After Obama got Suu Kyi’s blessing during the Air Force One flight, he announced at the East Asia Summit in Bali that Clinton, who stood next to him, would within days become the first USA secretary of state in 50 years to visit Burma. “She won the Nobel Peace Prize because of her courage against the junta”.
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Suu Kyi is the head of the National League for Democracy but a constitutional ban blocks her from running for the presidency. She is ineligible for the presidency because she has foreign family members, and key ministries are reserved for the military.
The formerly junta-ruled country goes to the polls on Sunday in elections that could see the army’s decades-long grip on power substantially loosened.
“In general, these elections are important because they are the first real indicator of whether the democratic transition is going to take a big step forward or remain in a quasi-civilian middle ground for years to come”, said Thant Myint-U, a historian and government adviser.
Preparation for the elections has been marred by a series of setbacks with around 4 million people unable to cast their votes. Very few people attend their rallies, according to political analysts and civil society organisations closely watching the election campaign.
She is under pressure from hardline Buddhist nationalists at home for not being “anti-Muslim” enough, and criticised by the worldwide community overseas for her failure to speak out more strongly against the situation.
For Aung San Suu Kyi, gone are the novice missteps and the hesitant idealism, replaced by a tough-minded appreciation of what it will take to fully dismantle the machinery of dictatorship.
After so many years without access to uncensored news, it makes sense that the transformation of public debate will generate a few problems.
For an outright majority over the combined parliament, the NLD need to win at least 330 – or 67 percent – of the contested seats.
Yet she knows that, whatever the outcome, there will have to be arduous negotiations with military-aligned interests still looking to retain control. Like many fans, he called her “Daw Suu”, meaning “Aunt Suu”.
As the country also known as Burma prepares for its most competitive election in a generation, there’s little talk in Congress about removing sanctions.
The NLD is fielding candidates in almost all of the nearly 1,200 constituencies up for grabs, a decision that angered the leaders of smaller ethnic-based parties who fear they will lose out.
The political evolution of Myanmar is so central to Clinton’s legacy that she raised it at one of the most stressful moments of her presidential campaign – a Capitol Hill hearing on Benghazi last month – to prove her ability to bridge political divides in Washington.
“I do not believe in persecution and revenge; I’ve always said – and not just me, but the NLD as its official policy from the very beginning has said – that national reconciliation will be the foundation of our movement for democracy”, Aung San Suu Kyi said.
Suu Kyi said the commission had ignored repeated complaints about irregularities in advance voting, the illegal use of religion by her political opponents, and the disenfranchisement of migrant workers.
The 70-year-old opposition leader looked relaxed as she fielded dozens of questions from reporters at her lakeside villa and expressed confidence that if her party wins the polls, as it is expected to, she will lead the next government.
VOTERS: About 30 million of Myanmar’s 52 million people are eligible to vote.
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AFTER THE ELECTIONS: Three electoral colleges will be formed comprising elected representatives of the upper house, the lower house and appointed military representatives from both houses. Suu Kyi’s silence on the plight of the Rohingya Muslims, at tremendous cost to her global image as an icon of democracy and human rights, was clearly aimed at corralling this vote. On the other was the opposition, led by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy, whose aim was never anything less than democratic government. The army had run the country for five decades had had kept Suu Kyi, hugely popular, under house arrest for years.
