Myanmar’s military regime is again stepping up efforts to hold a nationwide election after recent anti-regime offensives appeared to derail plans for the multi-party poll it claims is its ultimate goal.
Min Aung Hlaing earlier this month transferred his religious affairs minister, Ko Ko, to head of the regime’s election body. Ko Ko met with members of political parties last Wednesday while vowing to make the junta chief’s proposed poll a success.
On Thursday, junta immigration minister Myint Kyaing and officials from the Home Affairs Ministry met to discuss election preparations. Regime media said Myint Kyaing reported on progress of the national census, which is scheduled for completion by October.
They added that the first draft of the census has already been submitted to the junta’s election body.
Min Aung Hlaing says the census results will be used to compile voter lists. He told leaders of political parties on Feb. 13 that his regime was preparing for the poll.
The junta chief has never said when the election will be held, but signs point to 2025 after the voter lists are compiled.
Last year, his regime enacted a new Political Parties Registration Law which requires all political parties to re-register with junta’s election body or face dissolution. Major pro-democracy parties including the National League for Democracy and Shan Nationalities League for Democracy declined to register.
The regime has also decided to replace the current first-past-the-post system with proportional representation and invited tenders for the supply of election materials. It has also created an electronic voting machine, which the election body has demonstrated to voters in Yangon, Mandalay, Naypyitaw and Ayeyarwady.
The regime has however lost more than 40 towns since November last year, with fighting still raging in many parts of the country. Observers say the loss of huge swaths of territory and ongoing resistance offensive make it difficult to conduct the census, adding that voter lists compiled under such circumstances will not be accurate.
Min Aung Hlaing has, however, met leaders of political parties twice since January. He has also eased rules for registration of parties. Orders have halved to 50,000 the minimum number of members a party must have in order to contest the national election while cutting the number of townships where they must have offices.
Just over a week ago, the junta enforced mandatory military service for the country’s young population, saying conscription was necessary to restore peace and stability to pave the way for a “free and fair” election.
Fourteen million people are eligible to serve under the national conscription law, which was activated on Feb. 10. Observers say the law is intended to prop up a military seriously depleted by heavy casualties, desertions, mass surrenders and a recruitment crisis.
The US and other western governments, as well as the majority of Myanmar people, believe any vote held by the regime will be neither free nor fair and instead designed to cement military rule.
