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Southeast Asia
Myanmar "parliament" set for 1st session in 22 years
2011-01-11
Sneer quotes mine. This is about as much a parliament as the one in Egypt or Syria.
YANGON, Myanmar — Myanmar’s new parliament will hold its first session in 22 years on Jan. 31, state radio said Monday, an event the country’s military rulers hail as one of the final steps in its self-styled “roadmap to democracy.”

The new legislature dominated by pro-military lawmakers was elected in polls last year decried as unfair by the opposition parties, including that of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who was recently freed from house arrest.

The countryÂ’s 1,154 lawmakers will meet in a massive new building in the remote capital of Naypyitaw, the brief announcement said. It will be the first parliamentary session since a 1988 meeting in the old capital of Rangoon, which the junta renamed Yangon a year later.

The ruling juntaÂ’s military-backed thug party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party, garnered nearly 80 percent of seats in the two-house Union Parliament in Nov. 7 polls, the countryÂ’s first in two decades. The countryÂ’s 14 regional parliaments will convene the same day in their respective areas, the announcement said.

“We have waited 20 years to be able to make our demands through the parliament,” said Thein Nyunt, a member of the opposition National Democratic Force. “Now that the parliament is going to be convened, I hope I will be able to work for the betterment of the people and the country from within the system.”

The opposition party, formed by a faction of Suu KyiÂ’s party after it was disbanded for boycotting the polls, holds a mere 12 seats total in the national parliment.

Government opponents and outside observers have called the elections unfair and undemocratic, saying the results were manipulated to allow the military-backed party to win.

The election results assure that the military, which has ruled Myanmar since 1962, will continue to wield decisive power. Under the constitution, the parliament elects the countryÂ’s president and vice-president.
How convenient.
The constitution also allots 25 percent of parliamentary seats to military nominees, meaning that the pro-junta USDP party lawmakers combined with the nominees will account for 85 percent of seats in the lower house and 83 percent in the upper house. The dominance assures that the military through its allies can push through or block any legislation and constitutional amendments.
Almost as if it were designed that way.
As was the case with the elections, there will be strict rules governing the decorum of lawmakers at parliament. According to new laws announced in November, parliamentarians will be allowed freedom of expression unless their words endanger national security or the unity of the country. Any protest staged within parliament is punishable by up to two years in prison.

Anyone aside from lawmakers who enter the parliament while it is in session face a one-year prison term.
Posted by:Steve White

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