How do you get from junta to democracy in one step peacefully?
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Myanmar Awaits Results of Vote Ending Military Rule
Nov. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Myanmar citizens awaited results of an election that brings a multi-party parliament to the country for the first time since 1962 even as Aung San Suu Kyi and some 2,100 other political prisoners remain detained.
Myanmar has been placed under a 90-day state of emergency that prevents political gatherings and stops soldiers from leaving the military for three months, ABC News reported.
The U.S., Canada and the U.K. condemned the vote, the first since Suu Kyi's party won a landslide victory two decades ago in a result nullified by the junta. Two parties comprised of rival military factions are the frontrunners to control Parliament and submit presidential nominees, a process that ends 22 years of military rule.
"Serving military officers, former military officers and democrats will all be sitting around the table," Khin Zaw Win, an independent academic who was imprisoned for 11 years until 2005, told reporters in Bangkok by phone from Yangon, Myanmar's former capital. "That's quite an achievement for a country that has been so bitterly divided over the years."
The election and formation of a new government may prompt Western nations to reassess economic sanctions as Myanmar's Asian neighbors welcome the vote. China, India and Thailand are spending money on ports, railways and oil and gas pipelines that give them access to natural resources in the country formerly known as Burma and trade routes in the Indian Ocean.
'Neither Free nor Fair'
The elections "were neither free nor fair," U.S. President Barack Obama, visiting India on the first stop in a four-country trip, said in a statement yesterday. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, traveling in Australia, reiterated a U.S. push to establish an international Commission of Inquiry to hold junta leaders accountable for human rights violations.
Suu Kyi, 65, may be released on Nov. 13 and will visit supporters around the country "as soon as possible" if she's freed, Win Tin, a senior member of her party, told reporters yesterday by phone from Yangon. The Nobel laureate has been detained for 15 of the past 21 years, with her latest house arrest starting in 2003.
Considering Sanctions
Suu Kyi "is ready to consider the economic sanctions," said Win Tin, who spent 19 years in prison before his 2008 release. "First she would like to see what kind of sanctions are there and how they affect people's lives."
Than Nyein, 73, a former member of Suu Kyi's party who heads the National Democratic Front party, said her plan to boycott the election "miserably failed." The former political prisoner expected a "comfortable" number of his colleagues in the next Parliament while saying election officials instructed voters to cast ballots for the junta-backed party.
The military will retain a quarter of seats in two houses of Parliament, according to the constitution. Elected lawmakers in both houses will each be able to nominate a presidential hopeful to compete against the candidate picked by military- appointed legislators.
Junta leader Than Shwe backs the Union Solidarity and Development Party, which claims a third of the population as members. Its main challenger is the National Unity Party, a group loyal to former dictator Ne Win, who led a 1962 coup and established one-party rule until Than Shwe's group took power following a pro-democracy uprising in 1988.
The USDP and NUP ran more than twice as many candidates as the 35 other parties, making a 1990s-style win for the pro- democracy parties "statistically impossible," according to Richard Horsey, an independent political analyst who had worked with the International Labor Organization in Myanmar. The NUP will probably hold the balance of power in Parliament, he said.
Not a Facsimile
While the ensuing government would be dominated by "conservative, authoritarian-leaning nationalism," Horsey wrote in a pre-election report, "it would certainly not be merely a facsimile of the present regime in civilian clothing."
State-run MRTV showed Than Shwe and second-in-charge Muang Aye casting ballots dressed in military uniform. The votes will be counted at each polling station in the presence of candidates, after which the results will be announced.
The government banned most overseas journalists and diplomats from entering Myanmar to observe the election and rejected United Nations assistance in organizing the vote. U.K. Foreign Secretary William Hague said the election "will mean the return to power of a brutal regime," while the European Union called on authorities "to ensure that these elections mark the start of a more inclusive phase."
Banks as Target
The U.S. maintains trade and financial sanctions against the regime, and legislators are pushing the Obama administration to start targeting banks that hold offshore accounts for junta leaders. Europe has less stringent restrictions in place.
Italian-Thai Development Pcl, Thailand's biggest construction company, signed an $8.6 billion contract last week with Myanmar to build a deep-sea port and industrial estate. Earlier this year, China National Petroleum Corp. started building oil and gas pipelines across the country, and India approved plans for Oil & Natural Gas Corp. and GAIL India Ltd. to invest a combined $1.3 billion in a natural gas project.
Western countries want "a greater dialogue among countries, including those that are investing in Myanmar, to find common ground to put pressure on the regime to treat its population better," Ron Hoffmann, Canada's ambassador to Myanmar, said in Bangkok after the vote. "It's a long road ahead though and it's not going to be easy."
To contact the reporter on this story: Daniel Ten Kate in Bangkok at dtenkate@bloomberg.net .
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Bill Austin at billaustin@bloomberg.net
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