Suu Kyi's democracy party splinters over decision whether to contest coming election under junta's harsh rules
After clinging for two decades to their stolen victory in a 1990 election, Myanmar's main opposition party – led by Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi – is suddenly fragmenting and may be dissolved altogether, ironically over the prospect of another election.
When the military regime in Myanmar, also known as Burma, announced that it was altering the country's constitution and would hold its first election since Ms. Suu Kyi and her party won a landslide victory in the 1990 vote, it presented her National League for Democracy with a stark choice. It could take part in elections it had no chance of winning under the military's rules, or boycott and ignore the first hint of political opening the repressive junta has allowed in 20 years.
Taking part would mean renouncing the 1990 election results, as well as expelling the revered Ms. Suu Kyi – who has been under some form of arrest for most of the past two decades – and other political prisoners from the party, since no one with a conviction on their record is allowed to be a member of any party running in the elections.
Not registering for the elections may now lead to the forced dissolution of the party that has led the struggle for democracy inside the repressive country since it was founded in 1988. The election law specifies that only those parties that take part in the elections will be considered legal. Since the deadline for registration passed, the state-run media has taken to referring to the NLD as a “former political party.”
The decision not to run has split the NLD, with Ms. Suu Kyi and the bulk of the party deciding to stick to their position that the results of the 1990 election must be honoured, while a smaller faction has decided to break away from the main pro-democracy movement and to take part in the election.
The new party, headed by long-time NLD member Than Nyein, has adopted the name National Democratic Front. A reportedly furious Ms. Suu Kyi said through her lawyer that the new party was “undemocratic” – since it ignored a party vote not to take part in the elections – and has asked her supporters to boycott the election or spoil their ballots.
It's a situation that likely pleases the generals, who have ruled Myanmar since the end of British colonial rule in 1962. “The government has been trying to divide the NLD for the past 20 years. Only now can they see that happening,” said Htet Aung, a reporter at The Irrawaddy magazine, a publication run by Myanmarese exiles that publishes out of Chiang Mai, a Thai city roughly 100 kilometres from the border with Myanmar.
Like many exiles, Mr. Htet was unsure of where he stood on the issue. “I understand the NLD's position and Aung San Suu Kyi's position. They are committed to genuine democracy and when they see no hope for genuine democracy, they don't want to participate in these elections,” he said. “But on the other hand, when you're under a dictatorship, if you want democracy you must pass through the election process.”
So far, the junta has not set a specific date for the vote, only saying that it will take place by the end of 2010. Few see the election as anything but an attempt by the junta to give its rule a coat of legitimacy that it currently lacks. The election will be conducted under emergency laws that forbid criticisms of the government and gatherings of more than five people.
The newly passed election law sets aside one-quarter of the 440 seats in the lower house for the military, and with the opposition weak and barred from getting its message out, the generals and their allies look sure to sweep to a large majority.
General Thein Sein and 22 members of his cabinet recently resigned their positions in the military to run in the election under the banner of the junta's Union Solidarity and Development Party. Should, as expected, the regime control parliament after the election, the junta's senior leader, General Than Shwe will likely be voted into the powerful new post of president.
“The regime has 100 per cent of the power now, and they'll try and keep 100 per cent, but with the legitimacy of an elected government. They wanted the NLD to take part in the elections and then to allow them to win only 5 per cent of the seats,” said Nyo Ohn Myint, the Thailand-based chair of the NLD foreign affairs committee.
“Political parties [that take part in the election] won't have the opportunity to do any campaigning, or to criticize, because the election laws do not allow you to attack the government. You can't talk about the electricity shortages, you can't talk about the water shortage, you can't talk about the basic problems of the people, because every problem is related to the state. You can't criticize, so the election campaign is for what?”
However, Mr. Nyo admitted the decision not to participate had deeply divided the party. He characterized those who broke away to form the National Democratic Front as “moderates” willing to give the junta more benefit of the doubt than Ms. Suu Kyi and her allies were.
The election comes as both the United States and China have stepped up diplomatic efforts to engage with the government in Rangoon. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao will visit Myanmar this month, and Mr. Nyo said he feels China, which is worried about ethnic conflicts in the north of Myanmar spilling over its border, may be able to pass messages between the regime and the opposition.
The United States, meanwhile, is increasingly concerned by Myanmar's growing relationship with North Korea, as well as reports that it recently has been trying to acquire materials that could allow it to follow Pyongyang's lead by producing nuclear weapons. It's believed that two nuclear reactors are under construction in Myanmar, which has reportedly received aid from both Russia and North Korea in the effort.
“Burma could become another problem like North Korea,” said Aung Zaw, editor of The Irrawaddy, who met with U.S. assistant secretary of state Kurt Campbell before the latter's recent trip to Myanmar. “That's why the U.S. engagement is no longer about [promoting] democracy alone. It's about proliferation, too, now.”
Mark MacKinnon
From Thursday's Globe and Mail
No comments:
Post a Comment