Parties gear up for Pyithu Hluttaw fight
August 30 - September 5, 2010
COMPETITION in the November 7 election is expected to be most intense in the race for seats in the Pyithu Hluttaw, particularly in the seven Bamar-dominated regions, party leaders said last week.
The Pyithu Hluttaw is the lower house of the national parliament in Nay Pyi Taw and together with the Amyotha Hluttaw, or upper house, makes up the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw.
While the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) is expected to contest every seat in the country, most non-ethnic parties are likely to focus on the Pyithu Hluttaw because of their limited capacity to register candidates before the August 30 deadline.
There are 330 seats for elected representatives in the Pyithu Hluttaw – one for each township in the country – and 168 in the Amyotha Hluttaw, with 12 from each state and Region.
U Aye Lwin, chairman of the Union of Myanmar Federation of National Politics, said the greater responsibilities of the Pyithu and Amyotha hluttaws would encourage parties to focus on those two houses of government.
“We plan to register about 100 candidates,” U Aye Lwin said. “We will focus mostly on the Pyithu Hluttaw as it has the authority to choose one of the two vice presidents. So any party that has a majority in the Pyithu Hluttaw can elect their leader as vice president, and there’s also the possibility they will become president.”
Under Schedule 1 of the 2008 constitution, the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw will be responsible for matters relating to defence and security, foreign affairs, the national budget, the judiciary, the national economy, land administration, industry, most transport and communication projects, the energy, mining and forestry sectors and many other duties.
By comparison, the responsibilities of the state and region hluttaws are relatively few and include the state or region budget, land revenue, excise duties, agriculture, small-scale electricity and some aspects of the industrial sector.
State and region hluttaws will have a combined 665 representatives – two from each township except in Nay Pyi Taw and four Shan State townships, plus 29 “ethnic” representatives – although with large disparities. The Chin State Hluttaw will have only 18 elected representatives, while the Yangon Region Hluttaw will have 92, including a Kayin and a Rakhine representative.
Twenty-five percent of seats in all hluttaws are reserved for appointed Defence Services personnel.
Both the size of constituencies and number of seats on offer are likely to influence parties’ choices when registering candidates. The larger Amyotha Hluttaw constituencies may be logistically difficult to campaign in for those on a budget, while parties will find it difficult to win a majority in a state or region hluttaw with a high number of representatives.
“The democratic forces will only be strong in the Pyithu Hluttaw,” said U Kaung Myint Htut, the chairman of the Myanmar Democracy Congress. “In the Pyithu Hluttaw the constituencies are not as large as in the Amyotha Hluttaw, just the size of one township. If the democratic forces can contest Pyithu Hluttaw constituencies in the cities I believe they can win those.”
However, the equation is different for ethnic parties, most of whom can only expect to win seats in a limited number of townships. Those that have been able to meet the requirement of 1000 members are likely to contest seats in all three hluttaws in the areas where they have strongest support to maximise their number of representatives.
Parties representing the larger ethnic groups, including the Shan Nationals Development Party and All Mon Region Democracy Party, have a realistic chance of winning a majority of seats in their state hluttaw, while also having representatives in the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw.
