A Failure to Learn from the Past, Laotian Exile goups and Leaders should think twices before jump into Lao Election 2012: Burma Stole Election, Says Obama Voice of America

Burma Stole Election, Says Obama

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Dan Robinson | New Delhi, Dan Robinson | New Delhi 08 November 2010

U.S. President Barack Obama delivers a speech at Parliament House in New Delhi, on Monday Nov. 8, 2010.

President Barack Obama has reiterated his criticism of the election in military-ruled Burma, saying it was neither free nor fair.

U.S. President Barack Obama’s remarks directly to Indian lawmakers are significant since India has softened its criticism during the past decade of Burma’s military government.  He mentioned Burma during a portion of his speech about strengthening the foundations of democratic governance, and supporting human rights and struggles for freedom.

Referring to India’s independence struggle and its leader, Mohandas Gandhi, the president said India championed self-determination for people from Africa to Asia, and supported democratic development and civil society groups.

He then turned to Burma.

“When peaceful democratic movements are suppressed, as in Burma, then the democracies of the world cannot remain silent.  For it is unacceptable to gun down peaceful protesters and incarcerate political prisoners decade after decade,” said the president. “It is unacceptable to hold the aspirations of an entire people hostage to the greed and paranoia of a bankrupt regime.  It is unacceptable to steal an election, as the regime in Burma has done again for all the world to see.”

President Obama also framed the Burma situation in the context of the message he intended his three-day visit to send – that India is an already “risen” regional and global power.

“It is the responsibility of the international community, especially leaders like the United States and India, to condemn it.  If I can be frank, in international fora, India has often avoided these issues.  But speaking up for those who cannot do so for themselves is not interfering in the affairs of other countries,” president Obama said. “It is not violating the rights of sovereign nations.  It is staying true to our democratic principles.  It is giving meaning to the human rights that we say are universal.  And it sustains the progress that in Asia and around the world has helped turn dictatorships into democracies and ultimately increased our security in the world.”

In a formal written statement issued on the day of Burma’s election, Mr. Obama said the United States will monitor the situation closely in weeks and months ahead.

He said the United States will continue to implement a strategy of both pressure and engagement based on “conditions on the ground in Burma and actions of the Burmese authorities.”

The president also called again for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest, and immediate and unconditional freedom for other political prisoners, saying only genuine, inclusive dialogue can place Burma on the path to a truly representative democracy.

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Burma refugees flee fighting on Thai-Burma border (2nd Roundup)

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Women, children and men flee from the eastern Burma town of Myawaddy (background) towards the border river Moei and into Thailand on 08 November 2010. EPA/STR

Bangkok – Thousands of refugees fled Monday into Thailand as troops clashed and Karen ethnic minority rebels who had seized key government offices in a Myanmar border city.

A splinter faction of the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) on Sunday marked military-ruled Myanmar’s first general election in 20 years by seizing the police station and post office in Myawaddy, about 350 kilometres north-west of Bangkok.

Myanmar soldiers fought back Monday in the town just across the Moei River from Mae Sot in Thailand’s Tak province.

‘M-79 grenades and bullets from the clash have landed on the Thai side, injuring up to 10 people,’ Mae Sot district chief Kittisak Thomornsak said by a telephone.

Kittisak said the skirmish forced about 10,000 Myanmar refugees to flee to Mae Sot.

‘People are coming across the Moei River all the time,’ Kittisak said.

The Thai-Myanmar Friendship Bridge that crosses the river between Myawaddy and Mae Sot has been closed since August due to a diplomatic dispute.

Fighting was also reported between Myanmar troops and the DKBA in Wowlay across the border from the Three Pagoda Pass and Thailand’s Kanchanaburi province, border sources said.

‘This is Myanmar’s internal problem,’ Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said. ‘There will probably be more fighting over the next three months.’

The DKBA is a ceasefire group allied with Myanmar’s military junta, but a faction under Commander Saw Lah Pwe has rebelled against the demand that it become a border guard under the regime’s control.

Saw reportedly said he seized positions in Myawaddy to protest Sunday’s elections. The polls have been widely criticized as a sham, designed to cement the military’s rule over the country.

‘I am doing this for democracy,’ Saw told reporters on the border.

Last year, the junta insisted that all ‘ceasefire groups’ were to come under the command of the military as part of the regime’s election preparations.

Groups such as the DKBA were to set up political parties and turn their armies into border guard forces under the military’s control.

While the main force of the DKBA agreed, Saw’s Brigade 5 with about 1,400 troops has refused to submit to the military.

Other rebel groups that have refused to comply with the Myanmar military are the Kachin Independence Army with an estimated force of 7,000, the United Wa State Army with 30,000 fighters, the Shan State Army/North with 5,000, the Karen National Liberation Army with fewer than 8,000 and the New Mon State with 1,000.

In retaliation, the regime barred rebel-controlled portions of Kachin, Karen, Wa and Shan states from voting. An estimated 400,000 people were disenfranchised.

The pro-junta Union Solidarity and Development Party, packed with former military men, was expected to win the polls.

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More than ten thousand refugees fled election-related violence in Burma into neighbouring Thailand after the junta’s troops clashed with rebels at several key flashpoints along the border.

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By Ian MacKinnon in Bangkok
Published: 4:28PM GMT 08 Nov 2010

The most serious fighting between Burmese troops and rebels from the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA) in the border town of Myawaddy left at least three dead and 11 injured, the result of tensions that flared during Sunday’s widely-condemned elections.

Elements from the DKBA shelled the town with heavy weapons after Burmese troops moved in to clear rebels who had taken over government buildings during Sunday’s poll to protect voters from military intimidation.

Gunfire and mortar blasts went on sporadically for most of the day in Myawaddy sending the thousands of refugees scurrying across the frontier river Moei to the Thai town of Mae Sot.

Further south at the Three Pagodas Pass border crossing there were reports of exchanges of fire that went on for an hour, though there was no word of any casualties in the fighting.

The violence was in stark contrast to the poll on Sunday – the first election in 20 years in the military-run country – which passed off quietly and the turnout was reportedly low, a reflection of the feeling that the result was a foregone conclusion.

Early official results showed successes for pro-junta parties, the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) and the National Unity Party (NUP), though authorities have yet to release the number among the eligible 29 million voters who bothered to cast their ballot.

Detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), was banned from taking part. It called for a boycott and claimed success with reports that turnout was as low as 35 per cent.

The NLD won the last election in 1990 by a landslide but the military regime – which has ruled for 48 years and is now led by Senior General Than Shwe – simply ignored the results.

This time it took no chances. Campaigning was highly restricted, there were widespread reports of voting irregularities and intimidation of the electorate to ensure votes were cast in favour of pro-junta parties.

The threats against voters had prompted renegade soldiers of the pro-junta DKBA to take over government offices in the town of Myawaddy in an effort to protect the voters.

The breakaway DKBA group said that the army had threatened to shoot people who did not vote, forcing them to intervene on the side of the electorate. A Japanese journalist, working for the APF news agency, was also arrested in the town on Sunday when he slipped across the river.

Fighting erupted when about 300 DKBA troops found their route out of Myawaddy blocked by Burmese military trucks despite negotiations to end the stand-off peacefully.

“There have been at least 10,000 refugees who have fled to Thailand,” said Col Wannatip Wongwai, the Thai army commander for the region. “As soon as the situation is under control, we will start sending the refugees back to Myawaddy.” The UN was looking after the refugees in a makeshift camp in the meantime.

Col Wanatip said government troops appeared to have retaken control of Myawaddy, while the rebels of the DKBA held just a few positions on the outskirts of the town.

Burma’s Elections: Junta Believes in Politics

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By Hannah Beech / Rangoon Friday, Nov. 05, 2010

A burmese man stands next to a campaign truck in downtown Rangoon, Burma. CKN / Getty Images

For all those people still recovering from the furiously contested mid-term vote in the U.S., it’s time to rest easy. The November 7 election in Burma, where a military regime has ruled since a 1962 coup and nary a poll has been held for two decades, promises no such electoral drama. After all, the ruling junta has stacked the decks so thoroughly in its favor that the victory of army-backed parties seems almost assured. Indeed, opponents of the upcoming polls decry the exercise as little more than an attempt by the top brass to legitimize its grip on power. The National League for Democracy (NLD) — the party that won the country’s last polls back in 1990, which the junta then ignored — has boycotted the elections, lest the results be interpreted as an oppressed citizenry’s approval of continued military-dominated rule.

Nevertheless, in a tropical country where for decades political change has felt no more likely than a freak snowstorm, the elections herald a chance — even if it’s a tiny chance — for something to shift in the political climate. In Burma, known by its rulers as Myanmar, even an incremental inching forward beats stasis. The moral high-ground — taken by everyone from Western governments imposing financial sanctions on Burma to the influential Burmese exile community that has been working tirelessly from overseas to effect political change back home — hasn’t resulted in any significant political loosening. But in the walk-up to the vote, at least the mere mention of the word “politics” won’t land someone in jail. That is a measure of change for a country that has been preserved in amber for 20 years. Hla Hla Win, a 28-year-old teacher with an education degree from an American college, now runs English and leadership courses in Rangoon, the country’s largest city. “Before I was interested in politics, but I didn’t want to end up in Insein [prison],” she says. There are still more than 2,100 political prisoners across Burma. But Hla Hla Win says she’s “not scared to talk about politics anymore, and that’s why I came back.” (See pictures of how young Burmese are trying to change their country.)

The country to which she returned certainly won’t become a democracy at the stroke of midnight on Nov. 7. Under a constitution that received an unrealistically high 93% approval from the electorate in 2008, the military has reserved 25% of parliamentary seats for itself. Key leadership posts, like the presidency, cannot be filled by civilians. The country’s most famous member of the political opposition, NLD leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, has been barred from ever serving as head of state because of a rule seemingly designed specifically for her, which sidelines anyone who has been married to a foreigner. (Suu Kyi’s late husband was a British academic.) Imprisoned for much of the past 20 years, Suu Kyi will see her most recent stint of house arrest expire just six days after the election. (See how the youth of Burma are trying to connect their country to the rest of the world.)

Those opposition forces that have decided to contest the polls, around 30 disparate political parties and a dozen or so independent candidates, have complained of constant government-imposed obstacles to campaigning. Opposition candidates cannot directly criticize the junta. They cannot organize mass rallies. They cannot even campaign in small groups without filling in reams of paperwork with local authorities. Such impediments, of course, don’t hinder the military’s proxy, the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), and, to a lesser extent, another government-associated bloc called the National Unity Party (NUP). The USDP, in particular, has enjoyed constant favorable coverage in the state-controlled media. It also can freely use state funds for campaign purposes.

In the run-up to Sunday’s polls, reports of voter intimidation and vote buying have leaked out, especially in rural areas. Not that the junta has made it easy to know what’s going on inside Burma — the country’s Internet connection has been severely limited over the past week, a slowdown many suspect is an attempt by the government to keep a free flow of information from influencing the polls. Independent monitors and foreign journalists have been banned from covering the balloting. The U.S., the E.U. and the U.N. have all warned that the election will be neither free nor fair. (See photos of the Two Burmas.)

Not content with the already considerable rigging in its favor, the junta in recent weeks has also canceled balloting in certain ethnic minority areas, deeming these pockets too unstable for voting. Roughly 40% of Burma’s population hails from a diverse patchwork of ethnic groups, while the junta is exclusively ethnically Burman, also known as Bamar. Ever since the British departed in 1948, various ethnic rebel armies have fought against the central government. Although ceasefires have been signed with some of the biggest rebel groups, tensions between the Burman regime and the ethnic groups that are clustered in Burma’s borderlands remain on a hair-trigger. Further inflaming anger was a decision last month by the junta’s electoral commission to dissolve some ethnic minority parties that might have mounted a serious local challenge to the junta, such as the Kachin State Progressive Party that was likely to have garnered significant support in northern Kachin state.

Not that conditions are much better in regions where Burmans dominate. One weekday afternoon shortly before the election, at a time when campaigning would normally be in full swing in other countries, downtown Rangoon, the former capital, was unnaturally quiet, save for the sound of old diesel engines and betel nut juice being expectorated by pedestrians. Suddenly the silence was broken by a man in a green cap and longyi, as Burmese sarongs are known, broadcasting pledges through a megaphone. He was trailed by a dozen women, who handed out pamphlets to onlookers, few of whom looked eager to receive the campaign materials. “We will bring you uninterrupted electricity,” said the candidate for the USDP, the junta’s proxy party. “Clean streets and new buildings will be yours after the election.”

In a city that has been slowly crumbling for decades — people are regularly wounded by falling chunks of buildings and electricity is erratic at best — such promises seem almost comical. After all, it has been under the military regime’s watch that a once thriving city has so thoroughly decayed. But the USDP in recent months has been claiming credit for a slew of new government projects, from dams to bridges. The party’s logo, a lion, is emblazoned on many posters advertising the new projects. “They promise everything, and we can say nothing,” says an NLD supporter who is boycotting the polls. “This is not a real election. It’s a joke.” (Comment on this story.)

Nevertheless, dozens of opposition candidates have decided to contest anyway. Many are from the ethnic parties, who hope that victory will allow them a modicum of control over local government policies, ranging from the use of native languages to dispersal of tax revenue. (In the 1990 polls, the party that came in second after the NLD was one representing the Shan ethnicity.) Other parties running on Nov. 7 are the tattered fragments of the non-racially based democratic opposition that trounced the junta’s proxy party two decades ago. After Suu Kyi called for an electoral boycott earlier this year, a breakaway NLD group refashioned itself as the National Democratic Force (NDF). The party was only able to muster 160 candidates (in contrast to 1,100-plus for the USDP), in part because of more jiggering by the junta: opposition parties were only given a fortnight to find candidates, and each contender had to fork over a $500 registration fee to the government-controlled election commission. That amount is roughly equivalent to what an average Burmese makes in an entire year. Since campaigning has begun, the NDF has complained of persistent government pressure, ranging from its few posters being torn down to its supporters being harassed by special branch police.

Even the NUP, the second government-linked party, appears to be facing intimidation from the USDP machine. On Oct. 29, NUP candidate Kyaw Aye was injured in a motorcycle accident caused by an unknown perpetrator who fled the scene. The 70-year-old candidate happens to be the only man running against Thein Sein, Burma’s current Prime Minister who heads the USDP. In the past, army-backed thugs have been dispatched to neutralize political opponents, most notoriously in 2003 when dozens of NLD supporters are believed to have been killed.

Given such a contentious — and even dangerous — climate, why run? Yan Kyaw, an independent who is contesting a seat in Rangoon and served time as a political prisoner, has a simple answer: “What other choice do we have? If we continue doing what we did before, we will all die before we get anywhere. I am an old man, but not so old that I want to die without doing anything.” If he does end up in parliament, Yan Kyaw’s powers will be limited, especially since the political opposition is fractured and the military has given itself ample authority to disregard much of what any legislature might attempt to do. The massive, gaudy parliament building in the new capital Naypyidaw could very well end up housing a rubber-stamp body; and there is the high probability of military intimidation of independent parliamentarians. But at least Yan Kyaw or others like him will be giving a small voice to the Burmese people. In a country with some of the most oppressed people in the world, that’s almost more than anyone can really expect.

See TIME’s photoessay “To Be Young and Cool in Burma.”

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What’s Next for Burma Opposition After Elections?

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By Hannah Beech Monday, Nov. 08, 2010

Campaign signs dot a street in Rangoon, Burma. CKN / Getty Images

Polling stations were set up across Burma for an electorate of 29 million people, and candidates from 37 parties contested the Nov. 7 elections. But despite the trappings of political openness, the country’s first elections in two decades were hardly an exercise in democracy. As the first election results trickled in, the victors predictably predominated from one party, whose logo is an all-powerful lion: the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), the proxy for a military regime that, in one form or another, has brutally ruled Burma, which it calls Myanmar, for nearly five decades.

Local sources described the mood on election day in Rangoon, the country’s commercial capital and largest city, as unnaturally quiet. There were few lines at polling stations, said on-the-ground witnesses, a sign that a significant portion of the electorate had chosen not to vote. It was not clear, however, whether the limited balloting was due to a belief that the electoral results had been preordained by the ruling junta or whether they were due to a boycott call by the popular National League for Democracy (NLD), the country’s main political opposition party that disbanded itself instead of contesting polls that were so obviously skewed in the military’s favor. (See pictures of Burmese youth.)

Because of numerous campaign restrictions and hefty registration fees, the leading opposition party, an NLD breakaway group called the National Democratic Force (NDF), could only muster 164 parliamentary contenders. By contrast, the USDP and the National Unity Party (NUP), another military-backed party, each fielded around 1,000 candidates. In sum, even if all democratic opposition candidates are declared victorious — a practical impossibility given voter intimidation and irregularities — they still would not outnumber pro-government forces in parliament. U.S. President Barack Obama characterized the polls as “anything but free and fair,” adding “for too long the people of Burma have been denied the right to determine their own destiny.”

Indeed, even before a single vote was cast, the polls were hampered by a host of roadblocks. Around 1 million voters were disenfranchised when the junta decided in the weeks leading up to the election to cancel the polls in regions where ethnic minorities have been at odds with the central government. The regime conveniently decided to reserve one-quarter of parliamentary seats and many top ministerial posts for military appointees. The junta’s proxy USDP freely spent millions of dollars of state funds on campaigning, even as one-third of Burma lives under the poverty line. Not only did the army’s party have the bully pulpit of the state-run media at its disposal, but its ranks were packed with a host of recently retired generals whom voting against could be a fearsome prospect for many cowed Burmese. By contrast, many of the most well-known members of the country’s political opposition were barred from taking part in the polls by a series of arcane electoral laws. The most notable missing candidate was detained Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, whose NLD had won the last balloting in 1990, only to have the military ignore the election results. (Some 2,100 political prisoners are still languishing in Burmese jails.)

Those opposition parties that did take part, including the NDF and a host of ethnically based parties, had even more to complain about come election day. Half a dozen parties presented evidence of civil servants being forced to vote for the USDP, while many thousands of voters were compelled to participate in advance voting that makes it easier for officials to commit electoral fraud. Some voters, especially those planning to cast their ballots for the opposition, turned up at polling stations only to find their names mysteriously missing from electoral rolls. “I looked and looked but my name was not there,” says one Rangoon resident. “I don’t think it was a mistake.” (Read TIME’s cover story on Burmese youth.)

In both southeast Mon State and northeastern Shan state, where ethnic minorities abound, ethnic parties accused polling officials of taking illiterate voters’ ballots and filling them out in support of the USDP. “This was an election in name only,” says one Western diplomat. “We all know what the results will be, so no one’s holding their breath.” (A small group of diplomats taken on a stage-managed tour of polling stations by Burmese government officials included an envoy from North Korea, hardly the most qualified individual to conduct election monitoring.)

As flawed as the election may have been, there may be some cause for guarded optimism. By Monday afternoon, Khin Maung Swe, spokesman for the NDF, said he believed that at least 10 NDF candidates had won their races, including several in Rangoon constituencies. However, mysterious boxes filled with advance votes heavily favoring the USDP had been tallied the previous night in some areas, turning earlier counts favoring the NDF upside down. The government-controlled election commission has not bothered to tell the opposition parties when they will be announcing the official results. Still, the NDF leader remains hopeful, despite talk about a possible boycott of election results if they stray too far from what opposition parties believe are the expected returns. “In the tea shops or on the street, it is impossible to criticize the government,” he told TIME, as he fielded updates on the vote counts. “But in parliament, even if we have only have one or two people in place, we can speak out on behalf of the people and make our criticisms publicly.”

In ethnic minority areas where votes were not denied — and where sentiment against the exclusively ethnically Burman (or Bamar) junta is overflowing — parties representing ethnic groups like the Arakan (or Rakhine), the Shan and the Mon have expressed confidence in a strong showing by their candidates, particularly in the regional assemblies that are supposed to make policy on a local level. Indeed, even if only a small corps of opposition MPs ends up serving in the grandiose legislature recently built in the junta’s new capital Naypyidaw, it will be an improvement over the current situation, in which the military rules with no check on its power. Says one local observer: “As rigged as the elections [were], and as limited access to decision-making elected MPs may have, the ongoing political process [is] the only way out of the crisis that has afflicted the country.” A report published on Monday by a local organization that monitored 159 polling stations agreed: “While this election clearly fell short of international standards, it marks an important step forward towards a more democratic state. Political parties and voters are well aware that the playing field for this election was not level — but many have decided to take advantage of the small window of political space that has opened.” (Comment on this story.)

Meanwhile, as the votes are still being counted — fairly or unfairly — Burma is gearing up for another possible political milestone. On Nov. 13, the latest term of house arrest will expire for democracy icon Suu Kyi. The daughter of Aung San, Burma’s assassinated independence hero, Suu Kyi is beloved by the Burmese people yet she has spent most of the past two decades in detention. On previous occasions when Suu Kyi was released from house arrest, she has dived right back into politics at considerable personal risk. In 2003, army-backed thugs killed dozens of her supporters while she was out mingling with Burmese citizens in the town of Depayin. Through intermediaries, the 65-year-old Suu Kyi has sent signals that if she is released again she will re-immerse herself in politics anew, even expressing an interest in opening a Twitter account. But this time, the noble dissident known in Burma as “the Lady,” has no formal political mantle to claim as the winner of the ignored 1990 polls. Her NLD party has been dissolved for boycotting the Nov. 7 elections — a decision that came at Suu Kyi’s behest. What can she offer to move her beleaguered nation forward? Perhaps more than the election results themselves, it is what the Lady will say that Burma is really waiting to hear.

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• See TIME’s photoessay “To Be Young and Cool in Burma.”
• Read about Burmese exiles finding refuge in Thailand.

• Burmese Exiles Find Refuge in Thailand

A Failure to Learn from the Past, Year 2012 Laotian exile groups and leaders should learn from this: Myanmar holds first election in 20 years, but results are preordained

The constitution and election rules favor the two main parties backed by the country’s military rulers. Some opposition groups call for a boycott, but the regime pressures citizens to turn out and vote for ‘candidates correctly.’

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By a Times staff writer12:24 p.m. CST, November 7, 2010

Reporting from Yangon, Myanmar —Myanmar held its first multi-party election in 20 years Sunday, as citizens chose among lions, peacocks, bamboo hats, eyeglasses and other party symbols in a carefully scripted contest unlikely to bring about significant change anytime soon.

While there was no immediate announcement of the results from Myanmar, also known as Burma, the outcome was never in question.

Opposition candidates were far outspent, outmanned and out-advertised by the two main parties backed by the country’s military rulers. Twenty-five percent of parliamentary seats are reserved for the military. And the government-crafted constitution and skewed election rules heavily favored the regime’s candidates.

Speaking to students in Mumbai, India, on the first stop of a four-nation Asian trip, President Obama termed Myanmar’s elections “anything but free and fair.”

For many opposition groups, the short and highly restrictive campaign period and low literacy rates in some remote areas made symbols a means to gain traction quickly.

“I voted for the bamboo hat, I don’t like the lion,” said a Yangon travel agent Sunday, referring respectively to the main opposition party and the main pro-government party. Like many voters and observers, the agent requested anonymity.

In Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city, polling stations on 47th Street and 38th Street saw only a trickle of voters in the morning and were largely empty by early afternoon, while a larger station on Sule Pagoda Road witnessed a steady trickle but no line.

“I voted for the fighting peacock,” said a Yangon money-changer, referring to the symbol of the 88 Generation party which, despite evoking a former student activist movement, favors the government. “You have to vote or the state gives you trouble,” he added. “They’ll figure out a way to win no matter what.”

Some optimists saw Sunday’s electoral contest as the start of a process eventually leading to increased economic accountability and a way to eventually chip away at the generals’ grip after 48 years in power. Myanmar has about 2,100 political prisoners in detention.

“There are about 29 million eligible voters, and for the half that are under 30, this will be their first election,” said a writer and critic of the military government. “I say let them taste real cake. It may not be chocolate, but at least it’s sweet.”

Others said participation in the election only validated the regime. “We have a moral obligation to reject this,” said Hen Tha Myint, an executive committee member of the banned National League for Democracy. “And even if you were elected, your power would be very low.”

Sunday was declared a national holiday, leaving many shops in Yangon shuttered and the streets relatively empty. Along Bogyoke Aung San Road, a family bathed a naked 2-year-old with a bucket while nearby two middle aged men played checkers using bottle caps and a makeshift board.

It was not immediately clear how effective were calls by exile groups and leaders of the banned National League for Democracy party to boycott the election. In response, the regime pressured its citizens to turn out and vote for “candidates correctly.”

Than Nyein, chairman of the National Democratic Front, the largest opposition party running in the elections, symbolized by the bamboo hat, or khamauk, told the Foreign Correspondents Club in Bangkok by telephone that the boycott “failed miserably.” He also estimated there was a 60% turnout, although local reports suggested that could be high.

Residents here said government workers were illegally issued ballots in advance for the Union Solidarity and Development Party, the pro-regime party known by its lion image and staffed by many recently decommissioned military officials.

Six of the 37 registered parties that competed for some 1,100 national and regional seats lodged complaints alleging fraud favoring the regime.

Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate who has been in detention for 15 of the last 21 years, urged citizens not to vote, saying she “would not dream” of taking part.

With her house arrest set to expire Saturday, rumors about her release have swept a country where hearsay fills the void created by obsessive state secrecy. Some say her son applied for a visa and got it; others say she will be quickly rearrested.

In recent days, security has tightened, with uniformed and undercover security more evident and the Internet slowing to a crawl, leading organizers to delay non-essential meetings. Still, the security remained less obvious than the lead-up to major political events in China or North Korea.

The opposition’s performance wasn’t helped by infighting. After Suu Kyi’s party decided not to contest the election, leading to its forced disbandment, former members formed the National Democratic Force that fielded candidates in just 164 constituencies. That led to squabbling over, among other issues, who had rights to the bamboo hat symbol.

But the two pro-military parties, the Union Solidarity and Development Party that contested candidates for all 1,171 seats, and the National Unity Party that competed for some 900 seats, also displayed differences over economic and social issues.

Once elected, the national parliament will name a president, almost certain to be a former general.

Theories differ on why strongman and senior general Than Shwe, reportedly in his late 70s, created two centers of power, the president and the head of the military. Some say it’s an attempt to bolster his legacy as a reformer, if somewhat tepid. Others say it is part of a divide-and-conquer strategy to ensure no single leader can topple him and undercut his family’s sizeable economic interests as he ages and gradually recedes from power.

“He’s trying to avoid becoming a Dear Leader,” said one intellectual, referring to North Korea’s ailing leader Kim Jong Il. “It’s his exit strategy.”

Special correspondent Simon Roughneen in Bangkok, Thailand contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2010, Los Angeles Times

Hmong election makes history

Wausau resident Khoua Neng Yang was among hundreds of Wisconsin residents who made history Saturday.

Khoua Yang, 28, of Wausau, enters his vote during Saturday's Hmong elections at the Wausau Area Hmong Mutual Association in Wausau. (Xai Kha/Wausau Daily Herald)

Yang and the others cast ballots in the first ever democratic election to select a new cultural leader for the state’s Hmong community. The winner of the weekend election will lead the Hmong 18 Clan Council, a governing and leadership group, for the next four years.

“For me it’s very important to vote for someone who has the same thinking and understanding about the problems that the Hmong community is going through,” the 28-year-old Yang said. “If you want to see things happen, you can’t just sit back. You have to be able to vote for the person who will represent you.”

Election officials announced Saturday evening that Wa Meng Yang of Milwaukee won the election with 553 votes across the state. The other two candidates, Txoua Xiong of Green Bay and Sivblong Vang of Green Bay, came in second and third, respectively.

John Vang, one of the election coordinators in Wausau, said the new election process drew many to vote at the Wausau Area Hmong Mutual Association.

In the 35 years since the Hmong came from the Southeast Asian nation of Laos to Wisconsin, this marks the first time that the 18 Clan Council president was elected, rather than chosen by cultural leader Gen. Vang Pao. Much like in American general elections, Hmong candidates traveled across the state to campaign and speak with residents. They also participated in a debate on Hmong radio, Vang said.

Election officials expected a bigger turnout for the weekend elections.

“I don’t think the message got through to everybody,” Vang said.

Of the estimated 6,000 Hmong residents in Wausau and surrounding communities, only 153 showed up ready to vote, according to election results.

Yang Xiong, a Wausau resident who volunteered at the polling location, said the election drew few young voters.

“It’s been more of the older generations because of the media where they have been advertising,” Xiong, 25, said.

Yang, who arrived to Wausau from Laos as a 5-year-old in the early 1980s, said the most important issues that he expects the new president to address are domestic violence, higher education for Hmong youths and underage marriages.

He said the importance of addressing such issues is more relevant now that he has a 2-year-old daughter and a newborn son and he thinks about their future.

“As I get older and I have family now, I see that these things do affect me,” Yang said.

 

Oregon Matsutake season ends, pickers pack up

By SARA HOTTMAN
HERALD AND NEWS

CHEMULT, Ore. — After the first sticky snow of the winter, the lot surrounding Featherbed Inn in Chemult was quiet except for a few roosters pecking at puddles and two men taking down a tarp tent.

The men had been there for two months buying Matsutake mushrooms from the hundreds – some say thousands – of pickers who set up camp in tents, camper trailers, and hotel rooms during the two-month long picking season.

Each fall, from September to November or until the first snowfall, Chemult’s population temporarily swells from 120 people to as many as a few thousand with an influx of mushroom pickers seeking Matsutake mushrooms, which grow in abundance in the Fremont-Winema National Forests near Chemult.

The mushrooms are a delicacy in Japan and can demand a high price per pound in good years.

Pickers bring a surge of diversity to the small town. Most pickers are from Southeast Asia, with a small percentage of Hispanic pickers. Hassan, the buyer at Featherbed Inn who declined to give his last name, estimated 95 percent of pickers are from Laos, Cambodia or Thailand, and about 5 percent are Hispanic. Hassan is originally from Laos, and was a picker until he moved to the buying side.

The Chemult Ranger District issued around 800 picking permits this year, a slight increase from previous years, said Melissa Shuey, customer service assistant there. Don Oldham, who owns Featherbed Inn, said he heard pickers numbered in the thousands; one estimate was 4,500.

“This is huge to our community,” Shuey said. “Everybody has to be a little more cautious with traffic. In the evenings there’s a lot of hustle and bustle. But as far as business owners in town, the boost to the economy is fantastic.”

This year, despite more pickers, there were plenty of mushrooms to go around.

“You’d see entire Toyota pickup beds full of them,” Shuey said.

A wet spring and dry summer followed by a wet fall was particularly conducive to mushroom growth. The forest floor was covered with them, pickers said. Hassan said pickers were bringing in six tons a day of mushrooms – or about 12,000 pounds – worth roughly $24,000.

“It was a bumper crop,” said Mike Bivens, who does maintenance at the Featherbed Inn and has been there through many mushroom seasons.

Pickers, buyers, and locals gushed over how the mushrooms this year were “bigger, more beautiful,” he said.

However, more supply drove prices down. The mushrooms were worth about $20 per pound the first day, Bivens said. But prices dropped to $7 per pound, briefly went as low as $1 per pound, and settled at $2 per pound.

Hassan said bulk made up for low price to at least make the stay in Chemult worthwhile for pickers.

When snow came last Tuesday, many pickers and buyers returned to their homes in Washington and California. Some chose to stay, hoping the snow would melt for a few more days of picking.

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Information from: Herald and News,
http://www.heraldandnews.co