Myitkyina Township

U Mar Kah, a NDF candidate, stated that he does not accept the result of the polling station No. 14 in Myitkyina Township, Kachin State, as USDP members were in that station and were directing 100 voters to vote for the USDP by pointing to the name of the USDP until voters finally ticked it.

Source: BBC

The National Democratic Force (NDF), led by former members of detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD), has been banned from election campaigning in some parts of Myitkyina, the capital of Kachin State, northern Burma, said sources close to party.

The NDF’s campaign in Tatkone and Shatapru, the two main quarters of the capital, was prohibited yesterday by the ruling Burmese junta’s Kachin State Administrative Office of the so-called Kachin State Peace and Development Council, the sources said.

The Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), which is backed by Burma’s military, is campaigning in ethnic Kachin churches, using small donations to gain votes on November 7th, according to Kachin church sources.

On October 11, the USDP candidate, U Thein Zaw, campaigned at the Kachin Roman Catholic Church in Gat Shang Yang Village, 18 miles south of Myitkyina, the capital of Kachin State. Church sources said he made a donation 3 million kyat (est. US$3,109) to the church.

An interesting contest is in the offing in Myitkyina, Kachin State where U Mar Khar, a NDF nominee will take on the Post and Telecommunication Minister Thein Zaw, a USDP candidate, U Aung War, a Kachin State analyst, said.

The NDF opened its party office in Yuzana ward, Myitkyina on 9 October. Two Kachin nominees of the NDF will contest from Pharkant and Myitkyina Townships. Daw Jar Bauk will contest from Pharkant Township.

A Kachin voter in Myitkyina spoke to BBC reporters and said that he voted for the logo of the Manaw pillar (which is a traditional Kachin symbol) assuming that it was his Kachin ethnic people's party. The next day he realized that the logo was used by the USDP to represent a vote for USDP and he regretted his vote.

Many voters throughout Burma reported that they did not understand the ballots, political parties represented, or voting procedures.

The Burmese military junta is including people, who are outside Burma in the voters list, but excluding some still inside the country, in Myitkyina, Kachin State, in Northern Burma, according to local residents.

Many residents from Tatkone, Shatapru, Du Kahtawng and Dum Gan quarters, in Myitkyina, are not included in the voters list, the sources said.

“A lot of people are not in the list. They (the regime) pick and choose as they like, and they are not including people over 18 years old. They have put whoever they want on the list and do what they want,” said a resident.

The Burmese military junta-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) has started collecting votes forcibly from local members, before Sunday’s election in Kachin State, Northern Burma, said an unnamed source.

USDP member, Zung Bawm, was ordered by senior officials to come to the quarter administration office at 10 a.m., and was forced to vote for the USDP, in Du Kahtawng quarter, in Myitkyina, the capital of Kachin State, said the source.