, Burma. Demographics 2014 The 2014 Myanmar Census reported that Lewe Township had a population of 284,393. The population dens ...

. On 25 June 2014, the

Pyidaungsu Hluttaw The Pyidaungsu Hluttaw ( my, ပြည်ထောင်စု လွှတ်တော် lit. Assembly of the Union) is the ''de jure'' national-level bicameral legislature of Myanmar (officially known as the ''Republic of the Union of My ...

confirmed a replacement, Soe Win, who was previously deputy minister, to post of Minister of Religious Affairs. The Dekkhinathiri District Court rejected his plea bail in July 2014. On 22 July 2014, Hsan Sint was also charged with

sedition Sedition is overt conduct, such as speech and organization, that tends toward rebellion against the established order. Sedition often includes subversion of a constitution and incitement of discontent toward, or insurrection against, estab ...

. On 17 October 2014, the court sentenced him to 13 years, with a 100,000 kyat fine. On 6 April 2015, the

Supreme Court of Burma The Supreme Court of Myanmar ( my, ပြည်ထောင်စုတရားလွှတ်တော်ချုပ်) is the highest judicial forum and final court of appeal under the Constitution of Myanmar, existing as an independent ju ...

announced it would accept his appeal. In 2012, he supported a motion to sack

Ayeyarwady Region Ayeyarwady Region ( my, ဧရာဝတီတိုင်းဒေသကြီး , , ; formerly Ayeyarwady Division and Irrawaddy Division), is a region of Myanmar, occupying the delta region of the Ayeyarwady River (Irrawaddy River). It is bor ...

government and accused

Union Solidarity and Development Party The Union Solidarity and Development Party ( my, ပြည်ထောင်စုကြံ့ခိုင်ရေးနှင့် ဖွံ့ဖြိုးရေးပါတီ; abbr. USDP) is a political party in Myanmar, registered on ...

vice chairperson

Htay Oo Htay Oo ( my, ဌေးဦး; born 20 January 1950) is a Burmese former politician and military officer, and previously served as Pyithu Hluttaw MP for Hinthada constituency from 2011 to 2016. He also served as Minister for Agriculture and Irri ...

of interfering in the dispute. He was warned in 2014 before his corruption scandal for his comments on the need to eliminate corruption among government and parliamentary officials. There are some suggestions that he was a scapegoat for criticism of the government’s role in the Mahasantisukha Buddha Sasana Center raid. Hsan Sint was released on 24 May 2017, as part of a presidential amnesty for political activists.

Personal life

Hsan Sint was born in 1951. He is married to Khin Ma Lay, and has a son, Okkar San Sint, who allegedly owned ''Thandaw Sint'' newspaper.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hsan Sint Government ministers of Myanmar Living people People from Ayeyarwady Region Union Solidarity and Development Party politicians 1951 births