Myanmar’s “Election” Reveals Hairline Cracks in Military Rule

Myanmar’s new parliament will convene this month, following an election tightly stage-managed by the junta. The Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) will enjoy a commanding majority and the party of former generals can be expected to preserve the interests of the military and its associates.

It is unclear just how closely these broader interests align with the political ambitions of junta chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing. He does not formally lead the USDP, whose majority means it can choose the president without the help of the 25 per cent bloc of unelected military MPs.

In reality, the presidency and other major appointments are subject to delicate negotiations between USDP leaders and the junta chief. While Min Aung Hlaing allegedly covets the presidency, the constitution states that different people must occupy the positions of commander-in-chief and the two parliamentary speakers.

Analysts will pore over any future flicker of tension between these individuals — not for signs of budding democracy, but of instability within the ruling clique.

However, another vulnerability lies beyond the corridors of Naypyidaw. The USDP’s sweeping victory in the December–January election — surpassing 80 per cent of elected seats in the national legislature — has distracted attention from its actual vote share. Official figures put this at about 44 per cent of all ballots cast, prior to the distortions of the ‘winner-takes-all’ electoral system.

The party failed to win more than half of the votes in many constituencies in Bamar-majority regions (including some in Naypyidaw), where no ethnic parties presented a serious challenge. This means that more people voted against the USDP than for it. This is despite the meagre 54 per cent official turnout heavily favouring the party, whose supporters were far more likely to go out and vote, as well as widespread fear that people’s votes could be monitored.

Compare this to the 2015 and 2020 elections, when Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) won a clear majority of the popular vote. Even in 2010, the USDP received more than 75 per cent, enabled by a boycott of the polls by the NLD, which was dissolved ahead of the recent election.

Other, newer parties were competing on a national scale, but this author’s own reporting found that many voters were only dimly aware of the opposition to the USDP. The leaders of parties such as the People’s Party and Mon Unity Party, meanwhile, admitted they had struggled to spark public interest. A more established player, the National Democratic Force, was disqualified before it could compete.

This left the field mostly clear for a crushing USDP victory. The party’s failure to win a majority of votes reveals the military’s enduring struggle to win popular consent, even when it has tweaked the rules to its advantage.

The dramatic shrinking of the electorate compounds this failure. With post-coup conflict making voting untenable across large areas of Myanmar, just 24.26 million voters were registered, down from 38.27 million in 2020. State media said 13.14 million turned out, meaning about 5.8 million voted for the USDP. That is only about 11 per cent of Myanmar’s population, according to the junta’s own census in 2024: a slim mandate by any measure.

It is debatable how much public support matters under such a closed, authoritarian system. The spoils of office will be divided between current and former military men and their associates, accountable to those higher up the food chain rather than the people they are supposed to serve. Yet, such regimes tend to endure not by coercion alone, but also by co-option and patronage down to the community level.

In reality, the presidency and other major appointments are subject to delicate negotiations…

A growing market economy in the 1990s allowed the previous junta chief, Senior General Than Shwe, to cultivate a class of crony businesspeople, but Myanmar’s economy today is one of stunted growth and depleted natural resources. Than Shwe’s junta also managed to contain armed resistance to a degree that Min Aung Hlaing can hardly match. Any new ceasefires will, as before, only plant the seeds of future fighting.

Chinese support may be insuring the regime against collapse, but its erosion of Myanmar’s sovereignty undermines the military’s binding ideology. The generals still look back to the struggle against colonialism for legitimacy, and Sinophobia allegedly runs deep in the top brass.

Meanwhile, anger and frustration with corrupt and incompetent governance will find an outlet, even in the absence of the NLD. Future electoral challengers will most likely be hobbled at every turn, facing disqualification or worse if they gain serious traction. However, the tight controls showcased recently are costly to maintain over time, particularly if those in power lack the skills and resources to co-opt all those questioning their rule.

The junta’s recent election was an attempt at renewal, but it has been at best a tawdry makeover. The political order it masks is hollowed out and creaking with age, needing constant heavy maintenance to stay afloat.

This presents opportunities for those wishing to promote democracy but seizing them requires fresh thinking and multiple approaches. Those exploiting the space within legal confines need not be enemies of those pushing from the outside. At a time when the military seems resurgent, there is a need for frank debate, for building bridges rather than making new enemies and for a reckoning with hard truths. Min Aung Hlaing is counting on the opposite.

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