On December 28, 2025, Myanmar embarked on its first general election since the military’s controversial seizure of power in 2021, a move that has drawn sharp criticism from both domestic and international observers. The election, held under the shadow of a raging civil war and widespread repression, is being described by critics as a thinly veiled attempt by the military to legitimize its rule, rather than a true return to democracy.
According to Associated Press, voting took place in just 102 of Myanmar’s 330 townships during this initial phase, with two further rounds scheduled for January 11 and January 25, 2026. The remaining 65 townships were excluded from the process due to ongoing armed conflict, effectively disenfranchising at least 20 percent of the population at the outset. The final results are expected to be released by February 2026, but few expect any surprises: the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) is widely seen as the inevitable victor.
The current political landscape in Myanmar is starkly different from the one that existed before the 2021 coup. The National League for Democracy (NLD), led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, was dissolved in 2023 after refusing to register under new military-imposed rules. Suu Kyi herself remains in detention, serving a 27-year prison sentence on charges broadly dismissed as spurious and politically motivated. As Al Jazeera reports, the exclusion of major opposition parties has led many to view the election as a farce. “How can we support a junta-run election when this military has destroyed our lives?” asked Moe Moe Myint, a 40-year-old resident of the central Mandalay region, who spoke to AFP. “We are homeless, hiding in jungles, and living between life and death.”
Despite the military’s claims that the vote marks a new beginning for Myanmar’s 55 million citizens, the reality on the ground tells a different story. Reports of voter intimidation have surfaced across the country. In southern Mon state, a woman named Khin recounted her experience to Associated Press: “I have to go and vote even though I don’t want to, because soldiers showed up with guns to our village to pressure us yesterday.” Similar stories have echoed throughout independent media and rights groups, highlighting the climate of fear in which the election is being conducted.
Turnout, as expected, was low. At a polling station in Yangon, just under 37% of registered voters cast their ballots, according to counts publicly announced at the station. Of those, a majority—311 out of 524—voted for the pro-military USDP, suggesting that calls from opposition groups for a boycott may have resonated with much of the population. “I am voting with the feeling that I will go back to my village when it is peaceful,” said Khin Marlar, a 51-year-old voter displaced by conflict, in an interview with Associated Press.
Electronic voting machines made their debut in Myanmar during this election, a move the authorities touted as a step toward modernization. However, the machines did not allow write-in candidates or spoiled ballots, further restricting the already narrow field of political choice. Of the more than 4,800 candidates from 57 parties competing for seats in the national and regional legislatures, only six parties held any real sway nationwide. The USDP, by far the strongest contender, is expected to cement the military’s grip on power under the veneer of a civilian government.
International observers from Russia, China, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Cambodia, Vietnam, Nicaragua, and India were present, according to state-run Global New Light of Myanmar. Their presence, however, did little to allay concerns about the election’s legitimacy. Western governments and human rights organizations have dismissed the process as neither free nor fair, maintaining sanctions against Myanmar’s ruling generals for their continued repression and the brutal civil war that has followed the 2021 coup.
The United Nations’ Special Rapporteur on Myanmar, Tom Andrews, minced no words in his condemnation. “An election organized by a junta that continues to bomb civilians, jail political leaders, and criminalize all forms of dissent is not an election—it is a theater of the absurd performed at gunpoint,” he declared in a statement quoted by Al Jazeera and Los Angeles Times. Andrews went on to assert, “This is not a pathway out of Myanmar’s crisis. It is a ploy that will perpetuate repression, division and conflict.”
The numbers behind the crisis are staggering. Since the military coup, the civil war has killed an estimated 90,000 people, displaced more than 3.6 million, and left 22 million in need of humanitarian assistance, according to U.N. figures cited by Al Jazeera. The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners reports that over 22,000 people are currently detained for political offenses, and more than 7,600 civilians have been killed by security forces since 2021. A new Election Protection Law now imposes harsh penalties for virtually any public criticism of the voting process, further stifling dissent.
The military’s leader, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, who orchestrated the 2021 coup, cast his ballot in Naypyidaw dressed in civilian clothes, later telling reporters, “I am the commander in chief. I am a civil servant. I cannot say that I want to serve as a president. I am not the leader of a political party,” as reported by Associated Press. Nevertheless, he is widely expected to assume the presidency once the new parliament convenes. The general, holding up his ink-stained finger for cameras, insisted the election was free and fair, dismissing concerns about its military oversight.
Yet, for many inside and outside Myanmar, the outcome is a foregone conclusion. As Richard Horsey of the International Crisis Group wrote earlier this month, “The outcome is hardly in doubt: a resounding USDP victory and a continuation of army rule with a thin civilian veneer.” He added, “It will in no way ease Myanmar’s political crisis or weaken the resolve of a determined armed resistance. Instead, it will likely harden political divisions and prolong Myanmar’s state failure.”
While the military hopes that the election will provide cover for neighbors such as China, India, and Thailand to claim progress toward stability, most analysts and rights groups see only deepening repression and conflict. The prospect of genuine democratic reform, it seems, remains as distant as ever for the people of Myanmar.
Against a backdrop of violence, displacement, and fear, Myanmar’s election is unfolding not as a celebration of democracy, but as a somber reflection of a nation’s ongoing struggle for freedom and legitimacy.
