NAYPYITAW, Myanmar (AP) – Myanmar’s parliament on Tuesday elects a new president as the head of the country’s first democratically elected government, but it won’t be Aung San Suu Kyi, the face of the country’s decades-long struggle against military rule. Here’s why:
WHAT PREVENTED SUU KYI?
The military has been in power in this Southeast Asian nation since 1962. Faced with unrelenting international pressure, which boosted a non-violent campaign for democracy led by Suu Kyi that won her the Nobel peace prize, the junta began to pave the way toward a civilian government in 2011. But such was the antipathy of some generals toward Suu Kyi that they inserted a clause in the constitution to stymie her. The clause forbids anyone with a foreign spouse or children from becoming president. Suu Kyi’s late husband and her two sons are British.
WHAT DID SUU KYI DO?
Her National League for Democracy party won the Nov. 8 parliamentary elections by a landslide. At that point she had still hoped to convince the generals to allow the constitutional clause to be scrapped. The military, for which a quarter of parliament seats are reserved in parliament, refused to relent during several rounds of negotiations with her. So the NLD had to nominate someone else to contest the election for president, who is chosen by members of parliament.