Suu Kyi’s ‘puppet’ president
Denied the right to govern, Myanmar leader makes a plan AUNG San Suu Kyi has nominated a London-educated writer who once acted as her personal driver as her “puppet” president after weeks of febrile speculation and intense negotiations. The nomination of her longtime adviser and close friend Htin Kyaw marks the end – for now – of her dream of leading Myanmar out of five decades of military rule. The Nobel laureate circulated a note to her new MPs expressing regret for “not fully fulfilling the people’s desire” but asked for support “to reach the goal peacefully”. Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) party won a landslide electoral victory in November, but she is barred from holding the presidency under a junta-drafted 2008 constitution because her children are foreign citizens. Suu Kyi has pledged to run the country regardless. Htin Kyaw, 69, currently helps run Suu Kyi’s charitable foundation in the country. Known as a genial figure, he is also a writer and a staunchly loyal member of Suu Kyi’s close-knit inner circle. During her 15 years of house arrest, he was one of a handful of trusted aides allowed to see her. And during her sporadic releases, he also served as her personal driver. Suu Kyi, 70, finally accepted defeat in behind-the-scenes negotiations to persuade the military to suspend the constitutional clause that thwarts her ambition to lead her country. Htin Kyaw was one of the candidates nominated yesterday for the three vice-president positions, ending weeks of Myanmar’s most intense political parlour game.
Henry Van Thio, an ethnic Chin NLD politician, was also nominated, while the third position will go to a serving officer put forward by the military bloc of MPs. In a vote expected next week, the new NLD-dominated parliament will choose the country’s next president from the three vice-presidential nominees after they have been vetted. As he is Suu Kyi’s preferred nominee, Htin Kyaw is now almost certain to be elected as president of the first freely elected government since 1960. The NLD won a landslide victory in elections in November in a resounding endorsement of Suu Kyi, who has led the democracy movement since returning to her homeland from Oxford in 1988. Her father Aung San, the former Burma’s liberation hero, was assassinated in 1947 just months before the country’s independence from Britain. She has been trying to strike a deal allowing her to take the top job in talks with the generals who once jailed her but who last year recognised the result of the country’s first democratic elections in 55 years. But they only allowed that vote to take place on their terms. They will maintain three key ministries and 25% of MPs are military appointees who command a veto over changing the constitution. And most notably, that charter includes a clause that disqualifies any potential candidate for the presidency who has direct foreign family ties. Suu Kyi’s two adult sons are British citizens, as was her late husband. The focus now will be on how Suu Kyi intends to run the country when the new NLD government takes power on April 1 from the defeated military-backed administration. Before the election, Suu Kyi pledged to run the country from a role “above the president”, while close aides have said the person nominated will effectively be a puppet or a proxy.
