A year and a half after Aung
San Suu Kyi’s party won a
landslide victory, criticism is
everywhere. Abuses against
the Rohingya and battles
with armed ethnic groups are
eclipsing one of the world’s
most interesting political turns
below People from the
Rohingya minority gather
at a mosque in Sittwe’s
refugee campsIn November 2015, Moe Thway couldn’t conceal his
excitement. He was about to vote in a democratic
election for the first time in his life. As a founding
member of Generation Wave, a youth pro-democracy
movement born during the so-called Saffron
Revolution of 2007, he considered this first free general
elections since 1990 – when the military refused to
accept its defeat and remained in power – a personal
victory. He would not think of voting for any other
party than the National League for Democracy (NLD),
led by 1991 Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi,
who spent almost 15 years under house arrest.
“It doesn’t matter that the constitution, written by
the military junta in 2008, bans ‘the Lady’ – as many
call Suu Kyi – from contesting for presidency, because
her kids have a foreign passport. We know that she
will exert power through her candidate, Htin Kyaw,”
Thway explained.IMAGE © MIGUEL CANDELA