32 minutes agoShareSaveJonathan HeadSouth East Asia correspondent, Nyaungshwe, Shan state ShareSave<\/p>\n
Polls in Myanmar have closed after a third and final stage of voting in what are widely viewed as sham elections.<\/p>\n
Many popular parties are banned from standing and voting has not been possible in large areas of the country because of a five-year-long civil war.<\/p>\n
The dominant party backed by the ruling military junta is expected to win a landslide victory.<\/p>\n
The current regime has rejected international criticism of the election, maintaining that it is free and fair.<\/p>\n
Around one-fifth of the country's 330 townships, including the cities of Yangon and Mandalay, voted in the last stage. <\/p>\n
Six parties, including the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), fielded candidates nationwide, while another 51 parties and independent candidates decided to contest state and regional levels.<\/p>\n
Two previous rounds were held on 28 December and 11 January – giving overwhelming victories to the USDP.<\/p>\n
The party won only 6% of parliamentary seats in the last free election in 2020.<\/p>\n
As in previous rounds of this strange, month-long election, voting was orderly and peaceful at the polling station in Nyaungshwe, Shan State, which a BBC team observed. <\/p>\n
Set in a large school, shaded by huge rain trees, there were ample volunteers an officials to guide voters where to go, and how to make their choice using the new, locally-made electronic voting machines. <\/p>\n
You could be forgiven for believing this was a normal democratic exercise, not the sham its critics say it is.<\/p>\n
However polling day was preceded by a campaigning period marked by fear, intimidation and a pervasive sense that little will change after the inevitable victory by the USDP. <\/p>\n
Everywhere the BBC team travelled in southern Shan State, we were followed and closely monitored by dozens of police and military officials, always polite but very persistent. <\/p>\n
It proved nearly impossible to get people to say anything about the vote, so nervous were they of possible repercussions.<\/p>\n
The next steps after final results are announced are laid down in the military-drafted constitution. <\/p>\n
Parliament will meet within the next two months to choose a new president, and everyone expects that to be the coup leader Gen Min Aung Hlaing. <\/p>\n
It will be the same regime with civilian clothes. <\/p>\n
But he will then have to relinquish his command of the armed forces. <\/p>\n
His replacement is certain to be a loyalist, but his hold over the ranks of the military will inevitably be less secure, and it is no secret that many other senior officers do not believe he has made a good job of leading the country. <\/p>\n
With many more voices in politics, there is the possibility of wider debate inside government over which direction Myanmar should now take, and the possibility – distant for now – of the first steps towards ending the civil war.<\/p>\n
The military junta took control of Myanmar in a 2021 coup, ousting an elected civilian government led by Nobel Peace Prize Winner Aung San Suu Kyi.<\/p>\n
She remains in detention and, like many other opposition groups, her National League for Democracy has been formally dissolved.<\/p>\n
The military has been fighting against both armed resistance groups which oppose the coup and ethnic armies that have their own militias. <\/p>\n
It lost control of large parts of the country in a series of major setbacks, but clawed back territory this year enabled by support from China and Russia.<\/p>\n
The civil war has killed thousands of people, displaced millions more, destroyed the economy and left a humanitarian vacuum. <\/p>\n
A devastating earthquake in March and international funding cuts have made the situation far worse.<\/p>\n
Myanmar<\/a>Asia<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Final round of voting closes in 'sham' Myanmar election32 minutes agoShareSaveJonathan HeadSouth East Asia correspondent, Nyaungshwe, Shan state ShareSaveBBCAround half of Myanmar was not ex…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":7853,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bbc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7852","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7852"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7852\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp2.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}