Dismay in Myanmar As Leader Stumbles
MAWLAMYINE, Myanmar — The scene would have been unlikely a year ago. Tens of thousands of demonstrators filled the streets to protest a decision by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s government to name a new bridge for her father.
Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate once celebrated as a champion of democracy, was insulting the Mon people, the dominant ethnic group in the area, protest leaders said, by naming the bridge for a Burmese leader infamous here for crushing their rights.
No one expected governing to be easy for Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, who became the country’s de facto leader a year ago after the election that ended more than a half- century of military rule. Even so, her first year has been a disappointment to many.
She made it a top priority to end the ethnic insurgencies that have torn the country apart, but her anemic peace effort has proved fruitless so far.
The world has been shocked by reports that the military has carried out atrocities against the Rohingya, a Muslim minority in western Myanmar, but Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi has said little on the matter and done even less.
And her government’s growing suppression of speech on the internet seems perverse for a onetime democracy icon who spent 15 years under house arrest.
“She doesn’t have support like before,” said Zar Zar Oo, 31, a vendor selling bottled water at the Yangon train station. “We loved her so much before, but it seems like she doesn’t do enough for us.”
In a speech to the nation commemorating her first year in office, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi was defensive, saying people could choose another leader if they were unhappy with her.
“If you think I am not good enough for our country and our people, if someone or some organization can do better than us, we are ready to step down,” she said.
Some voters listened. In parliamentary by- elections early this month, her National League for Democracy won only nine of 19 seats.
Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, 71, cites building roads as one of her biggest accomplishments. The party spokesman Win Htein said her government had doubled spending on health care and education, though he provided no details. And the economy has con- tinued to grow as the country emerges from isolation under military rule.
But Richard Horsey, a political analyst and former United Nations official, said that the growth had slowed and that foreign investment had dipped significantly.
“Aung San Suu Kyi’s administration has not offered any compelling economic vision,” he said.
In Yangon, Myat Suu Mon, 28, a store clerk, said the cost of taking the bus to work has doubled while her pay has remained the same.
Support for Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, she said, “is less than before because people’s expectations were too high. But in reality we don’t see things changing here.”
Zaw Htay, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s spokesman, said the government faced complex problems years in the making. “It’s very complicated,” he said. “We are not magicians.”
Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi does face challenges. She must overcome decades of mismanagement and profiteering by previous military governments. And her party is hamstrung by a arrangement dictated by the mil-
A Nobel laureate tolerates atrocities and stifles speech.
itary, which controls key ministries.
The biggest stain on Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi’s record may be her government’s brutal treatment of the Rohingya, and her tepid response to it. Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi has played down the reports of atrocities and stood by the military.
While she released dozens of political prisoners, she left in place a law that is increasingly used to stifle criticism of public officials.
Under the telecommunications act, defaming someone online is punishable by three years in prison. The previous government, which adopted the law in 2013, used it only seven times. In the year since Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi took office, 47 cases have been brought, according to Maung Saungkha, who was once imprisoned under the law and now tracks its use.
“Without freedom of expression, there won’t be democracy,” he said. “If the government wants national reconciliation, this kind of law has to be discarded.”