Myanmar holds final election round, military-backed party set to win

Polls have opened in Myanmar for the third and final round of a controversial general election, with a military-backed party on course for a landslide win amid a raging civil war.

Voting began in 60 townships, including in the cities of Yangon and Mandalay, at 6am local time on Sunday (23:30 GMT, Saturday).
Critics say the polls are neither free nor fair, and are designed to legitimise military rule in Myanmar, nearly five years after the country’s generals ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi, leading to a civil war that has killed thousands and displaced more than 3.5 million people.

Aung San Suu Kyi remains in detention and, like several other opposition groups, her National League for Democracy (NLD) has been dissolved, tilting the political playing field in favour of the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), which is leading in the polls.

So far, the USDP has secured 193 out of 209 seats in the lower house, and 52 out of 78 seats in the upper house, according to the election commission.

That means that along with the military, which is allocated 166 seats, the two already hold just under 400 seats, comfortably surpassing the 294 needed to come to power.

Seventeen other parties have won a small number of seats in the legislature, ranging from one to 10, according to the election commission.

Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, who heads the current military government, is widely expected by both supporters and opponents to assume the presidency when the new parliament meets.