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Myanmar votes after 20 years amidst poll boycott call by Opposition party of Aung San Sui Kyi | People in Myanmar on Sunday exercised their franchise in its first ever election held in last 20 years, though a low turnout of voters was witnessed. Over 29 million people were
eligible to vote but it was uncertain how many would actually cast ballots. Many
voters heeded opposition calls to boycott an election in which two military-backed
parties running virtually unopposed were certain to prevail in a tightly controlled
election to end 50 years of direct army rule. Barack Obama criticised the vote
as "anything but free and fair", the Guardian reported. The banned opposition
party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), led by Aung San Suu Kyi, which
won the 1990 vote, called on supporters to boycott the poll. It is expected that
the junta's political arm, the Union Solidarity and Development party, supported
by its proxy party, the National Unity party whose candidates are mainly retired
generals, will win comfortably, through sheer weight of numbers, the report added.
Security was tight with armed police patrolling the streets of the main city Yangon
. Shops in the capital Naypyidaw were ordered to close on Friday night and not
reopen until after the vote. In many constituencies the poll is a two-horse race
between the USDP and the National Unity Party (NUP), which is the successor to
late dictator Ne Win's party and is also closely aligned with the military. A
quarter of the seats in the two-chamber national parliament and regional legislatures
are reserved for military appointees whatever the outcome. Two opposition parties
have accused the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) formed by ministers
who retired from the military in April of illegally collecting advance ballots
by coercion. Incidents of voter intimidation were also reported by the Chin Human
Rights Organisation, which said that in a ward in Chin State in western Myanmar
one of the polling stations was at an army checkpoint. The generals were also
feared to be intentionally blocking access to information. Internet users in the
secretive country have reported slow connections and frequent outages for more
than a week. It maybe noted that the junta has refused to allow international
monitors or foreign media into the country for the election and local journalists
face strict restrictions on visiting polling stations unless on an official tour.
It is unclear when the results will be announced. Meanwhile, Democracy icon Aung
San Suu Kyi remained locked up and two pro-military parties are together fielding
about two-thirds of the total candidates, leaving the splintered opposition with
little chance of success. Nobel Peace Prize winner Suu Kyi swept her party to
power in 1990 but the result was never recognised by the ruling generals. She
has been detained for most of the past 20 years and is supporting a boycott of
Sunday's election. As voting got underway, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
said the flawed elections "expose the abuses of the military junta". Democratic
Party chairman Thu Wai told on Friday that his party was "deeply concerned" about
reports of voter intimidation across the country and had filed an official complaint.
"We have learnt that the USDP together with ward authorities are trying to get
advance votes by cheating, bribing or threatening people," the party wrote in
a letter to the country's election commission.
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