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Back in Myanmar to Push for By-elections in Ethnic Minority States [2020/11/27]
Myanmar’s ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) party, led by State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, won the November 8 general election by a landslide.

The election was only the second competitive national poll in the Southeast Asian nation after some 50 years of military rule.

As head of the Japanese government’s election observer mission, I visited 10 polling stations in and around Yangon to observe voting and ballot-counting amid the lockdown restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As I reported in my blog on November 18, I told an online press conference with local Myanmar and Japanese reporters on November 9 that based on my observations and other reports we received, the election was organized peacefully in a free and fair manner.

However, in some areas of the country that are home to ethnic minorities, including Rakhine and Shan states, voting was cancelled ahead of time due to security reasons. So, at my meeting with Chairman U Hla Thein of the Union Election Commission (UEC) in the capital of Nay Pyi Taw on November 6, I stressed the importance of holding by-elections in those areas and he promised they would take place−providing, that is, the security situation there has stabilized.  

I made a similar plea when I talked with Commander-in-Chief of the Defense Services Senior General Min Aung Hlaing in the capital before and after the election and discussed the issue with State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi at our meeting on November 10.

After I came back to Japan, I received an urgent message from Myanmar that they need my cooperation to hold the by-elections. I accepted the request, believing “knowing what is right and not doing it is a want of courage” as I wrote here previously quoting an old Japanese saying. I thus left Tokyo and arrived in Yangon on November 25.

Myanmar is a country I have visited some 130 times in my capacity as Special Envoy of the Government of Japan for National Reconciliation in Myanmar and chairman of The Nippon Foundation. I am determined to work to the best of my ability to live up to Myanmar’s expectation by working with all the stakeholders in the country to hold by-elections in the areas concerned.
Posted by Y.Sasakawa at 15:03 | MYANMAR | URL | comment(0)
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