Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi will meet President Thein Sein and the country’s military commander-in-chief separately on Wednesday to discuss “national reconciliation” as her party prepares to assume power in January following its landslide victory in national elections.
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Myanmar’s National League for Democracy Party leader Aung San Suu Kyi is seen speaking to media in Yangon. It is also vital for NLD and Suu Kyi to maintain a cordial relationship with the military as the army continues to wield considerable influence in the Southeast Asian nation.
The NLD will be the dominant party when Myanmar’s new parliament sits in February.
It has 25 percent of all parliamentary seats guaranteed under the constitution as well as key security and bureaucratic posts that could put the brakes on an NLD government.
The meeting between Ms Suu Kyi and Mr Thein Sein was amicable, the presidential spokesman said.
But the opposition remains wary of a military establishment that has duped them before.
A previous election landslide by the NLD in 1990 was simply ignored by the then-ruling junta, which held onto power for a further two decades before ceding to a quasi-civilian regime in 2011.
Despite overwhelming public support, Ms Suu Kyi is constitutionally barred from taking the top job, because her children are not Burmese.
The pair smiled as they shook hands for the cameras before the closed-door session began.
Presidential spokesperson U Ye Htut said that the meeting in the country’s capital, Nay Pyi Taw, on Wednesday lasted for 45 minutes, but there was no discussion of constitutional issues.
Because it took so long for the two to meet, there were some concerns that the still powerful military would not easily accept the results. But she has suggested that she will rule through a proxy candidate.
Negotiations now could also determine whether a new trend of more a consultative approach to government is established, and parties in parliament can work together for the betterment of the country, rather than the autocratic manner in which the military-led government has operated in the past.
And Ms Suu Kyi said she was thankful that the elections were free and fair, as promised.
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The democracy icon had requested the meetings with the leaders of the current government and the military, apparently as part of preparations to form a new government led by the NLD as early as in March next year.
