Given that Myanmar’s military junta has been in power since 1962, do you think they’ll leave peacefully if they were to lose next year?
The dramatic, instantaneous and nonsense “commutation” of Daw Aung Suu Kyi’s sentence from three years hard labour to a mere 18 more months of house arrest (on top of the 20 years she has already served) was designed to achieve two goals.
First the Home Minister Gen. Maung Oo’s announcement of the junta leader’s Senior Gen. Than Shwe’s commutation of the sentence in the interests of Myanmar’s “peace and tranquility” was meant to show Gen. Than Shwe as a reasonable man who has the country’s interests at heart.
Of course there should never have been a trial in the first place, since she was charged for breaking the terms of her house arrest when an uninvited American adventurer swam to her villa and claimed he wished to protect her. However, holding her responsible for something which was in no way her fault served Myanmar’s brutal military junta’s second objective.
Her new sentence will ensure she is safely out of the way for next year’s elections. After all, the military junta didn’t take too kindly when Daw Aung Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy Party won more than 80 percent of the seats in the 1990 election; many of the party’s winning candidates have since been imprisoned, as Chávez has been doing with the winning opposition candidates since last year’s elections in Venezuela.
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Unjust trials, cruel verdicts and imprisonment of the main opposition candidate, who is also the 1991Nobel Peace Laureate. Given that Myanmar’s military junta has been in power since 1962, do you think they’ll leave peacefully if they were to lose next year? No? Well, I’d be willing to bet that somehow, mysteriously, they will win the election. What do you think?
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