MIN AUNG HLAING, Myanmar’s armed forces commander-in-chief, has emerged as the country’s new strongman following Monday’s declaration of a one-year state of emergency.

The senior general should have been quietly preparing to retire in July when he turns 65, the official retirement age for the commander-in-chief of the country’s armed forces.

Citing electoral fraud in the November 2020 general elections — in which Nobel laureate and de facto ruler Aung San Suu Kyi’s party won a landslide 83 percent of the vote – the junta imposed a one-year state of emergency that will be followed by “free and fair multiparty general elections,” according to a statement released by the office of Myanmar’s Commander-in-Chief of Defense Services.

The coup puts Min Aung Hlaing, the embodiment of Myanmar’s military system, at the helm of a country that has been under military rule for nearly half a century.

The 64-year-old general rose steadily through the ranks of the Tatmadaw, Myanmar’s powerful military, but as commander-in-chief for the past decade he also wielded significant political influence before the Feb. 1 takeover.

As Myanmar returns to military rule under his leadership, Min Aung Hlaing now looks set to extend his power and shape the country’s immediate future.

Born in 1956 in the southern city of Tavoy, now known as Dawei, Min Aung Hlaing steered clear of the political activism that was widespread at the time when he studied in Rangoon, the country’s former capital, now Yangon, in the 1970s.

“He was a man of few words and normally kept a low profile,” a classmate said in 2016.

While fellow students joined demonstrations, Min Aung Hlaing made annual applications to join the premier military university, the Defense Services Academy (DSA), succeeding on his third attempt in 1974.

A member of his DSA class said he had been just an average cadet who was “promoted regularly and slowly.”

Min Aung Hlaing has spent his entire career in the influential military.

His luck began to turn when he joined the army’s 88th Light Infantry Division, which was commanded at that time by a certain Colonel Than Shwe.

The relatively unassuming infantryman made Than Shwe his mentor and continued his career in the shadow of the man who, in 1992, rose to become head of the country’s military junta.

He became commander of the Bureau of Special Operations-2 in 2009 and joint chief of staff in August 2010.

Less than a year later, he was tapped for the military’s top post ahead of more senior generals, succeeding long-time leader Than Shwe as commander-in-chief to become the first armed forces commander-in-chief in Myanmar’s post-military junta era in March 2011.

When Min Aung Hlaing became military chief, blogger and writer Hla Oo — who said they had known each other in childhood — described him as “a battle-hardened warrior of Burmese Army,” but also called him a “serious scholar and gentleman.”

As Than Shwe’s heir and faithful to the vision of an all-powerful military, Min Aung Hlaing negotiated with Suu Kyi, charting the course of Myanmar’s democratic transition.

He went on several official trips, particularly to China and Japan, and received foreign dignitaries, such as Pope Francis in 2017.

Min Aung Hlaing began his tenure as military chief as Myanmar transitioned to democracy in 2011 after decades of military rule.

His political influence and social media presence increased as the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) led the government.

In 2016, when Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) came to power, he seemingly adapted to the change by working and appearing at public events with her.

Despite the change, he ensured the Tatmadaw continued to hold 25 percent of parliamentary seats and crucial security-related Cabinet portfolios, while resisting the NLD’s attempts to amend the constitution and limit military power.

The November 2020 general election saw a landslide win for the NLD, according to official figures, but in subsequent months the Tatmadaw and military-backed USDP repeatedly disputed the results.

The USDP made allegations of widespread electoral fraud. Those claims were dismissed by the election commission ahead of a planned parliament session Feb. 1 to confirm the new government.

Speculation of a coup grew amid the standoff between the government and the armed forces. On Jan. 27 Min Aung Hlaing warned that “the constitution shall be abolished, if not followed,” citing example of previous military coups in 1962 and 1988.

His office seemingly reversed this stance by Jan. 30, saying that the media had misinterpreted military officials’ words about abolishing the constitution.

However, on the morning of Feb. 1, the Tatmadaw detained State Counsellor Suu Kyi, President Win Myint and other senior leaders, and declared a year-long state of emergency.

Min Aung Hlaing assumed all state power for this period in his capacity as commander-in-chief and immediately prioritized the alleged electoral irregularities.

A meeting of the National Defense and Security Council led by him said it would investigate the fraud claims and hold new elections, effectively invalidating the NLD’s win.

(SD-Agencies)

Myanmar:

What’s next?

A CHINESE expert said the military’s move comes after their dissatisfaction to last year’s parliamentary elections, which the ruling NLD party won a sweeping victory.

“The Myanmar military believe there was massive voting fraud in last year’s parliamentary elections. And they had demanded postponement of new parliamentary sessions. But the Union Election Commission [UEC] dismissed the allegations,” Song Qingrun, an associate professor from Beijing Foreign Studies University, said.

The military in a latest statement claimed 25 percent of the voters may be fraudulent and said they have discovered over 10.48 million errors after reviewing the publicly released voters list by the UEC.

Noting the future could be “complex,” Song said it is quite difficult to say how the situation will develop in the future.

“It depends on whether the supporters of the NLD will go demonstration in the streets, whether the military could handle the conditions in the country... as well as what the results of the new elections will be,” Song said.

He pointed out last year’s election shows that the NLD led by Suu Kyi still enjoys a lot of supporters.

He also said Myanmar’s military will also be facing pressure from National League supporters and some Western countries.

He believes the military’s ruling of the country could still face several challenges.

“The first one is the outbreak of the coronavirus. Currently Myanmar has got over 140,000 confirmed cases and it reports about 400 to 500 new cases every day. So how to control the pandemic is a question laying in front of the military’s table. Meanwhile, they also need to make efforts to recover the country’s economy. These are the problems whether the Myanmar people could be satisfied with the military’s ruling for the coming one year.”

In terms of Suu Kyi’s future political career, Larry Jagan, an independent analyst, said removing Suu Kyi from power is key to the military’s “game plan,” which could signal the end of her political career.

(SD-Agencies)