🇲🇲 A pre-Myanmar votes reading list

No electoral upset expected, but plenty of scope to deepen divisions

November 06, 2020

Hello friends!

Enough of one depressing election! Let’s check out another uh depressing election. We shouldn’t expect any major upsets in Myanmar where the ruling National League of Democracy will likely walk it in on Sunday when (most of) the country takes to the polls. 

Still, stick close to Frontier Myanmar for their coverage over the weekend and early next week. While Aung San Suu Kyi and her friends aren’t going anywhere, ethnic and religious tensions will bubble away and there’s no one better to guide us than the team at FM. 

Here’s a few things I’ll be watching or found intriguing in the lead up as well as a whole bunch of reads that have helped me get across the election. Dig in, follow Frontier Myanmar and we’ll be back next week to check-in.

Stay safe out there!Erin Cook

(Aung San Suu Kyi fronts up to the United Nations in 2012 when the world still loved her, c/o the UN Geneva on Flickr)

This short video from DW focuses on the COVID-19 pandemic which has worsened in Myanmar in recent months even as neighbours recover. There are some fantastic streetscapes here so definitely give it a watch. The pandemic election is a tough one. I’ve seen some democracy activists argue that the pandemic is the most important time to ensure elections are held — assuming it is safe and secure — and I’m not sure what the other alternative is, postpone the election? Until when? Who decides? 

In Myanmar, it probably wouldn’t make a huge difference when it was held. The National League of Democracy and Aung San Suu Kyi is virtually guaranteed to get back in with no major upsets on the horizon. The bigger issues are, as always, on the fringe. 

We’ve spoken a lot in recent months about Rohingya candidates being booted and Rohingya would-be voters being purged from the rolls. Recent reporting shows how devastating this is for the hundreds of thousands affected. 

"Not being able to vote makes me feel really sad. It feels as though we are dead and we don't matter. These rights are important. We want our children to become engineers and lawyers one day. But I don't see this happening any time in the future. I don't have the confidence. I don't know if we will even be able to vote in 2025,”  Mohammad Yusuf, a Rohingya refugee living in Bangladesh, tells Thomson Reuters. 

Communities in other embattled states like Shan, Kachin and Karen are also finding themselves disenfranchised in what is supposed to be the country’s second democratic election. "We believed the NLD government would strive for democracy and work for the public. But now, I feel they're even worse," Kachin State People's Party MP Dwe Bu told the AFP. 

On the other hand, Ashin Wirathu is back. The extremist monk whose firebrand preaching stoked Buddhist hate against Muslims and driving divisions deeper has turned himself in. He’s been on the run for 17 months after a speech criticizing ASSK and ‘comparing military figures in parliament to Buddha,’ according to Coconuts Yangon. He faces three years imprisonment on sedition charges. 

The return of the monk is widely seen as an attempt to undermine the NLD vote. “By grabbing headlines just before elections (he) will hope to portray the NLD government as the enemy of Buddhist nationalism,” analyst Richard Horsey told the AFP.  

The domestic observer groups include the Hornbill Organization, which monitored the last general election in 2015, subsequent by-elections and local votes for ward and village tract administrators. The group’s executive director, Ko Chan Lian, said the coronavirus had seriously hobbled its plans for the November 8 vote. 

Hornbill recruited 470 volunteers for short-term observation roles but almost 170 have left because of the risk of contracting COVID-19 on election day.

“Some parents are not allowing their sons or daughters to be election observers because of the virus,” he told Frontier in a telephone interview on October 7, adding that Hornbill would not be recruiting replacements.

Issuing the second warning in as many days about potential bias in the vote, commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing told a local news outlet that the military was the “guardian” of the country and was watching preparations closely.

The rare interview in the Popular News Journal followed similar comments in a military statement on Monday that accused the election commission of “widespread violation of the laws and procedures of the pre-voting process”.

The weak state of health infrastructure in the country means there is little capacity to respond to a large health crisis. The lack of testing and treatment facilities means the full impact of Covid-19 remains unknown.

In addition to the concerns of holding a national election during what is really Myanmar’s first wave of Covid-19, human rights groups have led calls for the Rohingya in Bangladesh, and for those who are still displaced within Myanmar, to have a right to vote in the election.

It is hard to see how the election will be free and fair for all, or how the public will be kept safe from the threat of Covid-19. Instead, there is a risk of the elections supercharging the spread of Covid-19 in Myanmar.

After the NLD won in a landslide five years ago, many observers anticipated a liberal shift in Myanmar after decades of military rule. But today political apathy dominates: A preelection survey by the People’s Alliance for Credible Elections (PACE) found that only 30 percent of respondents were interested in politics, a major decline from 58 percent in 2016. And as the NLD prepares to defend its majority at the polls, the party is largely failing to live up to its name. The elections look certain to fall short of democratic standards.

The NLD enjoys widespread popularity among the Bamar ethnic majority and would most likely win a free and fair election. But rather than take the risk, it has undermined democracy in Myanmar, pursuing policies that resemble those of the military government that it fought for decades. The political playing field still isn’t level—with the military automatically retaining control over 25 percent of seats in parliament and controlling key institutions, such as the police—so the NLD may see itself as violating democratic rights to uphold democracy as part of an ongoing political transition.

Moreover, a vote for the NLD is a largely a vote for the personal rule of Aung San Suu Kyi, and her popularity has only increased after her defense of Myanmar at the ICJ and her reassuring presence amid the pandemic. Since the onset of COVID-19, she has addressed the public several times each week, imparting rousing messages of unity and perseverance.

The history of Burman domination of ethnic minorities is a major factor in the continuing armed conflicts across some parts of the country. Elections look set to entrench rather than ease that dynamic. The Burmese military (the Tatmadaw) has reportedly escalated its offensives against ethnic armed groups in Rakhine, Chin, Karen and northern Shan state.

Attempts to address reforms in the electoral system and amendments to the constitution have come to little, and Naypyidaw has largely ignored calls to appoint minority ethnic officials to head local administrations in minority areas.

The results will likely increase a growing dissatisfaction with electoral politics among minorities, and could in turn intensify Myanmar’s numerous armed conflicts.

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