Myanmar Spring Chronicle – October 28 Overview
(MoeMaKa) October 29, 2025
As the fifth anniversary of the military coup approaches and two months remain before the sham election
Nearly five years after the military coup that nullified the results of the 2020 general election, Myanmar’s junta is now preparing to hold a new election. Over the past five years, the coup regime has lost control of large territories to long-established ethnic armed organizations as well as newly formed resistance forces of various sizes. Because of these territorial losses, the military regime now plans to conduct the upcoming election only in limited parts of the country.
The junta-controlled Union Election Commission (UEC) has announced that the first phase of this election will be held on December 28. Candidate registration and campaigning have officially begun in areas designated for this first round.
Since 2010, Myanmar’s military has repeatedly amended the Political Parties Registration Law and election laws to suit its needs. It is widely recognized that such elections have never been free or fair—an obvious conclusion even to ordinary citizens.
The international community generally emphasizes that any multi-party election must ensure freedom and fairness. In contrast, the planned election in Myanmar is seen internationally as severely lacking in both, leading to hesitation and skepticism about supporting it.
Although the junta avoids calling itself a military dictatorship, its amendment of the party registration law after the coup—requiring all political parties previously registered under the 2020 Election Commission to re-register—was clearly designed to exclude parties it dislikes, especially the National League for Democracy (NLD), the military’s main rival. By changing the law, the junta ensured that only a few pro-military or minor parties could legally compete nationwide, effectively dismantling the multiparty system.
These legal and political manipulations undermine the principle of fairness. As for freedom, the situation is even worse: under post-coup decrees and suspended civil rights, amid ongoing wars and martial law in many areas, millions of displaced voters cannot even live in their own towns or villages. Under such conditions, no election can credibly be called free or fair.
Why, then, has the junta decided to hold this election? One main reason is that the military regime wants to maintain the justification it gave at the time of the coup and to secure continued backing from China. For Beijing, stability in Myanmar is more important than the emergence of a genuine democratic government. China appears to prefer a controlled, stable environment to prevent foreign powers from gaining influence in its neighbor.
Major powers such as the U.S., Russia, and China generally oppose rival great powers meddling in their neighboring countries. In that context, China seems to pressure or at least strongly encourage the junta to hold an election as a way to stabilize the situation—if only symbolically.
For coup leader Min Aung Hlaing, this election likely serves the same purpose as the military’s “roadmap” after the 1988 coup—to prolong power without a clear timetable for transition. Like previous junta leaders, he has extended the so-called transitional period repeatedly, citing the need for stability before any election can be held.
However, Min Aung Hlaing did not anticipate the devastating impact of Operation 1027, which inflicted severe military losses on his forces. While many believe China tacitly approved or supported that offensive, it was also China that later stepped in to prevent the operation from escalating beyond what Beijing wanted and helped the junta regain its footing.
The upcoming election, therefore, does not signify the end of military rule. It is merely a staged event designed to secure victory for the pro-military Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) and to maintain the military’s grip on power. Parties and candidates that are neither military-aligned nor composed of ex-generals are participating only because they see no other political alternative.
The USDP may believe it will win after the 2025–2026 elections, but the international community will not view the situation as it did during the partial liberalization of 2011. History may repeat itself in patterns, but events and conditions never return in exactly the same form.