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Election date announcement pressures opposition parties

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The announcement ordering that political parties submit candidate lists by the end of August 2010

Kong Janoi, IMNA :  Several opposition political parties in Burma are chafing under yesterday’s announcement of the  date of the country’s upcoming election, now set for November 7th of this year.

Three parties interviewed yesterday told IMNA that they are financially unprepared to submit their candidate lists to Burma’s Election Commission, which according to yesterday’s announcement must now be sent in between August 16th and August 30.

All candidate lists have to be submitted to the Commission along with a fee of 500,000 kyat [500 USD] per candidate, which parties now have less than a month to raise.

U Thein Htay, the leader of Union Democratic Party (UDP), told IMNA that  he feels that yesterday’s  announcement, which has effectively limited the submission of candidate lists and money to  within the next 15 days, has made the election process less democratic.

“We see that this [announcement] is cutting the democratic force in the parliament, because there is no logical procedure for submitting parties’ registration lists. They are not following their election regulations. They [the Election Commission] just announced suddenly that they have given limited time for preparations. Parties lacking financial support, like our party, are struggling to submit party candidate lists and money.”

U Thein Htay also elaborated on the difficulties that opposition groups have getting funds.

“To be able get funds from the individual donors, as you know in Burma many businessmen have connections to the military regime. Although they want to support democracy, they are afraid that their businesses will be destroyed [if they give opposition parties money].”

Like the UDP, the All Mon Region Democracy Party (AMRDP), which will run for election in Mon State, is also struggling to attain funds for candidate fees to submit to the Election Commission. The AMRDP is still in the process of campaigning around Mon state in search  of financial support; representatives from the party reported to IMNA that candidates from many opposition parties, including their own, are being forced to fund their positions on candidate lists  with their own savings, as their parties cannot raise the necessary finances.

U Thu Wai, who leads the group known as the Democratic Party, told IMNA yesterday that the party’s  planned number of candidates will be cut  in half, because of the limits placed on candidate lists by the Election Commission’s time frame and funding requirements.

“Right now, we have 100 candidates who are able to fund themselves. We also have a second group of over 100 candidates have the potential to run in the polls, but these individuals do not have enough money to fund their registration fees. Besides, the party is not able to fund them so we can only submit the 100 candidates who are able to fund themselves,” he explained.

Many of the parties interviewed informed IMNA that the financial problems caused by yesterday’s announcement have only added to a slew of election-related difficulties.

The Democratic Party has reportedly already complained to the Election Commission that party members have been intimidated by the Special Police (SP) after submitting party member lists to the Commission

“We think the Election Commission handed over our party’s profile to the SP because many SP in town came questioning our party members,” said U Thu Wai.

UDP chairman Thein Tin Aung informed IMNA that the party has not even been able to commence campaigning due membership issues and financial problems; the group’s party leader Phyo Min Thein resigned on August 5th , claiming that the election process was too inherently “unfair” to take part in.

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