Myanmar’s democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi faces an uphill battle if she is to become her country’s next president, posing new challenges for the party that she led through years of military dictatorship.
A military-drafted constitution bans her from the presidency because her late husband and child are foreigners. Her opposition party is trying to change that rule before next year’s election, which is shaping up as a critical test for an unconsolidated democracy, The Christian Science Monitor reported.
Should it fail, the National League for Democracy (NLD) – which is hugely popular – will struggle to find a replacement candidate. The battle over the constitution also exposes the limits of democracy under what remains a military-dominated system in Myanmar (also known as Burma).
In May, the NLD launched a two-month campaign calling for amendments to the constitution. This week it said it had collected 5 million signatures in support of its campaign.
“I dare say that there has never been a case such as this, where 5 million people supported a movement out of their own free will. This is [the] first time in our country’s history,” Ms. Suu Kyi told reporters Wednesday in the capital Naypyidaw.
US Secretary of State John Kerry arrived here Friday on a three-day visit amid criticism from the US Congress over the pace of political reforms under President Thein Sein, a retired general who is the country’s first civilian leader in five decades.
Last month Sen. Mitch McConnell (R) of Kentucky warned that the remaining US sanctions against Myanmar would be kept in place unless Suu Kyi was allowed to stand for president. As it stands, he said, the provision barring her from running would “cast a pall over the legitimacy of the election.”