{"id":75752,"date":"2025-12-26T09:01:53","date_gmt":"2025-12-26T00:01:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/dec\/26\/myanmar-junta-prepares-elections-legitimise-power"},"modified":"2025-12-26T09:01:53","modified_gmt":"2025-12-26T00:01:53","slug":"not-for-the-people-myanmar-junta-prepares-for-elections-designed-to-legitimise-grip-on-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=75752","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Not for the people\u2019: Myanmar junta prepares for elections designed to legitimise grip on power"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Elections will be first since military seized power in 2021, but analysts say vote is far from a step toward democracy<\/p>\n<p>Myanmar is preparing to go to the polls for the first time since its military seized power in a coup in 2021, but with its former leader behind bars, its most successful political party disbanded and roughly a third of the country either disputed or in rebel hands, few believe claims by its military rulers that its 28 December election will be \u201cfree and fair\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is not for the people, this is for themselves,\u201d says Pai, 25, who fled Myanmar after the military seized power. \u201cThey [the ruling junta] are looking for a way out of the trap they are [in].\u201d<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/dec\/26\/myanmar-junta-prepares-elections-legitimise-power\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Elections will be first since military seized power in 2021, but analysts say vote is far from a step toward democracyMyanmar is preparing to go to the polls for the first time since its military seized power in a coup in 2021, but with its former lead&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":327,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,50,82,1906,61,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-china","category-myanmar","category-myanmar-coup","category-south-and-central-asia","category-world-news"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/327"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=75752"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75752\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75753,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75752\/revisions\/75753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=75752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=75752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=75752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}