The Myanmar opposition party formed by ex-members of Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy opened a new office in Mandalay Thursday to drum up support ahead of November elections.
Watched by plain-clothes police and military intelligence personnel, about 100 people attended the inaugural ceremony in the central city, where members of the National Democratic Force cut a ribbon and released balloons.
‘We cannot avoid the coming election, whether we assume it is fair or not,’ NDF chairman Than Nyein said in a speech.
‘People might have expected in the past they would vote again for the NLD as they had done before. But, unexpectedly, the NLD does not exist any more as it is not participating in the election.’
He said NDF members felt they would be failing in their duties if they did not stand in the country’s first polls in two decades when people are ready to cast their votes.
‘We will not go backwards nor run away.... We are not people who will retreat because of difficulties,’ he said.
The NDF’s decision to contest the election has put it at odds with other former members of the NLD — including Suu Kyi — who opted to boycott the poll because of ‘unjust’ election laws.
The vote has been widely condemned by activists and the West as a sham aimed at shoring up almost half a century of military rule.
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