BANGKOK – By throwing his weight behind the legitimacy of Burma’s opposition party, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has deprived Burmese Prime Minister Khin Nyunt of claiming political progress to mark his first anniversary in office.
Annan’s statement on Tuesday goes to the heart of what the Burmese military government has been avoiding – to permit the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) and its leader Aung Saan Suu Kyi, currently under house arrest, from participating in the country’s political reform process.
The UN secretary-general’s reference to the lack of credibility faced by the National Convention, a forum convened by the junta to draft a new constitution for the country, was an added blow to the attempts by Khin Nyunt to convince the international community that Rangoon is serious about democratic reform.
"Unless and until the views of the National League for Democracy and other political parties are sought and considered, the National Convention and the roadmap process will be incomplete, lacking in credibility, and therefore unable to get the full support of the international community," Annan declared in his statement.
Shortly after being appointed prime minister on Aug. 25, 2003, Gen. Khin Nyunt revealed plans for a seven-step road map towards democratic reform in Burma. The reconvening of the National Convention, which was first initiated in 1993 but adjourned in 1996, was described as the preliminary step of this exercise.
But some Burmese pro-democracy activists say that the UN chief’s unequivocal position will expose the role Khin Nyunt has been asked to play over the past year by the junta, which is led by the all-powerful Gen. Than Shwe.
"He is only a puppet trying to play a role for the ruling generals," Zin Linn of the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma (NCGUB), the democratically elected government in exile, said in an interview.
None of the plans he has unveiled have come into existence, because the military rulers are only giving it lip service, he revealed. "Their agenda is different. To hold on to power."
"Khin Nyunt does not have the power to take political reform forward through the National Convention," Soe Aung, external affairs director of the Network for Democracy and Development, a group of Burmese exiles agitating for political reform, told IPS.
Khin Nyunt’s appointment last year was to "reduce the pressure the military regime was coming under by trying to appease the international community with an offer for political change," Soe Aung added.
In fact, some Burma watchers have portrayed Khin Nyunt as the moderate force within the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), as the government of Burma, also called Myanmar by the junta, is officially known.
But his military record, including his position as head of military intelligence in one of Southeast Asia’s most oppressive states, has exposed him of being very much a figure of the ruling dictatorship.
Khin Nyunt was appointed in the wake of global outrage following an attack on Suu Kyi and her party members on May 30 last year. The "Depayin massacre" as it has come to be known, due to over 70 people being killed and close to 100 missing, was the work of thugs linked to the junta.
Human rights groups viewed that attack as further proof that the junta was least interested in political reform, given the four decades the military has been in power after staging a coup in 1962.
The junta lent credence to that position by refusing to release Suu Kyi and thus denying her party’s involvement in the National Convention, which began for the second time in May under conditions that denied participants the right to debate and disagree with the constitution drafted by the military.
But the constitutional convention, which was adjourned on July 9, has already run into a crisis, say political insiders.
They dismiss the official view of the suspension where the junta said the current monsoon rains had created a problem and that the convention’s delegates had to return to their respective political bases to consult with their leadership.
"A difference has emerged between the SPDC and ethnic groups at the convention over decentralization of power," said a Burmese pro-democracy activist.
The 13 ethnic groups at the convention have drafted a proposal suggesting that each of their regions elect their own regional governments headed by a prime minister and that they have control over their area’s finances, he added.
"They also want to draft their own state constitution, which will protect the use of their own language in their state besides using Burmese and English," he revealed.
Burma’s 49 million people reflect the country’s ethnic diversity, which includes the Burmans, the largest group, and seven others with sizable numbers – the Chin, Kachin, Karen, Karenni, Mon, Rakhine and Shan.
The idea of equality among all ethnic groups was a feature recognized in the 1947 Panglong Accord, the document that defined Burma’s independence.
However, Burman-dominated military regimes have failed to uphold it in practice, resulting in decades long armed conflicts between Rangoon and ethnic rebels.
The junta’s reluctance to let go of its iron grip will make it increasingly difficult for Khin Nyunt to claim that there have been political improvements since his appointment, says Zin Lin of the NCGUB.
That has been made worse by Rangoon refusing entry to both Annan’s special envoy for political reform in Burma since the beginning of this year and to the UN human rights envoy for Burma.
It is a ban that the UN chief wants to end, with his call in this week’s statement to "allow the (UN) special envoy to return to Myanmar as soon as possible to continue his facilitation efforts."
