Myanmar’s democratic process was originally planned by the military, a product of authoritarianism and popular compromise, to avoid the bloodshed of a direct revolution and to spare the military government, which should have been held accountable for its dictatorship and numerous crimes, from punishment, as was the case with the authoritarian Kuomintang’s transition to democracy in Taiwan. Myanmar was expected to follow the example of Taiwan’s Kuomintang and move from authoritarianism to democracy, but after a decade of slow progress, it has suddenly stopped, causing international shock.
Ung San Suu Kyi is the most embarrassing
The most embarrassing part of this coup is, of course, Ung San Suu Kyi, who was the subject of international condemnation for the genocide of Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine State by the local army and Buddhist militant groups in 2017, and the UK even withdrew the medal awarded to her, which is a great shame. The U.S. announced sanctions with limited effect, but the Chinese Communist Party is secretly clapping and applauding to see how Biden will clean up the mess.
On February 8, mass protests on the streets of Yangon, after several days of calling, have gathered 100,000 people, just like the anti-Send-China movement in Hong Kong, the masses demanded the military to release Ung San Suu Kyi, the police finally shot and expelled the crowd after a few days of restraint, the demonstration movement against military control on the streets of Yangon before the All NLD came to power is back, this is the misfortune of Burma, the cycle of history always does.
After the end of the Pacific War, the British also ended their colonial rule in Burma, and the British-trained military took over the administration, and Burma entered a military-run military regime. However, after half a century, Burma became the poorest country in the Central South Peninsula, and the military government became an object of hatred for the people. The Philippines and Indonesia have become dictatorship version 2.0, Vietnam and Laos are also ruled by strongmen, Myanmar and Khmer are half-hearted, and Thailand is often in turmoil due to its attempts to overthrow the royal power.
Communist-led military change of heart
The military’s sudden change of face towards Myanmar’s democratic process began when the military-backed USDP was defeated by Ung San Suu Kyi’s NLD with only 30 percent of the vote in last year’s election, and the military used election fraud as a reason to launch the coup. The sum total of fears finally made the military turn its face and blatantly retract its commitment to democratization, the reason actually being the ridiculous Ung San Suu Kyi’s illegal importation of walkie-talkies.
The reasons for Myanmar’s troubled democratic process go beyond the military’s intervention. Richard Cockett, the British Economist’s correspondent in Myanmar, best described Myanmar as a democracy in disguise in his 2016 book, “Myanmar in Disguise,” saying that Myanmar is a land of blood, Dreams, and Gold.
Another book that understands Burma, “Rebels in Pursuit of Freedom and Democracy” by Delphine Schrank, begins with a straightforward statement that Burma’s problems stem from a conflict of three forces, British colonialism, Greater Burmeseism, and ethnic minorities, and that in the 1950s, the military, the wielder of state power, sought to perpetuate colonialism and make Burma the only ethnic Burmese Burma itself is multi-ethnic and stateless, with the Burmese living in the central lowlands accounting for 60% of the population, and the other 40% living in the so-called drug zones that border the mountainous areas, including the Karen, Kachin and Shan states. These ethnic groups do not want to be ruled by the Burmese and have set up their own armed independence movements that have not stopped to date. Some of these independent states in the north are Christian, as the Rohingya in Rakhine State believe in Muslims, and the radical Buddhist groups, with 500,000 practitioners, have sacrificed much in the pursuit of democracy in Burma by burning themselves, but Burma’s radical Buddhists are also cruel in their treatment of different religions, and these irreconcilable issues are the biggest obstacle to democratization in Burma.
The military’s dictatorship became an international joke after the war, with many dissidents imprisoned, the country in a state of self-imposed isolation, and economic development hampered.
It was only after 2000 that the military had to make peace with the already rising All People’s Alliance, so a democratic way of protecting the military’s seat in the lower parliament and limiting the power of Ung San Suu Kyi was born. Ung San Suu Kyi was released, Western money came back, and if it continued, perhaps democracy in Myanmar was in sight, but the military suddenly changed its face, and foreign media speculated that Chinese Communist Party Foreign Minister Wang Yi led the drama of the military’s change of face. In short, the Now the most happy is the Communist Party of Afghanistan, the most painful is the Burmese.
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