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BURMA
Suu Kyi’s Inexperienced Party in Search of Policies for Burma
A car passes a signboard in front of the venue for the National League for Democracy party congress in Rangoon. (Photo: The Irrawaddy)
RANGOON — Aung San Suu Kyi’s inexperienced party begins its first congress on Friday aiming to push forward positions that will become increasingly important in the run-up to a 2015 election in Burma that could sweep it into government.
For years Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) had the singular, unswerving objective of ending rule by the generals who hounded it and locked up its leaders.
While that mission may not be completely over, the NLD has become fully involved in politics under reforms ushered in by President Thein Sein and his quasi-civilian government since the end of direct military rule in 2011.
But the NLD has not set out its aims and spelled out how it will achieve them.
Foreign investors are moving in but uncertainty remains while the investment and financial climate evolves. The prospect of Suu Kyi’s NLD taking the reins of government brings additional risk, especially if its policies are vague.
“The biggest problem is the NLD needs more policy expertise—not who calls the shots, but they need to bring in more outside experts who can help them craft a policy platform and, potentially, govern,” said Joshua Kurlantzick of the Council on Foreign Relations think-tank in the United States.
“While the current government is OK, it is still putting into place decent policies in an essentially authoritarian framework, so an NLD victory would open up politics and make it more democratic. They just need to bring in more policy expertise.”
While Suu Kyi has become an influential voice in the newly empowered parliament, political analysts say the NLD has few real policies beyond its famous chairwoman’s statements.
Suu Kyi co-founded the party in 1988, just after the military crushed a months-long democracy uprising and after years of military rule when opposition parties were banned.
The party was defined by its opposition to the military and easily won a 1990 election. But the junta refused to accept the result. Suu Kyi and many party members spent years in detention.
Struggling to survive, the party did little work on policy. But even during the reform process that began in 2011, and has seen the military surrender rule to a government run by ex-soldiers, it has not set out an agenda.
The party issued a two-page manifesto for by-elections in April 2012 that put Suu Kyi and 42 NLD colleagues in Parliament, after they boycotted a general election in November 2010.
It made the rule of law, internal peace and reforming the Constitution top priorities. The Constitution was ratified after a fraudulent referendum in 2008 and it reserves a quarter of parliamentary seats for military personnel, effectively giving the military a veto.
Senior NLD member Han Tha Myint said the congress, which runs until Sunday, was the party’s first opportunity to fill out its middle ranks, bringing in new faces and new ideas.
“We didn’t get this chance in the past,” he told Reuters.
All seven members of the party’s Central Executive Committee, which is led by Suu Kyi, are in their sixties or seventies. Suu Kyi, 67, and other leaders who risked their lives to try to end military rule are expected to continue to determine the party’s overall direction.
Suu Kyi, in comments in the party’s weekly paper, D-Wave, warned of “a rough journey” ahead.
“It is necessary to strengthen the party with new blood and it is necessary to make correct choices,” she wrote.
The party’s popularity, built on its stand against the generals, is unquestionable. It has more than 1.2 million members in a country of an estimated 60 million people. Members have chosen 894 delegates for the congress.
The party said the agenda would include national reconciliation—a preoccupation in a diverse country plagued by ethnic conflicts—human rights and democracy and policy.
Trevor Wilson, a former Australian ambassador to Burma, said the NLD needed practice.
“One task they face is to get as much knowledge and experience between now and 2015 when they might assume the running of the government,” he said.
“They still have quite a bit of time to do this.”
Additional reporting and writing by Alan Raybould
Forget about policy at this moment. Policy is much more difficult step. First NLD need to find it’s own soul. Repeating talk of Democracy, Human Rights and peace will not do the trick in very near future. I have my own thinking of how will I achieve my own organization unity, strength and objectives if I am running an organization? The very first step is to find organization’s “CORE BELIEVE”. Organization’s core believe should be within 20 words, easy to remember and it should represent all of the organization’s members and majourity populace. Than, second step should be finding the principles of the organization. Organization should be live and die with it’s own principle and the principle must represent as much population as possible. Organization must be free from individual influence and it must always represent by Democracy principle. When Organization achieve those qualities, than organization can start influence majourity of the society and organization can built policy depend on majourity society demend. The policy which doesn’t represent or reflect to the demends of people is a fail policy. If you understand what is a fail policy, than you will understand what is a successful policy. Sometime, a successful policy can not be implimented by many reasons, but successful policy always return very often. NLD has to understand entire Burmese population before NLD do any political work and searching organization’s soul. At this moment, NLD is just big ZOMBIE organization full with a big nothing. It is interesting that if NLD win in 2015 election, how will they run the country? I know that it will still be better than quasi BS government, but we will not achieve as much as we should achieve as a nation. NLD’s Aunties and Uncles should give up power and make way for younger generation. You guys fought against the power, why are you doing exactly the same behaviour that you fought with your life? Is it logical?
How about fighting for the release of all political prisoners along with an apology and some compensation for their suffering?
Trevor Wilson!
Any idiot with a single bone of honesty would readily admit this NLD thing is pale beyond joke.
One Woman and Her Fan Club and Opportunists Party.
Characterized by total disregard for any one;’s opinion but her own. Let alone people of the country but no one at all knows what is going on to start with yet HOWLING LIKE A BANSHEE of openness, BS and “Democracy” which is in Burma is like MSG!
All Aung San Suu Kyi has done thus far is reverse of what should be happening in Burma. Stopping the military in the track. No she encourages verbally and by silence so that they can commit more atrocities against the citizens of Burma more than ever.
Cutting own the military budget. No, it is even increased visibly and invisibly. While people are starving still working in farms, factories and government posts.
Keeping peace among the people. NO. She incites the chauvinistic Burman and Arakanese against the “mus” so that it will now spread to more and more parts of the country.
What does NLD stand for a-in any policy matters? They simply glow and gloat over one woman the “West” is using to get access to rape and pillage the land and enslave the people.
Those IMF, WB, ADB, Japanese LOANS AND LOANS AND LOANS are to build roads and buildings (by their own companies, using their own audit firms) for the benefit of the international corporations and the Comparado bourgeois and the connected party members and leaders of the “ethnic armed groups (Peace Groups or Piece Groups) but the people of the country Burma who are going to be looted off their land and put in hard labor camps called SEZ’s are the ones having to pay back the LOANS.
And we are celebrating!!!!
Aristotle said that the three aims of the tyrant are, one, the humiliation of his subjects; he knows that a mean-spirited man will not conspire against anybody; two, the creation of mistrust among them; for a tyrant is not to be overthrown until men begin to have confidence in one another — and this is the reason why tyrants are at war with the good; they are under the idea that their power is endangered by them, not only because they will not be ruled despotically, but also because they are too loyal to one another and to other men, and do not inform against one another or against other men — three, the tyrant desires that all his subjects shall be incapable of action, for no one attempts what is impossible and they will not attempt to overthrow a tyranny if they are powerless.
The tryants have their plan in place. It’s a shame the same can’t be said of the NLD.