The last legislative elections, in November 2020, served as a pretext for the army to overthrow, three months later, Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, whose party had won the election hands down. The ruling generals, who have accused their opponents of massive electoral fraud – unfounded, according to observers – now hope to take their revenge at the polls.
With a political opposition decimated by repression, and the tacit support of China and Russia, the poll must take place before August, according to the Constitution.
But turnout promises to be uncertain, with parts of the country in the throes of a violent conflict between armed forces and rebel militias that deters residents from voting or poses the threat of reprisals for those who do.
The ballot will be like “a cart with one wheel,” a former civil servant in Yangon, who has been on strike since the military took power, told AFP. “There is no chance that it will bring progress,” he assured, having requested anonymity for fear of reprisals.
In the jungle near the border with Thailand, Lin Lin, a member of one of dozens of popular defense groups fighting the army across Burma, assures that the elections will not change the prevailing chaos.
“We will hold on to our weapons”
“We will hang on to our guns until we have an elected government,” he told AFP.
In difficulty on the ground, the Burmese army is accused of war crimes and of bombing civilian populations. More than a million people have been internally displaced by violence since the coup, according to the United Nations.
“In all areas of human rights – economic, social and cultural, as well as civil and political – Burma has deeply regressed”, was alarmed at the end of January the High Commissioner for Human Rights of the UN, Volker Türk.
The organization of legislative elections must accelerate after the expected lifting of the state of emergency, declared by the army in the wake of the putsch, which is due to expire at the end of January.
No date has yet been set, but political parties wishing to participate have until the end of March to register with the junta-controlled electoral commission.
The army, in search of legitimacy, tries to include in certain constituencies rebellious ethnic groups, represented by small movements on a regional scale.
But it is almost certain that voting will be impossible in many regions, noted Htwe Htwe Htin, of Curtin University in Australia. “In areas that the military controls, people may be forced to vote, and to vote for the party or parties affiliated with the junta,” she said.
“People will certainly assume that they will be watched” and that abstaining or voting against the junta will be punishable, she said.
A sham election
Threats also lie with those involved in holding the poll, with local media reporting several attacks on teams going door to door for voter lists in Yangon.
“The technical capacity of the junta to organize elections (…) will be limited by the lack of bureaucratic means, confusion, boycotts and violence”, estimated with AFP David Mathieson, independent expert.
With the generals having the protection of their Chinese and Russian allies on the UN Security Council, many in Burma have given up hope of help from the international community.
It would take “a miracle” for the Burmese resistance to obtain weapons as is the case in Ukraine, Mathieson said. Diplomatic sources in Yangon believe that Thailand, India and China, all of which border, will tacitly support the junta’s election plan, while the United States has already denounced this “imposture”.
Elections or not, the resistance does not intend to back down an inch. “The mission is to attack the military dictatorship with the determination of our defiance,” Lin Lin said. “When an elected government is chosen by the people, we will stop.”
