Military rule is a form of autocratic governance in a country. Its tenures rarely end in democratization, whereas the opposite is true of military regimes.
by Anwar A. Khan
Burma, officially called the Union of Burma, is the largest country by area located in Southeast Asia. Burma is also known as Myanmar. Burma comes from the Burmese word "Bamar," which is the local word for Myanmar.
Naypyidaw, officially spelled Nay Pyi Taw is the capital and third-largest city of Myanmar. Mayanmar’s populace is 60 million. Theravada Buddhism, the majority religion of the nation. Distance from Bangladesh to Myanmar is 607 kilometers. This air travel distance is equal to 377 miles.
The Bangladesh–Myanmar border is the international border between the countries of Bangladesh and Myanmar. The border stretches 270 kilometres (170 miles), from the tripoint with India in the north, to the Bay of Bengal in the south. About 210 km (130 mi) of the border is fenced, with the government of Myanmar announcing in 2017 that it was planning to fence off the rest of the border.
Myanmar was ruled by the armed forces until 2011, when democratic reforms led by Aung San Suu Kyi ended military rule.
Aung San Suu Kyi, 75, is the daughter of Myanmar's independence hero, Gen Aung San who was assassinated just before the country gained independence from British colonial rule in 1948.
She remained popular with the public despite spending years under house arrest.
She was released in 2010, and in November 2015, she led the NLD to a landslide victory in Myanmar's first openly contested election for 25 years and became de facto leader.
In recent years, her leadership has been defined by the treatment of the country's mostly Muslim Rohingya minority. She has fallen from her grace.
In 2017 hundreds of thousands of Rohingya fled to its neighbouring Bangladesh due to an army crackdown sparked by deadly attacks on police stations in Rakhine state.
Myanmar’s military all of a sudden staged a coup d'etat Monday led by commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing and detained senior politicians including Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi — a sharp reversal of the significant, if uneven, progress toward democracy the Southeast Asian nation has made following five decades of military rule. The takeover was announced in a statement aired on a military-owned television station. All international print and electronic media have published this deplorable incident.
Military rule is a form of autocratic governance in a country. Its tenures rarely end in democratization, whereas the opposite is true of military regimes.
We know for autocratic rule by a member of the military, regardless of the nature of the rest of the leadership, is military-led autocracy. Military-led autocracy encompasses two distinctive forms of rule: domination of decision making by a group of officers representing the military institution, which we label a military regime; and dictatorship controlled by a single officer absent elite constraints, which we call military strongman rule.
It also suggests that theories of authoritarianism should take the military and its distinctive interests into account in that country.
Military rule implies that people are governed by force. This means that political freedom and participation are prevented because of political coercion (by military rule). To this effect, a political dictatorship prevents the masses from exercising their political rights to vote, for instance. The reason offered is that military rule is a political dictatorship that excludes people’s right to free and fair elections or political participation.
The consequences of a military dictatorship for education are that students could be prevented from questioning and challenging the state; and that scholars might be censored and, in some instances, silenced if they speak out against the state. Education would be constrained because education, in the first place, should allow people to criticise, oppose and disagree, and at the same time people would be included in an educational experience.
On the streets of the main city, Yangon, people said they felt their hard-fought battle for democracy had been lost.
But Suu Kyi’s international reputation also suffered severely following an army crackdown on the mostly Muslim Rohingya minority. Former supporters accused her of refusing to condemn the military or acknowledge accounts of atrocities.
Suu Kyi, President Win Myint and other leaders of the National League for Democracy (NLD) were arrested in a series of raids.
No major violence has been reported. Soldiers blocked roads in the capital, Nay Pyi Taw, and the main city, Yangon. International and domestic TV channels, including the state broadcaster, went off air. Internet and phone services were disrupted. Banks said they had been forced to close.
Later, the military announced that 24 ministers and deputies had been removed, and 11 replacements had been named, including in finance, health, the interior and foreign affairs.
A curfew is now reportedly in effect in Myanmar. It signals repression shall easily be applied against opponents and democratic forces in Myanmar because armies are prepared to use force at all times.
The military takeover follows weeks of tensions between the armed forces and the government following parliamentary elections lost by the army-backed opposition.
The opposition had demanded a re-run of the election, raising allegations of widespread fraud that were not backed by the electoral commission.
The armed forces in Myanmar have confirmed that they have carried out a coup d'etat, their first against a civilian government since 1962, and in apparent violation of the constitution which the military promised to honour as recently as last Saturday.
The grievances which have been driving tension between the military and the government are well enough known. The military-backed party, the USDP, performed poorly in last November's general election, whereas the NLD did even better than in 2015.
The timing of this coup is also easily explained. This week the first session of parliament since the election was due to start, which would have enshrined the election result by approving the next government. That will no longer happen.
But the military's longer game plan is hard to fathom. What do they plan to do in the year they have given themselves to run the country? There will be public anger over a coup so soon after an election in which 70% of voters defied the Covid-19 pandemic to vote so overwhelmingly for Aung San Suu Kyi.
Famously stubborn, she is unlikely to co-operate with a gun held to her head. Her ally, President Win Myint, is the only person authorised under the constitution to enact a state of emergency. He has been detained with her.
For the moment the military's action appears reckless, and puts Myanmar on a perilous path.
Michael Ghilezan, a partner of a US law firm who lives in Yangon, told the international news agencies he had expected military vehicles and protests in the city, but there was instead an eerie calm. "The most common reaction from my Burmese friends has been anger. They feel deeply betrayed by the military and the USDP."
This was reflected in other comments from the streets, although there have been some supporters of the army out waving flags in Yangon.
TheinnyOo, a development consultant, told Reuters: "We had a lawful election. People voted for the one they preferred. We have no protection under the law now."
Many people feared giving their names. One 64-year-old resident of Hlaing township told AFP, "I don't want the coup. I have seen many transitions in this country and I was looking forward to a better future."
Author and historian Thant Myint-U tweeted that a door had opened to a "very different future", and he feared for the millions who had been descending into poverty.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres called the army's move a "serious blow to democratic reforms", as the security council prepared for an emergency meeting. The UN demanded the release of what it said were at least 45 people who had been detained.
Joe Biden released a statement saying "force should never seek to overrule the will of the people or attempt to erase the outcome of a credible election".
He said the removal of sanctions over the past decade as Myanmar progressed to democracy would be immediately reviewed, adding: "The United States will stand up for democracy wherever it is under attack."
In the UK, Prime Minister Boris Johnson condemned the coup and Aung San Suu Kyi's "unlawful imprisonment".
European Union leaders have issued similar condemnations. But China, which has previously opposed international intervention in Myanmar, urged all sides in the country to "resolve differences", while some regional powers, including Cambodia, Thailand and the Philippines, said it was an "internal matter".
Earlier times, Suu Kyi's defence of the military over the widely condemned crackdown lost her much of her international support.
The military rulership affects the executive, legislature, the judiciary and the civil society. The values and norms imbibe manifests in the practice of the current democracy. This explicates the use of force rather than dialogue in the suppression of dissent and disobedience of the court orders, closure of media houses, the arrest of journalists. It displays with recklessness in the democratic environment. It is instructive to note that the era of military rule can only end with good governance by a civil democratic government.
I condemn the present military leadership who usurped power in Myanmar unlawfully in the most corrosive language despite we have a serious problem with Suu Kyi and its party NLD on millions of people of Rakhine community of Myanmar who were forced to flee to Bangladesh because of persecution by her government. They are now living in our country and it is a great burden for Bangladesh.
-The End –
The writer is an independent political analyst based in Dhaka, Bangladesh who writes on politics, political and human-centred figures, current and international affairs.
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