Sham election another rung down in Myanmar’s credibility rating

Ongoing polls augurs ill for democracy, peace, and Asean’s claim that regional norms still matter.

Myanmar’s military junta insists that elections currently under way will restore political order.

Voting is in three phases — it began on Dec 28, 2025 in 102 townships. This will be followed by polling in 100 townships on Jan 11, 2026 and another 63 townships on Jan 25, 2026.

This staggered arithmetic is not a sign of prudence. It is an admission of failure.

Four years after the February 2021 coup, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing presides over a country that no longer functions as a coherent state. The elections are not designed to resolve Myanmar’s crisis. They are intended to disguise it.

Since overthrowing the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi, the Tatmadaw, or Myanmar armed forces, has failed to reassert nationwide control. Instead, Myanmar has descended into a multi-front civil war.

Ethnic armed organisations and the People’s Defence Force, the armed wing of the national unity government, now operate across regions once considered secure.

Governance has fractured, violence has normalised, and the economy has collapsed.

Measured by effective control rather than administrative maps, rebel-held and contested areas now account for as much as 70–75% of Myanmar’s territorial landscape.

Large parts of Sagaing, Chin, Kachin, Kayah, Karen, Rakhine and northern Shan states lie outside meaningful junta authority.

In many areas, the state exists only through airstrikes and punitive raids.

Against this backdrop, the notion of a nationwide election collapses.

Crucially, even Min has openly acknowledged that the polls will not be nationwide. That admission strips the exercise of any remaining credibility.

This is not a temporary logistical problem. It is the political reality of a state that has lost control over most of its territory.

The decision to proceed with voting in 265 townships is therefore not gradualism. It is a confession. The 65 excluded townships are not peripheral; they are precisely where resistance is strongest and the state weakest.

Ballots cast in military-secured enclaves cannot confer national legitimacy when vast regions and millions of citizens are excluded by force. Political pluralism has collapsed alongside territorial control.

Only six parties are contesting at the national level, with 51 others limited to single states or regions.

Many parties that participated in the 2015 and 2020 elections have been disbanded or deregistered.

Anti-junta resistance groups have refused to participate altogether, viewing the process as illegitimate.

What remains is a filtered contest among junta-approved parties. At its centre is the military’s proxy, the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP).

The USDP is fielding 1,018 candidates, roughly one-fifth of all registered candidates nationwide. This dominance is structural, not popular.

The irony is stark. The USDP, led by former generals, was crushed in landslide defeats by the National League for Democracy (NLD) in 2015 and 2020. The 2020 election — the most decisive rejection of military-aligned politics in Myanmar’s history — was annulled after the coup.

Today, with the NLD dissolved and its leaders imprisoned, the USDP faces no genuine national rival. This is not an election designed to test public support. It is one designed to ensure continuity of military power under civilian camouflage.

Asean understands this. The region is fully aware that Myanmar’s elections lack credibility.

It has urged the junta not to proceed with anything overtly shambolic, knowing that a visibly fraudulent poll would further damage Asean’s already strained credibility.

But the junta’s response has been openly contemptuous.

As one official military spokesperson bluntly declared, “whether the international community recognises or does not recognise the election is irrelevant”.

This statement captures the self-conceit of the regime under Min.

It is a government that no longer seeks legitimacy through compliance, but survival through defiance. That posture stands in direct violation of the Jakarta Five-Point Consensus.

Over the past four years, the junta has ignored calls for a ceasefire, obstructed humanitarian access, and rejected inclusive political dialogue.

Instead of de-escalation, it has escalated air campaigns. Instead of dialogue, it has offered ballots without choice.

Asean now faces a stark reality. Recognition of the election would hollow out its principles and reward defiance. Rejection, however, risks further marginalising the bloc’s influence.

What is no longer tenable is the pretence that this election represents a step toward normalisation. Myanmar today is not a state in transition. It is a state in fragmentation.

Elections conducted amid civil war, territorial loss, and political exclusion do not restore sovereignty. They expose its absence.

Min’s insistence on proceeding is not a sign of confidence. It is evidence of isolation.

Without consent at home or credibility abroad, the junta seeks refuge in procedure — hoping ballots can substitute for legitimacy. They cannot.

In this context, Myanmar’s ongoing elections do not bode well — not for democracy, not for peace, and not for Asean’s claim that regional norms still matter.

They merely underscore a dangerous illusion: that power can endure indefinitely without consent, even as the country it governs continues to burn. - FMT

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.