Myanmar’s military begins phased election amid ongoing civil war.
Opposition parties dissolved, and Suu Kyi remains imprisoned.
U.N. and Western diplomats condemn polls as unfair and repressive.
Myanmar’s military rulers on Sunday launched a tightly controlled, phased general election that they claim marks a return to democratic rule, five years after overthrowing the country’s elected government — a move that plunged the nation into a protracted civil war. The vote has been widely rejected by opposition groups, rights organisations and Western governments as neither free nor fair.
According to AFP, voting began at 6 a.m. in junta-held areas, including parts of Yangon, Mandalay and the purpose-built capital Naypyidaw, as the first of three rounds in a month-long polling process. The military authorities have acknowledged that elections will not take place in nearly one in five lower house constituencies because of ongoing conflict.
Myanmar, a Southeast Asian country of about 50 million people, remains deeply fractured by civil war. Large swathes of territory are under the control of armed resistance groups, and there will be no voting in rebel-held areas.
The election is taking place under heavy restrictions, with former civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi still in prison and her once-dominant National League for Democracy (NLD) dissolved and barred from participating. Ms. Suu Kyi, ousted in the February 2021 coup, is serving a combined 27-year jail sentence on charges that rights groups say are politically motivated.
“I don’t think she would consider these elections to be meaningful in any way,” her son, Kim Aris, said from Britain.
Campaigners, Western diplomats and the United Nations have strongly criticised the polls. AFP reported that the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, Volker Turk, said the election was being held “in an environment of violence and repression”.
The pro-military Union Solidarity and Development Party is widely expected to secure the largest number of seats, in what critics argue amounts to a civilian rebranding of continued martial rule.
At a polling station in Yangon’s Kamayut Township, close to Ms. Suu Kyi’s now-vacant home, 63-year-old Bo Saw became the first voter to cast his ballot. “The election is very important and will bring the best for the country,” he said. “The first priority should be restoring a safe and peaceful situation.”
But the early hours of voting showed little of the enthusiasm seen in the 2020 election, when long queues formed across the country. According to AFP, journalists and polling staff outnumbered voters at a central Yangon station near the Sule Pagoda, a focal point of mass pro-democracy protests following the coup.
Among the small number of voters who did turn up, some dismissed international criticism. “It’s not an important matter,” said Swe Maw, 45. “There are always people who like and dislike.”
The military annulled the 2020 election results — which the NLD won by a landslide — alleging widespread fraud, claims that independent observers rejected. After seizing power, the junta violently suppressed nationwide protests, driving many activists out of cities and into rural areas where they joined armed resistance groups, including long-standing ethnic minority armies.
In the run-up to the current polls, there were none of the large-scale rallies that once accompanied Ms. Suu Kyi’s campaigns. Instead, the military has intensified operations in contested regions in what observers describe as an effort to secure territory ahead of voting.
“It is impossible for this election to be free and fair,” said Moe Moe Myint, a 40-year-old woman who said she had spent the past two months fleeing junta air strikes in the central Mandalay region. “How can we support a junta-run election when this military has destroyed our lives?” she told AFP. “We are homeless, hiding in jungles, and living between life and death.”
Junta chief Min Aung Hlaing has repeatedly framed the election as a step towards reconciliation but did not respond to AFP requests for an interview.
The military governed Myanmar for much of its post-independence history before a decade-long opening from 2011 raised hopes of democratic transition and reform. Those hopes were largely extinguished by the 2021 coup.
Most political parties that contested the 2020 election have since been dissolved. The Asian Network for Free Elections says that 90 per cent of parliamentary seats from the last vote were held by parties that will not appear on the ballots this time.
The junta has also introduced electronic voting machines that do not permit write-in candidates or spoiled ballots, further fuelling concerns over the credibility of the process.
According to AFP, the authorities are pursuing legal action against more than 200 people under sweeping laws that criminalise “disruption” of the election, including public criticism or protest.
The second round of polling is scheduled for two weeks’ time, with a final round planned for January 25. Even then, large parts of the country are expected to remain excluded.
“There are many ways to make peace in the country, but they haven’t chosen those — they’ve chosen to have an election instead,” said Zaw Tun, an officer with the pro-democracy People’s Defence Force in the northern Sagaing region. “We will continue to fight.”
(With inputs from AFP)
