Myanmar’s pro-military party claims landslide in tightly controlled first phase of elections

Myanmar’s main pro-military party says it is cruising to a dominant victory in the first phase of elections organised by the country’s junta, as critics warn the process is designed less to reflect public will than to lock in military rule under a civilian veneer.

A senior official from the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) told AFP that the party had won 82 of 102 lower-house seats in constituencies where counting has been completed, suggesting it captured more than 80 percent of the seats contested in Sunday’s vote. The official also claimed the party swept all eight townships in the capital, Naypyidaw. Myanmar’s Union Election Commission has yet to publish official results.

The vote on Sunday was only the first stage. Two further rounds are scheduled for January 11 and January 25, while elections have been cancelled entirely in 65 townships, underscoring how limited the process is in a country torn apart by war.

The United Nations human rights chief has already condemned the elections, pointing to a sweeping crackdown on dissent, while campaign groups say the candidate lists are overwhelmingly stacked with figures loyal to the military.

Voting took place in only about a third of Myanmar’s 330 townships, with vast areas inaccessible due to fighting between the armed forces and opposition groups since the 2021 coup that toppled the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

The USDP is widely expected to emerge as the largest party and has long been viewed by analysts as a civilian proxy for the military. In the last general election in 2020, the party suffered a crushing defeat to Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy, which has since been dissolved. The NLD is among some 40 political parties banned by the junta, according to campaigners in the United Kingdom. Suu Kyi has remained in detention since the coup.

After polling stations closed on Sunday, junta leader Min Aung Hlaing said the military could be trusted to hand power back to a civilian-led government, despite having ruled by decree for nearly four years.

That promise rings hollow for many in Myanmar. The coup triggered a nationwide civil war, with pro-democracy activists forming armed resistance groups alongside ethnic minority forces that have battled the central state for decades. The conflict has killed an estimated 90,000 people, displaced around 3.5 million and left roughly 22 million in need of humanitarian assistance. More than 22,000 people are currently detained for political offences, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.