Photo of Shwe Mann walking in parliament in Naypyidaw today / Coconuts Yangon
Those who were expecting a dramatic showdown in Myanmar’s parliament today left a tad disappointed.
Lower house speaker Shwe Mann opened the session in Naypyidaw less than a week after being removed from his post as USDP chairman, a move that many have described as an internal coup. He is, however still a member of the party and still speaker, at least for now. In his speech, which some thought he might use to go rogue, he said he was sad and that he didn’t want to cause any more trouble, but that staying silent would make people think he was guilty of a variety of allegations, including misusing party funds.
Mel Gibson in Braveheart it was not.
Of course, this could all be a ruse, a sly way of appearing compliant while wheeling and dealing with Aung San Suu Kyi behind the scenes (today, Suu Kyi said it was clear who was the enemy and who was the ally, and criticized Shwe Mann’s ouster). He did end the speech by thanking journalists (you’re welcome!) and saying that his current explanation would suffice for the time being.
Hmmm. Maybe he’s biding his time?
Alternatively, he could be taking one for the team in an attempt to not cause instability or avoid getting thrown in the slammer like previous purged officials.
If you want have a go at reading between the lines, here’s a translated version of the speech, which Shwe Mann posted to his official Facebook account. We’ve taken out his repetitive “Dear MPs” and in some places added punctuation for clarity.
Dear MPs,
It is true that people are worrying about the USDP. I don’t want you to bring the USDP issues to parliament.
But, as I am the speaker of the lower house, chairman of the Union Parliament [combination of lower and upper houses] and a member of the USDP, and as I am directly related to this issue, I [will] explain to MPs as much as is essential. I don’t want the problem to be bigger or happen again. I just want a stable and smooth democracy transition of the state. That’s why I am explaining it.
We received a letter that was addressed to me and U Htay Oo [the man who replaced him as party chairman last week]. In this letter, it was mentioned that ‘there is no unity between the leaders of the USDP, decided by the co-president of the party by neglecting democracy which is practiced in the USDP, using USDP’s funding without transparency, disobeying the constitution, [and also] some voters in the constituency complained to parliament to recall the MP [Shwe Mann] that can affect the image of the USDP and winning in the election.’ I would like to express that I had no intention to do this.
I received that letter on August 13. From that moment until now I didn’t take any actions other than sadness and instead I decided that I’ll solve it in the future if it is necessary.
But, if I stay silent it means admitting [wrongdoing] in terms of law. So we analyzed good and bad, truth and mistakes and we thought that we should do this to be happen for the benefits of people.
We don’t need to explain in detail about what had happened on the night of August 12 as we all know [for those who don’t know, this was when state security forces sealed off the ruling party headquarters in Naypyidaw and set into motion the purge that would be made official the next day].
This is the time to think and work for rule of law and trust from the people. I don’t want any problem to happen again from this issue and I just want the stability of state and peace of citizens.
So I’m just explaining through the MPs, proving the kindness of the government and that people are secure and under rule of law.
And I welcome and respect that news media are interested, worrying and asking me to hold a press conference. I believed that this is a proper explanation for this time and situation. Thank you all.
