Especially the National League for Democracy (NLD) party went to many parts of Burma to voice their concerns. They were urging the Burmese that people have their own rights not to vote in the election as well which granted by constitution.
The verbal order from the generals is to complement or override the traditional ways of persecuting politicians and activists. In the past 20 years or so, thousands of democracy activists were jailed using unjust laws and verbal orders given along the chain of command. According to the critics of Burmese political scene, the recent verbal order by the generals is another blatant violation of human rights violation.