The Burmese soldier, wearing his crisp green uniform, rifles through a box of T-shirts for a souvenir of his time in Myanmar’s fledgling legislature — a deeply controversial position in the former junta-run nation on the cusp of key elections.
With one-quarter of parliamentary seats and an effective veto on opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s presidential hopes, unelected military men have a major role in the nation’s delicate political transition, regardless of the result of landmark polls later this year.
Aung San Suu Kyi has said reforms are stalling and refuses to rule out a boycott of the election, expected in early November, as she fights to change the junta-era constitution which bars her from the top job.
Photo: AFP
While the army is reluctant to further relinquish its political leverage, observers said the hundreds of soldiers who have sat in parliament have been exposed to lively debate and compromise like never before.
“It is interesting,” the soldier said of his experience in the legislature, asking not to be named. “We serve here as a duty, appointed by the Tatmadaw [army],” he said, after finally selecting a T-shirt bearing a picture of the massive parliament building in the remote capital of Naypyidaw.
Myanmar’s army seized power in 1962 and ruled by force for nearly half a century, steering the formerly rich nation into isolation and poverty.
Criticism was crushed, with bloody crackdowns on mass protests in 1988 and 2007, the jailing of hundreds of dissidents and draconian media censorship.
In 2011, the country’s junta rulers dramatically stepped aside in favor of a quasi-civilian government, which has ushered in sweeping reforms, despite remaining dominated by retired generals.
Those changes — including the release of political prisoners, untethering of the press and opening up of the economy — stunned the international community and lured in hordes of foreign investors.
An International Crisis Group report released late last month said the military “initiated the transition and continues to back it.”
However, it said that while the army chief has pledged to ensure credible elections, its “expectations are unclear.”
The army also retains significant powers, including control of key security ministries.
Aung San Suu Kyi, whose party is expected to sweep the elections, is ineligible for the presidency because the army-drafted constitution excludes those with foreign children from top office. Her two sons are British, as was her late husband.
The military has vowed to prevent major constitutional amendments.
It has the last say on charter changes because of rules that require more than a three-quarters majority for significant amendments, and on these issues, they are set to vote together.
“When it comes to some things, some sections, we are organized,” Burmese Member of Parliament (MP) Brigadier General Htay Naing said in a rare interview at parliament recently.
However, he said army MPs were entitled to vote freely on other matters.
The military contingent of MPs — selected by the army chief and shuffled periodically — had evolved over the years, he added.
“In the past, there were many young people. They didn’t understand much. Now we have more seniors and so they are more knowledgeable,” he said.
The appointment of higher-ranking officers to parliament in 2012 also suggests an “evolution” in the understanding of their role, according to Renaud Egreteau, a visiting fellow at the Institute for Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore who has conducted research into Myanmar’s parliament.
While they have proved “increasingly engaged in discussions,” especially in closed-door parliamentary committees, he said they remained “relatively quiescent backbenchers” and were likely to stay as such until after the election.
However, he said their behavior might change if “the preserves of the military parliamentary bloc become increasingly challenged by fellow elected representatives — or a new government.”
Aung San Suu Kyi has a complex relationship with an army that kept her under house arrest for more than 15 years.
In 2013, the Nobel peace laureate said she was “fond” of the army — despite her detention, and despite a litany of allegations of rights abuses, particularly in Myanmar’s ethnic conflicts.
Aung San Suu Kyi has said that allowing soldiers to remain indefinitely in parliament is “not democracy,” but is advocating a gradual reduction in the proportion of army MPs — a pragmatic position in a nation and region blighted by military coups.
Even the army admits it would one day need to retreat to the barracks.
“There will be a time when we are not needed here anymore,” Htay Naing said, but added that the nation’s decades of ethnic conflict, still raging in some areas, justified the military’s continued presence in politics.
With Aung San Suu Kyi barred from the presidency, observers say the tussle for the top job might end up between two ex-generals — Burmese President Thein Sein and Parliamentary Speaker Shwe Mann — while Military Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing is also thought to harbor political aspirations.
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