Conflict-ravaged Burma Goes to the Polls in Widely Criticised 'Sham' Election.
Myanmar is going to the polls in a vote widely dismissed as a farce, with major political parties banned, numerous figures jailed and a significant portion of the country unable to participate because of an ongoing internal conflict.
A Phased Ballot Amid Conflict
The ruling junta is conducting a staggered election nearly half a decade after it took control in a coup, which sparked massive protests and spiralled into a devastating conflict.
Observers say the junta, with backing from Beijing, is attempting to validate and entrench its power as it looks for a way out of the devastating deadlock.
"The environment does not allow for the exercise of the freedoms of free speech, assembly or peaceful assembly," the United Nations' top human rights official Volker Türk stated.
More than 200 people have been charged for disrupting or opposing the polls under a new law which imposes harsh penalties, including the possibility of execution.
Director Mike Tee, performer Kyaw Win Htut and comedian Ohn Daing were among the prominent figures convicted under the law, which was enacted in July. They were each given a seven-year jail term after speaking out against a promotional video promoting the elections.
Immense Challenges and Coercion
Civilians are "being coerced from all sides," Mr Türk said in a comment, adding that resistance forces have made warnings asking people to boycott the polls.
The army has been engaged on multiple battlefields, against both armed resistance groups who oppose the coup, as well as ethnic armed organisations which have their own forces. It ceded territory of large parts of the country in a series of major setbacks, but regained territory this year following relentless airstrikes made possible through support from China and Russia.
All of this and the fact that significant regions of the country are still under rebel administration presents a huge operational hurdle for holding an election.
A Restricted Poll
Voting is set to take place in three rounds over the next month in two hundred and seventy-four of the country's 330 townships, with the remainder deemed not secure enough. Results are expected by late January.
There is unlikely to be any voting in as much as one half of the country. Even in the townships that are voting, not all constituencies will go to the polls, making it challenging to forecast a possible turnout.
A handful of parties, including the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party, are fielding candidates nationwide, while dozens more parties and non-aligned contenders will compete only at the local levels.
Some 40 parties, including Aung San Suu Kyi's National League of Democracy, which scored landslide victories in 2015 and 2020, have been dissolved. Suu Kyi and a number of the party's senior figures have been imprisoned under charges widely condemned as politically motivated, while others are in hiding abroad.
International Condemnation
"By splitting the vote into phases, the junta can adjust tactics if the results in the initial round do not go their way," commented Htin Kyaw Aye, a representative of the election-monitoring group Spring Sprouts.
Nations in the West, including the UK and the European Parliament, have dismissed the vote as a pretence, while regional bloc Asean has called for political dialogue to precede any election.
The Myanmar regime has dismissed condemnation of the polls, maintaining that it aims to "return [the country] to a democracy with multiple parties".
"The election is being held for our nation. It is being held for the people of this country. It is not being held for the outside world," a junta spokesman stated at a news conference last week.
Military leader Min Aung Hlaing cautioned earlier this week that those who refuse to vote are rejecting "the path to democracy".
