New Year Statement English)

New Year Special Statement by NCUB 1. On this auspicious occasion of New Year 2009, while we wish all the people of Burma to be freed from oppression and misery, to regain their human dignity and the status of being citizens of a dignified state, we declare our action plan as follows. 2. Due to the sacrifice of many lives by the people in the 1988 people’s movement, the SLORC/SPDC held the 1990 multi-party general election. However, when the National League for Democracy (NLD) led by national leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, gained more than 80% of the seats in the election, the military reneged on its promise to return to the barracks and has been attempting, ever since, to implement the plan of substituting a fraudulent democratic system. 3. The military regime has totally ignored the advice by the international community, including the United Nations, for nearly 20 years to embark on national reconciliation through negotiation based on the results of 1990 election. Moreover, we can clearly see that it has been going adamantly ahead, with its plan, to hold election in 2010, after adopting by force the 2008 State Constitution, against the will of the people. 4. Obstinate refusal by the military clique to accept consistent calls for dialogue by the NLD, winner of the 1990 election, the offer made by the NLD in its 2006 Union Day statement to legitimize the rule of the military clique, with a view to initiating a process for national reconciliation, and the overtures made by it in its special statement of September 22, 2006 - all of which were intended for the resolution of the country’s political problems by political means, peacefully, and for the establishment of a democratic federal union – shows the true mind-set of the military clique towards the people and the country. 5. All these actions of the SPDC military clique are for total repudiation of the May 1990 election results and setting up the country for military enslavement, with the Constitution enshrining life-long rule of the country by the military dictatorship. The situation is that we cannot even imagine amendment of the Constitution. Objectively speaking, the root cause of the general political malaise in Burma and the long but still continuing civil war is the failure to practice true democracy and federalism, which guarantees equality for all the ethnic nationalities. It is plainly obvious that the military clique’s 2008 Nargis Constitution and the election intended to be held by it in 2010 are to send the country towards a unitary state under the permanent rule of military dictatorship.

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6. It is not true that the SPDC military clique is completely united and its Road Map is a total success. We have to note that though the State Constitution which was put to referendum in May 2008 was declared unilaterally by the SPDC to receive 92% of approval vote, it is still not accepted by the international community as a legitimate one. The plan of the SPDC to disarm the ceasefire groups before the referendum had been a failure and it is certain that the SPDC will not be able to carry out its intention to disarm them before the 2010 election. The State Constitution, which is the life blood of the SPDC, itself consists of complicated power sharing systems and, as a result, there has evidently been an upsurge of struggle for power among the military officers, who are still in service, officers who have been retired purposely for standing in the election, the old retirees, who had joined the National Unity Party, and members of the Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA). In our analysis, we conclude that the armed forces of the SPDC are no longer a force “which will not divide whoever tried”, but the armed forces which have become divided due to the SPDC own fraudulent Constitution. While there is power struggle in the upper levels, officers and men of the SPDC armed forces at the frontlines have lost their aim in life, become demoralized and developed a relation of discrimination between the upper and lower ranks. We would like to say that we are in the know of the massive desertion taking place in the SPDC armed forces, every day. 7. In our analysis we, the NCUB, sincerely reach the conclusion that we have to do everything possible to remove the military clique from power and establish a genuine federal union in order to cure the country of worsening situations. To realize our aim in practice, we have to establish a firm and inclusive political leadership out of national solidarity. From that basis, we will lay down firmly the establishment of a (provisional) “National Unity Parliament” (a de facto parliament) and a “National Unity Government” (a parallel government) to carry on the struggle, as the national policy for action of NCUB. 8. In practical realization of work in connection with organization for action, we have to unify in coordination with the entire people, made up of various ethnic nationalities, including the forces at home and abroad, and be in line with the international norms and standards, in our struggle. 9. On the auspicious occasion of this New Year, we solemnly proclaim that we will take up the strategic plans mentioned above as the action plan of NCUB for 2009 and struggle on relentlessly in consonant with the struggle in the fields of politics, diplomacy and self-defense actions. January 1, 2009 Contacts: U Nyo Ohn Myint

Foreign affairs Committee – NCUB

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