The Situation in Myanmar
On the morning of February 1st 2021, the democratically elected members of Myanmar’s Government were forcibly romoved from power by the Burmese military, the Tatmadaw. A few months earlier on November 8th 2020, Myanmar had held a general election that was widely accepted by the international community as legitimate and fair, despite conflict and political upheaval, especially in the Rakhine and Shan states. The election was a landslide for the sitting party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), who increased their already large majority by three seats in both the upper and lower house. This gave Myanmar’s progressive leader Aung San Suu Kyi an even larger mandate to enact the radical reforms the country needed to continue its upward economic trajectory before the SARS-CoV2 pandemic. The coup was carried out one day before the newly-elected members of Parliament were due to be sworn in. A number of charges have been brought against Suu Kyi and other members of her party by the Tatmadaw, including breaching Burmese COVID-19 restrictions, violationg the official secrets act, and intent to incite public unrest. Large-scale protests followed, and during what is now being called “The Spring Revolution”, over eight-hundred people have been killed by military and police forces, and over four-thousand have been arrested. The Tatmadaw have attempted to frame the 2020 election as fraudulent, despite Myanmar’s independant electoral commission catagorically rejecting these claims. The military invoked articles 417 and 418 of the 2008 Burmese Constitution, which gives power to the sitting president to declare a national emergency after consultation by the National Defence and Security Council (NDSC), and transfers the power of the three branches of Government to the Commander-in-Chief, respectively. However, the state of emergency was declared by the Vice-President, and the civilian members of the NDSC (which comprised half of its members) had been arrested by the Tatmadaw. This has lead to the reinstatement of the military junta being internationally criticized as unconstitutional.
The Story so far
The motives for this coup are blindingly obvious to everyone who knows the slightest amount about the Tatmadaw, or their history in Myanmar. Since the departure of the British, Myanmar (then Burma) was subjected to near-constant military dictatorships and civil war, before mass protest and public outcry led to elections being held in 1990. Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD Party won an overwhelming majority, but the military refused to give up power. The NLD won another resounding victory in the 2015 election, and Suu Kyi was granted the role of State Counsellor. Suu Kyi and the NLD wished to enact as many reforms as possible to loosen the Tatmadaw’s grip on power, but the 2008 consitution grants the military a quarter of the seats in the legislature automatically, as well as having de facto control over the rural states. Even during Suu Kyi’s tenure, the Tatmadaw still enjoyed considerable power in Myanmar, leading to the continuation of the various conflicts in the Burmese countryside, as well as the genocide against the Rohingya people in Rakhine state. After the NLD increaded its majority in the 2020 election, and the military subsequently losing seats, they staged another coup.
The Tatmadaw’s Motives, and Hope for the Future
The Tatmadaw has been the ruling power in Myanmar for almost half a century. Whilst they may not have a central figure to rally to, such as Pol Pot in Cambodia, or Mao in China, The Tatmadaw as an institution has subjected the people of Myanmar to similar levels of injustice and cruelty. Through threats and deceit they have wriggled their way to more and more power in Myanmar’s new democratic system to ensure their hegemony in the country. When the people try to oust them democratically, they simply throw a tantrum and take back control. That is all this coup is; a national tantrum from the spoilt brat Tatmadaw, so accustomed to oppressing and brutalising its own citizens that they cannot stand for a second to be any less than in total control of the country. The only issue they have now, is that they have flagrantly broken their own laws to keep their precious power, and in the age of the Internet, a government’s flaws may be exposed for the whole world to see. The voice that the Burmese people posess is now louder than ever, and their overwhelming response to the coup has been one of repudiation. Civil disobedience is widespread, the streets are almost constantly full of protests, and strikes are becoming more and more frequent all over the country. Police have started defecting to the side of the protestors, and a military boycott campaign has been started by the people. Even some members of the Tatmadaw have defected.
stay safe
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