Nearly unimaginable a year ago, the recent reforms in Burma—releasing political prisoners, allowing democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi to run for Parliament, loosening censorship, and holding peace talks with armed ethnic groups—have been widely lauded and even rewarded by Western governments. In the last month, the United States restored diplomatic relations with Burma (also called Myanmar), and the EU removed travel bans on top officials.
Yet the reforms are inherently fragile, supported only by good will, and not rule of law. The country’s less than democratic constitution and the lack of transparency over who is really governing the country, means that any change could be reversed at any moment.
“If we are saying we are going toward democracy, these undemocratic elements in the constitution have to change,” says Dr. Sein Win, Burma’s prime minister-in-exile, who lives in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Sein Win, a first cousin to Suu Kyi, is chairman of the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma (NCGUB), the government-in-exile. The NCGUB was formed in the aftermath of the 1990 general election that Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) party won by a landslide and the junta ignored.
A guiding principle of the NCGUB is that once democracy and human rights are restored in Burma it will dissolve. That time has yet to come.
Under Burma’s Constitution—drafted by the military generals in 2008 and endorsed in a sham referendum—the military has an enshrined role in political leadership in the form of the National Defense and Security Council (NDSC), a permanent military institution.
The NDSC has 11 members, including the president, two vice presidents, the commander in chief, his deputy, and two speakers, and four key ministers—foreign affairs, home affairs, defense, and border affairs. The latter three ministries all go to the military, or “Tatmadaw,” effectively giving them majority voice in the council.
Moreover, 25 percent of seats in the national Parliament and regional assemblies are also reserved for Tatmadaw members.
And although the president appoints the commander in chief, the military chief has a strong say in ruling the country through his ministers. He can also suspend all “fundamental rights” “if necessary” during an emergency, although formally he needs presidential approval.
After the November 2010 election, the country’s first in 20 years, the ruling junta was dissolved and power was handed to a quasi-civilian government under President Thein Sein, a former general. The 2008 constitution also remains in place.
Win says the real power in Burma, therefore, is still in the hands of the army, which means that without the agreement of the commander in chief, nothing substantial can happen.
It is possible, the army supports democratic reform, but Win says without a real change to the constitution, those reforms can be reversed at any time.
“Only reforms are not enough—they have to be backed by law,” said the PM-in-exile.
Achieving this is what’s tricky. Tim Aye-Hardy, director of the New York-based Burma Global Action Network, describes the current constitution as intentionally designed to create significant confusion and a lack of consistency between the president, parliament, and the military.
“This is what they [the generals] have planned for so long to happen and I feel like the international community and Daw Suu are somehow compelled to play along with it.” Daw is an honorific affectionately used to refer to Suu Kyi.
Following the plan, Suu Kyi and the NLD are allowed to run for government in by-elections in April. Out of 664 seats in Parliament, 48 are vacant. If elections are fair, the NLD can be expected to win all of them.
Continued: Window of Opportunity
Window of Opportunity
But while 48 seats, or roughly 7 percent of Parliaments, are not enough to impose legislative changes, some feel that it’s positive that the opposition will be in Parliament at all.
“A small window of hope is about to open by having Daw Suu and other NLD members in the Parliament, that she might be able to persuade the MPs from the military and majority party (USDP) to support any proposed bills and overturn existing unjust laws,” said Aye-Hardy.
Then the proposed changes need to be taken up by the president who he has to “convince or impose” them on the military, said Paul Copeland, a Toronto-based lawyer and longtime activist for democracy in Burma.
“Suu Kyi can initiate the changes but the president has to drive them. If he is not interested in these changes, it is not going to happen. But I think he is,” said Copeland.
The lawyer says that even if the military still has the say in Burma, the country has gone a long way away from absolute control.
“It would be unfair to the president, to say that the military are ruling behind the scenes, as he has been the one driving democracy in Burma. I think the president has to be given credit.”
The release of 651 prisoners earlier this month came after a presidential amnesty. The NLD was allowed to register for the by-elections under President Thein Sein, and he displayed good will in meeting Suu Kyi after her release from detention shortly after the November elections.
Last week, Burma’s Foreign Minister Wunna Maung Lwin declared the reforms in Burma “irreversible.” And in President Thein Sein’s first interview with foreign media, he told the Washington Post that he vowed to bring peace and stability to the Burmese people and all ethnic groups.
Believing Too Soon?
Still, the extent of the president’s power has been questioned. Only half of those released in the amnesty were political prisoners, leaving several hundred dissidents behind bars. And despite peace talks and ordering a ceasefire with the Kachin Independence Army, government troops have continued to attack ethnic Kachin bases in northern Burma.
It begs the question of who is really calling the shots in Burma.
“The real power is in the ex-Commander in Chief Than Shwe, while the current one, Gen. Min Aung Hlaing seems to be the paper tiger,” says Kanbawza Win, former foreign affairs secretary to the prime minister of Burma in the 1970s, who now lives in exile in Canada.
Commenting via email from Vancouver, Kanbawza Win says Shwe still influences the NDSC and is pulling the strings behind the scenes. The ex-official doesn’t believe the government or the generals will ever change their mentality and will thus cling to the current constitution in order to remain “the only pebble in the beach.”
In the article titled “Why Should the West Fall into the Burmese Trap,” published in Burma Digest, Kanbawza Win warns, “The West should not be carried away by some cosmetic reforms and that Burma’s long-ruling military still wields enormous power despite a veneer of democracy provided by the sham elections with a dubious constitution.”
When it comes to lifting economic sanctions on Burma, most experts agree that without real reforms, the gesture does nothing to help the Burmese people, and will only benefit the regime and its cronies.
“We should all be aware that economic hardships and severe poverty that people of Burma are facing are the direct results of the decades of economic mismanagement by the regime and plunder of the country’s natural resources for their own personal benefits, not because of sanctions imposed by the Western countries,” says Aye-Hardy.
Thus many Burma activists argue that the best course is for the West to offer cautious support for the changes, and remain vigilant about protecting interests of the people in one of the poorest countries in the world.
“It’s important that the international community remains strong in its approach on Burma until there is genuine and deeper political reforms taking place. What people in Burma want is the release of all political prisoners and a nationwide ceasefire that leads to a long-term political settlement through national reconciliation,” wrote Zoya Phan from Burma Campaign U.K. in an email from London.
“As long as the repressive laws and constitution remain in place, people in Burma won’t enjoy real peace and freedom.”
