In late October, the U.K. imposed sanctions against six Myanmar entities involved in either providing aviation fuel to the military or supplying restricted goods, including aircraft parts. Among them was Swan Energy Co.
Amid serious fuel shortages, the regime formed a committee to import fuel from its major ally and key arms supplier Russia in August 2022. Chaired by former Lieutenant General Nyo Saw, chairman of the military-owned conglomerate Myanmar Economic Corporation (MEC), the committee was reorganized in October 2023, incorporating Swan Energy Co represented by Win Kyaw Kyaw Aung.
“Swan” stands for Sein Wan, who has long-standing ties with the Myanmar military and is usefully related by marriage to a current junta minister.
A business tycoon mainly operating in Mon State and Tanintharyi Region, he is also the father of hip-hop singer Kyaw Phyo Tun aka Ah Boy. Ah Boy in turn is a business partner of junta boss Min Aung Hlaing’s son Aung Pyae Sone.
According to fuel suppliers, it was Swan Energy that bought the Myanmar operations of Swiss-owned Puma Energy in 2022, when the major aviation fuel supplier left following the 2021 coup.
Puma itself, the retail arm of the scandal-ridden Trafigura empire, did not name the local buyer, but the chain of custody can be traced through a complicated network of associations.
In Mon State’s capital Mawlamyine, electricity is supplied by Myanmar Lighting IPP Co., whose director is Win Kyaw Kyaw Aung, a dubious character who has an outstanding 2015 arrest warrant against him from Singapore for the attempted murder of a Myanmar migrant in the island state.
Win Kyaw Kyaw Aung also owns Asia Sun Energy (ASE) which engages in logistics, fuel importation, and distribution. In 2014 ASE, which was only established a year earlier, partnered with Puma Energy to establish Puma Energy Asia Sun Co. to import and supply aviation fuel in Myanmar. The joint venture built Myanmar’s largest fuel storage terminal with a capacity of 91,000m³ at Thilawa Port in Yangon. The US$100-million port opened in 2017.
When Puma pulled out in 2022, it was thought to have sold its stakes to ASE, and Win Kyaw Kyaw Aung is reportedly a co-owner of Swan Energy.
Sein Wan started his business in Tanintharyi Region’s Myeik and was already a rich man in the Myanmar Socialist Programme Party era, when Myanmar was under the iron rule of dictator Ne Win.
Sein Wan’s wealth grew further when he smuggled Thai goods into Myanmar during the early days of the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC) regime that came to power after the 1988 pro-democracy uprising, according to a Mawlamyine businessman.
As his business empire grew, so did his network of contacts, who were mostly ruling generals, winning him contracts for power supply. His other businesses include Electrical Home Appliance Manufacturing Co., the Myanmar Lighting Group of Companies, Myanmar Lighting (IPP) Co., and Myanmar Lighting Manufacturing Co.
Also on the boards of those companies sits Okkar Aye, the son of former Lieutenant General Tin Aye, who chaired the Union Election Commission under Thein Sein’s quasi-civilian administration. In the SLORC era, Tin Aye served as quartermaster general of the Myanmar military and chief of the military-owned conglomerate Myanmar Economic Holdings.
Other joint ventures between Sein Wan and Okkar Aye are the pharmaceutical companies Fit Myanmar Co. and Fit Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Co.
Myanmar Lighting established a gas-fired power plant with a capacity of 560 megawatts in Mon State’s Thanbyuzayat Township, supplying Mawlamyine town, while Southern Myanmar Development Co. (SMD), also owned by Sein Win, is building an oil terminal in Hnit Kayin village in Mon State’s Ye Township to import, store, and distribute fuel.
SMD, a joint venture between Bedok Construction and Engineering Co. and Singapore-based Siam Gas Power Pte Ltd and Asiatech Power Pte Ltd., boasts Sein Wan’s rapper son Ah Boy as an executive director.
Sein Wan also has interests in construction, export and import, and other manufacturing businesses. He has another son and a daughter. One of his children is married to a child of junta-appointed Investment and Foreign Economic Relations Minister Dr. Kan Zaw, another stalwart of the military regimes who served as national planning and economic development minister in Thein Sein’s government.
Editor’s Note: The story was updated on Jan 2, 2025 to add Swan Energy is on the fuel import committee from Russia.
