More Sham Election Deception

This past week, the illegal junta escalated its deceptive tactics to seek false legitimacy and promote its sham election plan, all while continuing to bomb civilians countrywide. The international community must unequivocally denounce the junta’s sham election and cut off its ability to commit atrocities against the people. At the same time, the international community—especially ASEAN—must take concrete actions to support the Myanmar people’s ongoing efforts to build federal democracy from the ground up.

On 30 July, the junta claimed that its sham election will happen by the end of this year—an exercise guaranteed to be completely farcical given the junta’s lack of legality, legitimacy, and territorial or administrative control to hold any kind of vote. On the same day, the junta announced the “Law on the Protection of Multiparty Democratic General Elections from Obstruction, Disruption, and Destruction,” which imposes draconian punishments for election interference or dissent, including the death penalty and life imprisonment.

On 31 July, the illegal junta changed its shell yet again, switching names from “State Administration Council” to “State Security and Peace Commission”—both complete misnomers for a criminal entity hellbent on destroying the country and terrorizing the people. In the same illegitimate breath, the junta chief appointed himself “acting president” and named nine other active and former military generals to the new “commission.” This is nothing more than a superficial reshuffle to whitewash the military junta with a civilian façade to seek false legitimacy on the world stage. The international community must not be fooled by these theatrics from the military’s decades-old playbook on entrenching tyranny.

Last week, the junta also announced three months of martial law for 63 townships across Kachin, Karenni, Karen, Rakhine, Shan, and Chin States, as well as Sagaing, Mandalay, and Magwe Regions. This move puts the junta’s lack of effective control on full display: 46 of those townships are under the control of anti-junta resistance forces, and in the other 16 townships, resistance forces control most rural areas.

Meanwhile, as the junta gears up to force a sham election as a so-called “solution” for the polycrisis of its own making, the junta is escalating its lethal airstrikes against civilians across the country—targeting hospitals, homes, hotels, Buddhist monasteries, and local markets crowded with people. On 2 August, the junta killed at least 19 people and injured 31 more in bombings targeting resistance-controlled areas of Mandalay Region. The timing of these attacks is no coincidence: The junta is using its firepower to rain bombs on areas under resistance control in an effort to gain territory before its sham election.

The junta’s relentless violence against the people has spurred even ASEAN—which has dragged its feet on the Myanmar crisis for years—to blatantly condemn the junta’s sham election plan and its atrocities against civilians. On 11 July, ASEAN announced its position that the junta’s so-called election “is not a priority” and “will not solve any problems, but instead will worsen conditions.”

In response, 237 organizations, including Progressive Voice, acknowledged ASEAN’s denouncement of the junta’s sham election as a step in the right direction. The organizations urged the bloc “to reinforce this position during its Summit in October with a concrete, time-bound action plan in support of the Myanmar people’s efforts to achieve a peaceful and sustainable future.”

Going forward, ASEAN must stop pressuring the Myanmar people to accept military tyranny through an “inclusive dialogue” with the criminal junta. The Myanmar people have fully and vehemently rejected the junta, and its sham election plan will never be a possible pathway to a genuine, durable peace in Myanmar. To take serious steps towards a sustainable, peaceful future for Myanmar, ASEAN and its Member States must immediately cease all engagement with the junta—including diplomatic, political, military, and financial engagement—and formally engage with Myanmar’s democratic stakeholders and legitimate representatives.

Following ASEAN’s position, the Japanese government also took a principled step in the right direction by publicly stating on 1 August that the junta’s sham election could “only provoke further strong backlash from the people of Myanmar and make a peaceful resolution more difficult.” It’s high time for the wider international community to follow suit.

The international community must also cut all ties with the junta and increase coordinated, targeted sanctions on the junta and its cronies. The junta’s sham election must be unequivocally denounced, and its capacity to terrorize the people must be stopped.

Global solidarity with the people of Myanmar—who are risking their lives to resist the military’s tyranny and build a new Myanmar where human rights are a reality for all—must be in the form of concrete action, including diplomatic isolation of the junta, strongly enforced sanctions, avenues to accountability, and political recognition of the Myanmar people’s legitimate representatives.

In the words of Khin Ohmar, Chairperson of Progressive Voice, “If the international community legitimizes this electoral farce, then you are not just legitimizing an illegal junta, you are denying the future of millions who are struggling to live in peace, dignity and hope. Myanmar’s peaceful future will not be born in the junta’s polling stations. It is already being built now, in liberated areas, displacement camps, bombed-out classrooms, online universities, and jungle hospitals by ordinary people doing extraordinary things.”

Myanmar’s people are risking everything for freedom from military tyranny. The world must not reward the junta nor its sham election with false legitimacy.

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[1] One year following the 1988 pro-democracy uprising, the former military junta changed the country’s name from Burma to Myanmar overnight. Progressive Voice uses the term ‘Myanmar’ in acknowledgement that most people of the country use this term. However, the deception of inclusiveness and the historical process of coercion by the former State Peace and Development Council military regime into usage of ‘Myanmar’ rather than ‘Burma’ without the consent of the people is recognized and not forgotten. Thus, under certain circumstances, ‘Burma’ is used.

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Progressive Voice is a participatory, rights-based policy research and advocacy organization that was born out of Burma Partnership. Burma Partnership officially ended its work on October 10, 2016 transitioning to a rights-based policy research and advocacy organization called Progressive Voice. For further information, please see our press release “Burma Partnership Celebrates Continuing Regional Solidarity for Burma and Embraces the Work Ahead for Progressive Voice.”