Myanmar’s democracy movement enters the post-Aung San Suu Kyi era

Guest contributor Htuu Lou Rae The titular campaign calling for proof of life for Aung San Suu Kyi received a response on Monday: the junta issued photographs of her recent meeting with a team of representatives from the International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) led by Arnaud de Baecque, the ICRC’s head of delegation in Myanmar. Even for the most vocal critics of Aung San Suu Kyi as myself, this is welcome news. Nevertheless, one cannot ignore the disproportionate attention and concern from the local and international media—and Myanmar public at large—on the well-being of Aung San Suu Kyi. Just a minute fraction of this public obsession and media frenzy is extended to tens of thousands of other dissidents detained by the junta that do not enjoy the same privilege. Many of these individuals— unlike Aung San Suu Kyi—were vocal against the human rights abuses the military committed under the NLD administration. They were key players in organising the February 6 mass protest that sparked the Burmese Spring in 2021, and have stood at the frontline of the anti-coup movement ever since. For their courage and determination, they have been subjected to systematic torture and life-threatening human rights abuses on a regular basis in detention. Horrors that Aung San Suu Kyi is spared from. The tens of thousands who have lost their lives, families, and livelihoods since the coup also received only a sliver of this collective headspace. This imbalance is even more perplexing to anyone with an insightful understanding of Myanmar politics. During her political tenure, Aung San Suu Kyi achieved precious little in terms of meaningful and tangible social or political progress for the people of Myanmar. Her involvement and compromises have been a burden, if anything, to the collective struggle for human rights, democracy and autonomy in the Myanmar region. This inequality in attention is preposterous and does not bode well for the struggle for democracy in Myanmar, at present and in the long run. What role did Aung San Suu Kyi play in the Spring Revolution, after all? What positive impact did she have on advancing the socio-political rights of the Myanmar peoples?