Myanmar’s military government has imposed harsh new penalties for protesting its planned election, with critics potentially facing years in prison for dissent.
The state-run Global New Light of Myanmar reported that the new law took effect on Tuesday, months before elections expected at the end of this year.
The legislation bans “any speech, organising, inciting, protesting or distributing leaflets in order to destroy a part of the electoral process” – which opposition groups and international monitors have slammed as a ploy to shore up military rule.
Those convicted of violating the law face three to seven years in prison, with group offences punishable by five to 10 years.
The law also criminalises damaging ballot papers or polling stations, and intimidating or harming voters, candidates or election workers – with sentences of up to 20 years. If anyone is killed during an attempt to disrupt the election, “everyone involved in the crime faces the death penalty,” the law says.
Myanmar’s military government seized power in a 2021 coup that prompted a many-sided civil war, and swaths of the country remain outside the military’s control. Some state census workers deployed last year to gather data before the poll faced resistance and security threats.
Data could not be collected from an estimated 19 million of the country’s 51 million people, provisional results said, in part because of “significant security constraints”.
Analysts have predicted that the myriad of anti-coup fighter groups and ethnic armed groups which the military is battling may stage offensives in the run-up to the vote as a sign of their opposition.
A United Nations expert called on the international community last month to reject the election plan as “a fraud”.
Tom Andrews, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, said the military is “trying to create this mirage of an election exercise that will create a legitimate civilian government”.
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