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Promoting democracy
The special envoy must race against time to squeeze out a tenable plan by September, under a precarious guarantee by the Myanmar military regime.
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Brunei Second Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Erywan Yusof (right) attends ASEAN Foreign Ministers' Meeting ahead of the 34th ASEAN summit in Bangkok on June 22, 2019. (AFP/TANG CHHIN Sothy )
T
he Chinese proverb, “a mouse’s vision is only one inch long,” may very well reflect the sense that observers have over this week’s appointment of an ASEAN special envoy to mediate the power struggle in Myanmar.
In the potentially far-reaching consequences of a regional attempt to restore order in the beleaguered country six months after a coup, ASEAN’s choice of mediator risks appearing short-sighted.
The decision to appoint Brunei’s senior diplomat Erywan Yusof as the bloc’s principle representative is at a glance preferable to having a Thai ally of the junta regime lead potentially farcical proceedings. After all, Erywan had been helming ASEAN’s activities thus far, including in responding to the coup situation.
But the question is: Will his new mandate continue beyond Brunei’s chairmanship of ASEAN, which ends in the next few months? Many in the region are acutely aware of the risk of not being able to maintain continuity in the mission.
As experts have pointed out, the special envoy must race against time to squeeze out a tenable plan by September, under a precarious guarantee by the Myanmar military regime. Any later and the project is likely to be doomed to fail in the same way efforts to repatriate Rohingya refugees did just a few years back.
Medium-term prospects under Cambodia’s chairmanship of ASEAN next year are also not entirely clear. While sources indicate that its leadership may still soften its stance on the ASEAN approach, there are few incentives for one autocratic regime to sabotage another.
So where does this leave us with the coup crisis?
If Myanmar’s junta takes a page from the 2014 Thai coup playbook, it may find a precedent for avoiding severe international condemnation and delaying a “return” to democracy.
But the military brass are not the only ones taking lessons from their neighbors; Myanmar’s civil disobedience movement is drawing inspiration from Thailand’s youth uprising, as well as growing discontent over the handling of the COVID-19 disaster.
The reality is that the February putsch was launched at a time when the pandemic was only beginning to unfurl and Myanmar’s economy had just started to reap the benefits of democratic development. The risks are real – the United Nations Development Program reported on April 30 that COVID-19 and the coup could reverse the economic gains that were made over the last 16 years.
For ASEAN, the task ahead could present a decisive opportunity to take democracy under its wing. The bloc has already decided on a different approach to what it did with Thailand’s multiple coups, when some member states endorsed military rule and others refrained from meddling.
On the eve of ASEAN’s 54th year of existence, leaders from the region can either choose to strive for its 2025 targets to achieve a shared and prosperous ASEAN Economic Community, or risk it all for a lurch back into a military-led authoritarianism that benefits only those close to power.
Indonesia can lead by historical example, as much of its political and economic reform hinged on the goodwill of its military leaders to step back and let the nation prosper.
It is thus crucial for ASEAN to unite for the sake of its people and shepherd the special envoy’s mission toward getting Myanmar back on the path to democracy.
