NAYPYITAW — The ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) said it will form a team tasked with monitoring the performance of the ministers and fellow party lawmakers of the country’s states and regions.
U Zaw Myint Maung, the NLD’s vice-chairman, revealed the plan following a meeting of the party’s Central Executive Committee (CEC) in Naypyitaw on Sunday.
He said the team will monitor the local chief ministers, other ministers and NLD lawmakers in order to improve the party’s performance ahead of the 2020 general elections.
“It will see if the chief ministers and ministers are really working and if the lawmakers visit their constituents. This will make us better prepared” for the elections, he said.
U Zaw Myint Maung did not say what measures the party would take against ministers and lawmakers found wanting.
While the regional ministers already have to submit monthly reports to the President’s Office about their activities, the new team will submit a monthly report of its own to the CEC.
“It is a good move, but it is important that the team is brave and speaks the truth about its peers,” said Daw Sandar Min, a NLD lawmaker in the Yangon Region Parliament.
The team will include one member each from the party’s CEC, Central Youth Committee, Central Women’s Committee and Regional Chapters Executive Committee.
NLD spokesperson U Myo Nyunt said there will also be a six-member team for each region and state to monitor the performance of other party members.
“The teams will assess the performance of the regional party chapters and submit a monthly report to the party CEC,” he said.
“I think it is good and necessary. But it is important that the assessments are fair and balanced and not biased by personal judgments,” U Myint Kyi, the municipal minister of Sagaing Region, told The Irrawaddy.
The move comes after the NLD lost some seats in by-elections last month that it had won in the 2015 general elections.
Translated from Burmese by Thet Ko Ko.
