Myanmar’s military holds first election in five years, widely dismissed as a sham with Aung San Suu Kyi jailed and voting barred in rebel-held areas.
YANGON: Myanmar’s military junta is presiding over voting starting Sunday, touting heavily restricted polls as a return to democracy five years after seizing power.
The vote follows the 2021 coup that ousted Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government and triggered a devastating civil war.
Suu Kyi remains jailed and her National League for Democracy party has been dissolved.
International monitors have dismissed the phased, month-long vote as a rebranding of martial rule.
They cite a ballot stacked with military allies and a stark crackdown on dissent across the country of 50 million.
The election will not take place in vast rebel-held areas embroiled in conflict.
In junta-controlled territory, the first of three voting rounds begins Sunday in cities including Yangon, Mandalay and the capital Naypyidaw.
“The military are just trying to legalise the power they took by force,” one resident of Myitkyina told AFP, pledging to boycott the poll.
The run-up has seen none of the feverish public rallies that Suu Kyi once commanded.
“Almost no one is interested in this election,” said the 33-year-old Myitkyina resident, speaking anonymously for security reasons.
Junta chief Min Aung Hlaing has promoted the polls as a chance for reconciliation in state media.
He admits the military “will continue to play a role in the country’s political leadership” after results are in.
Under Myanmar’s constitution, 25% of parliamentary seats are reserved for the armed forces.
The military ruled for most of Myanmar’s post-independence history before a 10-year democratic interlude.
After Suu Kyi’s party trounced pro-military opponents in 2020, Min Aung Hlaing seized power alleging voter fraud.
Suu Kyi is now serving a 27-year sentence on charges rights groups call politically motivated.
“I don’t think she would consider these elections to be meaningful in any way,” her son Kim Aris said from Britain.
The NLD has been dissolved along with most parties from the 2020 vote.
The pro-military Union Solidarity and Development Party is by far the biggest participant in this election.
New electronic voting machines will not allow write-in candidates or spoiled ballots.
The junta is prosecuting over 200 people for “disrupting” the poll through protest or criticism.
Around 22,000 political prisoners languish in junta jails, according to a monitoring group.
Some present the poll as the only recourse for a country deadlocked in conflict.
“I’d like to urge people to come and vote,” People’s Party leader Ko Ko Gyi told AFP.
When the military seized power, it put down protests, driving many activists to fight as guerrillas.
The junta has waged a pre-vote offensive but concedes elections cannot happen in around one in seven constituencies.
An air strike on a hospital in Rakhine state this month killed more than 30 people, according to local aid workers.
“There are many ways to make peace, but they’ve chosen to have an election instead,” said Zaw Tun, a pro-democracy fighter in Sagaing.
According to conflict data group ACLED, 90,000 people have been killed on all sides since the coup.
Some 3.6 million people are displaced and half the nation lives in poverty, the UN says.
“I don’t think anybody believes those elections will contribute to the solution,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said.
The second round of polling is scheduled for January 11, with a date for the final round yet to be announced.
