Myanmar on the brink

Hours before the Burmese parliament was set to certify the results of the general election held in November, the country’s powerful armed forces seized control of government and declared a year-long state of emergency.

The iconic leader of the National League for Democracy, Aung San Suu Kyi, was placed under house arrest along with others from the higher echelons of the party that won the elections by a landslide. The military, whose proxy political party suffered a trashing at the polls, contested the results and filed as many as 200 complaints claiming fraud in the electoral process.

Tension in the country of 54 million has been building in the weeks before the re-opening of parliament and the army’s spokesperson persistently refused to rule out any takeover attempt. Then, in the night hours of February 1, tanks and armed SUVS descended on the capital Nay Pyi Taw in an operation that moved with absolute efficiency.

In the morning, the Burmese woke up stunned but not surprised. A country that has only started a gradual process of democratisation a decade ago, Myanmar knows military rule all too well.

The surprise came from the other side.

Supporters of the pro-democracy NLD party erupted into large demonstrations, defying a ban on gatherings and a night curfew. Tens of thousands of people across the country are publicly demanding the release of Suu Kyi, who is now facing criminal charges for allegedly owning walkie-talkies. Teachers have been at the forefront of the civil disobedience movement while civil servants have resigned en mass, crippling the government’s bureaucracy.