National Defence and Security Council of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar holds 2/2022 meeting

The National Defence and Security Council of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar held the meeting 2/2022 at the meeting hall of National Defence and Security Council in Nay Pyi Taw yesterday morning.
Present at the meeting were Pro Tem President U Myint Swe, Speaker of Pyithu Hluttaw U T Khun Myat, Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, Deputy Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services Commander-in-Chief (Army) Vice-Senior General Soe Win, Union Minister for Defence General Mya Tun Oo, Union Minister for Home Affairs Lt-Gen Soe Htut, Union Minister for Foreign Affairs U Wunna Maung Lwin, Union Minister for Border Affairs Lt-Gen Tun Tun Naung, specially invited Secretary of the State Administration Council Lt-Gen Aung Lin Dwe and Joint-Secretary Lt-Gen Ye Win Oo. Vice-President U Henry Van Thio asked for a leave of absence from the meeting.
In his presentation, the Senior General said that there were 1,077 election cases in 2020 General Election period, and of them, 546 cases were opened under Union Election Law and 345 cases were firmly prosecuted while 200 were withdrawn and one still seeking legal suggestion.
A total of 2,417 officials were prosecuted for failing to supervise the electoral processes systematically. It also took action against 479 who participated in voting frauds and lawless action and arrangements are being made to report/prosecute against who cast vote for two times and above.
The UEC led the investigation processes on the political parties as per Political Parties Registration Law Section 18 and Rule 23 and inspected 85 political parties from August 2021 and July 2022.
The 18-month Pankhinn Project is being conducted to grant certain certificates to 3,491,364 people (over 3.4 million) out of eligible citizen voters, associate citizens, naturalized citizens for coming election and has already granted to 3,340,130 people (over 3.3 million) so far.
The Pilot Projects to verify the ground population census for the accuracy of the basic voter lists were launched on 14 February 2022 and completed in 298 townships while 14 were in operation and 13 were remaining as of 25 July.
Regarding the Road-Map (2),” Effective measures will be taken with added momentum to prevent and manage the COVID-19 pandemic,” between 31 January 2021 and 31 January 2022, there were 395,668 cases, 388,832 recoveries and 16,185 deaths. Between 1 February and 28 July 2022, there were 78,477 cases, 79,592 recoveries and only 124 deaths.
The country bought 45 million doses of vaccines from China, India and Russia as of 3 July 2022 and received 31,591,600 doses donation from China, India, Russia, Thailand, Malaysia, Japanese Nippon Foundation, GAVI Covax Facility and AHA Centre. The country produced vaccines in April and made over 4 million doses as of 1 July. The country achieves over 80 million doses and signs to purchase further 1.4 million doses.
It is necessary to upgrade health services for ensuring promotion of average lifespan of people for building a healthy and strong society, raising awareness for consumption of safe foods, inspecting foods for safety, using modern medicines and medical equipment and prioritizing vaccination and production of vaccines for prevention of the pandemic.
As per Road-Map (3) “Actions will be taken to ensure the speedy recovery of businesses from the impact of COVID-19,” the SAC will continue its efforts to revamp the COVID-hit businesses. Before the office of SAC, the local and foreign debts increased year-on-year. The current government repays about $700 million including capital and interest yearly. During the one-year office term, the government managed to export and reduce the nonessential imports. In former two governments’ terms, the trade deficit was $24.71billion.
Moreover, a new K400 billion fund out of remaining K491.18 billion fund of National Disaster Management Fund was also established with the permission of National-Level Central Committee for Prevention, Control and Treatment to promote the socio-economy status of rural population.
It is estimated to plant over 1.5 million acres of sunflower plantation in the country in 2022-2023 and a total of K100.248 billion was granted to sunflower farmers.
Being an agricultural country, the government invests K400 billion in summer rice, bean, maize and edible oil crops plantation under Contract Farming system in coming year.
Road-Map (4)” Emphasis will be placed on achieving enduring peace for the entire nation in line with the agreements set out in the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement,” the State stability plays key role for the development of country. Therefore, Tatmadaw firstly released statement for ceasefire and eternal peace on 21 December 2018 and extended the ceasefire until the end of 2022 on 28 February, and it has already released for 21 times.
On 17 February, 2021, the National Solidarity and Peacemaking Central Committee, Work Committee and Negotiation Committee were formed to boost the peace processes and the SAC Chairman Commander-in-Chief of Defence Services met with EAOs for nine times while 75 times by NSPNC with EAOs, political parties and other organizations.
Discussions were also held regarding the agreements in part (1/2/3) of the Union Accord and the points to be discussed in Table (2) that remain to be discussed in Part (3) and the agreements were signed.
Regarding the invitation to the leaders of the ethnic armed organizations to meet and discuss peace, another invitation was made on 14 June 2022 for the participation of the ethnic armed organizations that have not yet attended the peace talks. It will be necessary for the EAOs to cooperate, he said.
Between 1 February 2021 and 23 July 2022, 6,311 weapons, 335,184 ammunition of various types, and 11,715 grenades/mines of all kinds were seized from terrorists. He said that most of the incidents are happening only in areas such as KIA, KNU and KNPP, which provide manpower and weapons behind the terrorist incidents that occurred.
In the 18 months since 1 February 2021, there were a total of 14,907 terrorist attacks, including arson attacks, killings and bomb attacks, killing a total of 3,483 civilians, injuring 3,065 people, and 41 were missing.
He said that the prevention and control of drugs, which will make the whole nation ruined, is also being increased. In the year 2021, the total amount of drugs and related materials was over 970,288.9714 million Myanmar Kyats (USD 524.48 million). From January to May 2022, more than 576,416.6651 million Myanmar kyats (311.58 million USD) of drugs and related materials were seized. The value of seized drugs in the five months of 2022 is more than half of the value seized in 2021.
Regarding the implementation of the Road-Map (5), which states “After conducting in accordance with the provisions of the emergency period, we will hold a free and fair multi-party democratic general election in accordance with the Constitution (2008) and continue to hand over the responsibility of the state to the winning party in accordance with democratic standards,” the Senior General said “Our government is constantly aiming to re-hold a free and fair multi-party democratic generation election. What remains to be done has been fully presented”.
The basis for strengthening a genuine multi-party democratic system is a “free and fair multi-party democratic general election”. According to the results obtained through the election, the respective Hluttaws and the government can be structured and run the state apparatus. Therefore, I would like to present that it is necessary to be able to hold elections across the country in order for those who represent various classes of people in the regions and across the country to be elected.
Since the introduction of the multi-party democratic system in our country, general elections have been held three times. There are 330 townships in the country and 325 townships in the 2010 election. Elections were held in 323 townships in the 2015 election and 315 townships in the 2020 election. We can see that the number of townships that can hold elections is decreasing. It should be noted that the number of ethnic regions that have lost their democratic rights has increased because elections were not held under governments that were democratically elected and were supposed to implement a democratic system. I would like to report that there are still issues that need to be addressed to ensure that elections can be held without gaps across the country.
There are reasons that the townships couldn’t hold elections because there was no peace. The main reason for the instability is due to the presence of armed conflicts and the emergence of ethnic armed groups. We as the government have found that ethnic groups and ethnic regions need to be given more rights in order to resolve these issues. I would like to present that representatives representing various ethnic regions and public classes must be arranged to enter the parliament, which is the official political stage.
When looking at the classification of the 92 political parties currently in our country, (1) 43 parties representing the political ideology, (2) 30 political parties representing the region and (3) 19 parties representing ethnic groups can be found. All of them have representations and support. To make these representations comprehensive, the current First Past The Post-FPTP election system is not fully sufficient, efforts are being made to include the Proportional Representation-PR system. In order to do this, the relevant organizations, including the Election Commission, must continue to do preparations and plans. Political parties must also make appropriate changes to the electoral system. The public also needs to be widely educated about the election system. In order to do this, the preparation time and the work time are needed.”
Regarding the efforts to strengthen the true and disciplined multi-party democratic system, the Senior General said, “Today, the Tatmadaw is taking on national responsibility and is acting in accordance with the Constitution. This happened because officials of the previous government, political representatives and election officials violated the constitution and existing laws. Our country’s founding democratic system has withered. These issues should not happen again. Action must be taken to prevent abuse of democracy, the establishment of a dictatorship in the name of democracy, and the establishment of personal influence over the institution. Action must be taken to prevent major vote fraud in the elections. For this, we need to build the foundations now. The basics need to be strong. In order to do these things, our government is working towards the welfare of the people and the future of the Union.
In our country, we must continue to strengthen the “genuine and disciplined multi-party democratic system” which is the desire of the people. The Tatmadaw has firmly guaranteed a union based on a multi-party democratic system and a democratic federal system. According to Section 20 (f) of the basic principles of the constitution, Sections 6,7,8, which include three responsibilities, Tatmadaw has the main responsibility to protect the multi-party democratic system and the federal system. The Tatmadaw will carry out these responsibilities as a guardian for the benefit of the nation and the ethnic people.
Then the Senior General submitted a report to the SAC Government to allow him to serve for an additional 6 months in accordance with the emergency provisions of the Constitution to enable him to carry out his duties successfully.
Then, Pro Tem President U Myint Swe invited the members of the National Defence and Security Council individually to discuss the issue of extending the time period according to Article 425 of the Constitution. According to the authority of subsection (b) of Section 421, the members unanimously supported the proposal to extend the period of the declared state of emergency for another 6 months under Section 425 of the Constitution.
After that, the Senior General, said that the things he discussed and presented were according to the actual conditions, adding that the previous government turned a blind eye to the offer to meet and discuss the differences in the ballots since the end of the 2020 general election and that he is only carrying out his national duties in accordance with the existing laws.
He said that when the elections are held again, we must take steps to ensure that ethnic representatives can participate in the parliament by having the full rights of the ethnic groups.
Then Pro Tem President U Myint Swe said that according to the country’s constitution, the military is “to protect the constitution; To protect our three main national causes, mainly responsible for maintaining a genuine and disciplined multi-party democratic system.” These are not created duties, but history-given duties, he said.
The Pro Tem President also urged “the State Administration Council (Tatmadaw) to perform the duties as the Guardian of the state and the people and to strive for the rule of law, community peace, development of the people’s socio-economic life, and to strengthen a genuine and disciplined multi-party democracy,” and concluded the meeting.—MNA