The National League for Democracy, the party of Nobel Peace Prize winner Daw Aung San Suu Ki is refusing to register for Burma's (or Myanmar, as the military dictatorship calls it) coming elections in protest over new regulations. In a unanimous decision, the NLD is refusing to compromise their principles and surrender to the undemocratic prerequisites of the Political Party Registration Law.
The Political Party Registration Law bans all political prisoners from participating in elections by voting and contesting, forming a political party, or joining a party. Parties must make sure that political prisoners are not included in their membership and must pledge in writing that they will obey and protect the country's constitution and abide by its election laws. They are also required to participate in the election. Failure to comply with these restrictions will lead to abolishment of the party.
For me, the decision was simple: No.
~ U Win Tin, leader of the NLD party, from his 3.30.10 editorial in the Washington Post.
Win Tin's simple refusal to legitimize his fascist government is powerful, moving, and an example for all moral citizens of every nation. But there is an irony here. Win Tin didn't get to decide that he was a 'no' - he was one of the ~2,100 political prisoners who are members of the NLD, and who would be disqualified from participation. Those who framed the debate, the junta, presented only choices they approved of: either a decapitated NLD, or no NLD at all.
The NLD is choosing a third way - non-cooperation.
By participating in this legal yet immoral process, the NLD would legitimize it. In 1990, the NLD won a landslide election campaigning for economic and social liberalization - but the entrenched interests prevented any real change from taking place. The results of that election have never been honored by the ruling junta, and any compromise with them that doesn't at least recognize that inequity is a step back. Without mechanisms to ensure accountability, any challenge to the entrenched interests can be expected to meet the same result - which is to say, whatever result they want.
Burma is at a crossroads. The NLD is substantially weakened by decades of the regime's abuses - at-will imprisonment, the harassment and surveillance of its members, and violent intimidation - yet the junta's autarkic leader, Than Shwe is 78 years old, and has never shared power enough that a viable successor could develop within his own regime.
It appears that Shwe is attempting to follow China's model, and pursue a purely economic liberalization program. They've begun to privatize the health care and educational system, and are divesting many previously public assets. Regulations on car and motorcycle ownership have been loosened to encourage consumption, and trade barriers to rice exports have been mostly removed. While these reforms will increase the standard of living for the people of Burma, their primary purpose is to ensure regime stability after the death of Shwe, by distributing power.
Burma is a nation which has been strangled into abject poverty. In 2008, the Burmese government had 48 hours notice of a category four cyclone, but provided no notice to its people leading to the deaths of 130,000. They then refused to accept aid for weeks, confiscating much of what got through; the intrasigence and malfeasance was so bad that the UK violated orders to stay out of Burma's airspace to furtively airdrop supplies for the 1.5 million people with no access to food or water. 50 million people strive for just the necessities of life. This campaign of bread-and-circuses may work to tether the citizenry to the emergent oligarchy for generations to come - and the NLD is right to work against that.
In this context, it is clear that the NLD needs to do whatever it can to prevent Shwe from successfully metamorphosisizing from Mao to Deng. If the NLD compromises with Shwe and allows him a hand in sewing the seeds of the next regime, they will be giving up the hope of a better harvest.
Win Tin makes the only ethical way forward clear:
I hope the international community will stand with us. The governments of the world should declare that they reject the regime's election and prearranged outcome, and pressure the regime to make substantive and positive change for Myanmar, beginning with the immediate release of all political prisoners, including Aung San Suu Kyi, and the cessation of the regime's military campaign against ethnic minorities. The regime should negotiate with Myanmar's democracy forces, led by Aung San Suu Kyi, and ethnic representatives for a peaceful solution toward national reconciliation and true democracy.