London, Jan 6 (IANS) Myanmar’s ongoing election, conducted in three phases from December 28 to January 25, is unlikely to bring any change, with Western diplomats and analysts describing it as a “pantomime” – a box-ticking exercise by the military junta to secure international legitimacy, a report said on Monday.

It added that while Beijing concluded that an unstable criminal State on its doorstep is untenable, the current elections in Myanmar are neither free nor fair.

“Outside polling stations guarded by armed police, an upbeat music video urging people to take part in the election plays on repeat. But there’s little enthusiasm for the vote in Yangon, one of Myanmar’s largest cities,” a report in UK-based ‘The Telegraph’ cited.

According to the report, this marks the first election in the country since 2020, with several international media outlets granted rare access.

Amid a lack of enthusiasm, voter turnout in Yangon and Mandalay — the two largest cities in Myanmar under military control–is minimal, a sharp departure from 2020, when mass turnout delivered a landslide victory for pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

“I don’t want to vote, but I am scared not to. I feel trapped,” said one 32-year-old woman, speaking on condition of anonymity, like many others interviewed by The Telegraph.

“If I vote, I feel like I am betraying my own beliefs. If I don’t vote, I worry that my name will be noted and I could be questioned later. Every decision feels dangerous,” she added.

According to the report, it has been nearly five years since the military overthrew Suu Kyi’s popular government, ending a decade of development and democratic promise and driving the country into a brutal conflict that has shattered the economy and deepened social crisis.

With little commitment to genuine reform, it said, the junta has focused its election campaigns on pushing people to vote rather than addressing policies to tackle Myanmar’s multiple challenges.

“[The election] is the latest and the worst in a decades-long series of rigged votes staged by the military,” said Yanghee Lee, a former UN Special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar.

“They will not reopen the limited democratic space – their purpose is to stop that space ever opening again,” The Telegraph quoted her as saying during a recent press briefing.

“[The election] does not represent a softening of [their] position, but rather a doubling down.”

She described the polls in Myanmar as “neither free nor fair”, warning that the outcome was predetermined.

Echoing Lee’s concern, Richard Horsey, a Myanmar analyst at Crisis Group, said “Yet again, as it has for 80 years, the military has found a way to hang on and remain in the driver’s seat”, noting that China has been “pushing the regime to proceed with the polls without further delay.”

–IANS

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