Labor
I think it pretty clear to all of us that Nyan Win couldn't and wouldn't
have said what "The Irrawaddy" has re****ted. Nyan Win is a lawyer, and he
would know perfectly well that all polling stations were required by law
to
stay open until 4.00 p.m. When "The Irrawaddy" re****ts that "most" (that
is,
a majority) of polling stations closed at 11.00 a.m. or five hours before
they were required by law, then that re****t is clearly nonsense. I doubt
that a single one of the 25,837 polling stations closed before the time
due,
because if they did the NLD would pounce like tigers. There were also a
number of foreign observers around, officially and unofficially.
As regards the other stories in "The Irrawaddy" re****t, I regard most of
them as being of very low credibility. I would accept that in cases where
poorly educated or elderly voters might have not known quite what to do,
they might have been guided by "helpful" polling station officials. I
would
also suspect that a number of nervous voters who would like to have voted
"No" could have been put off by police/security guards around the polling
stations. But I await a definitive judgement from the NLD on the general
voting process before forming a final conclusion. At present, on a scale
of
1 to 10, I give the SPDC only 1.5 for freedom and fairness in the campaign
period, a very low mark indeed, which would have been even lower if the
NLD
had been disbanded completely and had not been able to make its views
partially known. But as far as voting on the day is concerned, I think it
compares quite favourably with the Thai Referendum on 19 August 2007 when
the State likewise exerted tremendous pressures to get a "Yes" vote, but
on
the day acted in a way which was reasonably fair. So I find myself giving
the State in Burma/Myanmar provisionally 8.5 marks out of 10 for what
happened yesterday. We shall however need to take another judgement when
the
results are eventually declared as to whether the results recorded at the
polling stations have in any way been rigged.
Derek
"labor" <labor@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:4826f5b0$0$22166$5a62ac22@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> May 10, Irrawaddy
> Massive cheating re****ted from Referendum polling stations
>
> Burma's constitutional referendum went ahead as planned on Saturday in
> areas not affected by Cyclone Nargis, amid accusations of massive
cheating
> at the polling stations and re****ts of a very low turnout.
>
> Many voters in several Rangoon town****ps, Mandalay, Pegu, Sagaing and
> Magwe divisions told The Irrawaddy that referendum officials had handed
> out ballot papers already filled in with a tick, indicating approval of
> the government's draft constitution.
>
> They also complained that the referendum was not free and fair, saying
> they cast their votes watched by officials, including members of the
> government-backed mass organization Union Solidarity and Development
> Association and militias such as Swan-Ar-****n. Officials of the
> organizations sat close to the ballot boxes and advised people how to
> vote.
>
> Voter turn-out was re****ted to be very light, despite fevered attempts
by
> the regime to persuade people to participate. State TV broke into
> programming throughout the day with a video showing a group of smiling
> young women singing a ditty in sup****t of a "Yes" vote. "Let's go vote
> .... with sincere thoughts for happy days," they sang.
>
> About 27 million of Burma's 57 million population are entitled to vote.
>
> Nyan Win, spokesman of the opposition National League for Democracy told
> The Irrawaddy that most polling stations closed at about 11 a.m.
Officials
> then went to the homes of people who had not voted and made them fill in
> registration forms indicating they had handed in ballots that had
already
> been filled in with a tick.
>
> Rangoon-based Burmese journalists said security at polling stations was
> very strict. No foreign news agency correspondents or independent
> journalists were allowed near.
>
> The cheating and intimidation observed on Saturday confirmed claims by
> human rights activists and western governments that the referendum would
> be a sham and neither free nor fair.
>
> The regime had used both intimidation and vote-buying to assure itself
of
> a "Yes" vote and would predictably resort to vote-rigging if it lost,
> observers said. Widespread rumors say the results have already been
fixed
> to deliver an 84.6 percent vote in favor of the charter, an AP re****t
> said.
>
> The government has also been widely criticized for pressing on with the
> referendum while the country is still reeling from the catastrophic
> effects of Cyclone Nargis.
>
> "Instead of putting all resources toward saving the lives of the
victims,
> the military is concentrating on legalizing military rule in Burma
forever
> through a sham constitutional referendum," said a joint statement from
the
> All Burma Monks Alliance, the 88 Generation Students and the All Burma
> Federation of Student Unions.
>
>
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