Myanmar Spring Chronicle – October 11 Scenes
MoeMaKa, October 12 2022
The dissolution of the UBP party; The 2023 election which has more risks than opportunities;
We read in today’s news that the Union Betterment Party, the party of former Military General Thura U Shwe Mann, who had a close relationship with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the NLD, from 2012 to 2018, was planning to be dissolved.
This means that Thura U Shwe Mann decided to dissolve his party before the election held by the military council next year. It was stated that because of his age and other reasons, but it might be assumed that, according to the political situation, standing as a political party in the coming days would probably cause more harm than good.
After the removal of General Khin Nyunt, the Thura U Sjwe Mann was the number 3 person on the list holding power during the SPDC military regime, and in 2010, when General Than Shwe and General Maung Aye went behind the political curtain, U Than Shwe chose U Thein Sein, who was next on the list, as the president. He was assigned as the Speaker of the Pyithu Hluttaw from 2010 to 2015.
He had a close political relationship for years with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the NLD party, who entered the Hluttaw through by-elections during his tenure as Speaker of the Pyithu Hluttaw. At the end of 2018, Thura U Shwe Mann decided to establish a political party, and at the beginning of 2019, after preparing to establish a party, relations with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi became distant.
Min Aung Hlaing, who is the Commander-in-Chief of the Army, was concerned that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi would take the help of U Shwe Mann to organize the army, and was also watching. There is an instance where Min Aung Hlaing prepared to prosecute a newspaper that reported that the message posted on social media about military university cadets to focus on the benefit of the country rather than the benefit of the individual. Min Aung Hlaing was furious that it was meant to dissolve the army.
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi had some sort of communication with U Thein Sein before the 2012 by-election, but when she entered the Hluttaw after the by-election, it was seen that she had a close relationship with the Speaker of the Pyithu Hluttaw, Thura U Shwe Mann, as a political ally. Thurra U Shwe Mann might have had the goal of getting an important political position by cooperating with the leader of the NLD party, which has the most public support.
In August 2015, the media referred to as the midnight coup, the incident in which the acting chairman of the USDP Party was removed from his position after internal USDP party conflict. More than 2 days later, on the day he attended the Hluttaw, U Shwe Mann, the Speaker of the Hluttaw was stopped at the press group where Daw Aung San Suu Kyi also there and answered some questions from the media about the midnight coup. That made the generals made comfortable.
Until then, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi might have had an evaluation criteria for U Shwe Mann that was more than a political ally. After NLD won the election and took over government power in 2016, the NLD party appointed U Shwe Mann as the chairman of the Legal Affairs and Special Cases Assessment Commission of the Assembly of the Union, and he was responsible for making recommendations to the NLD-dominated parliament regarding laws that should be amended and repealed.
General Than Shwe was ordered Daw Aung San Suu Kyi to be placed under house arrest, banned, and prosecuted, from the late 1990s to 2010 and Thura U Shwe Mann was the person who communicated between General Than Shwe and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi to meet.
U Shwe Mann’s relationship with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi was strained when he was preparing to join the new party at the end of 2018, and it is probably that now he has decided to temporarily or permanently leave the field of political parties.
In conclusion, the upcoming 2023 election will probably be considered as an event that is more risky than an opportunity for the rest of the political parties except for USDP, and it will be possible to analyze if you look at the dissolution of Thura U Shwe Mann’s party, known as the UBP.