00:00 Myanmar's military-controlled government has extended the state of emergency for another
00:09 six months.
00:10 The emergency was first imposed when the army had seized power from an elected government
00:15 in 2021, forcing a further delay in elections it promised when it took over.
00:21 The announcement made yesterday is the fourth extension of the emergency rule.
00:24 According to the reports, the NDSC or the National Defence and Security Council met
00:30 yesterday in the capital city and extended the state of emergency for another six months
00:35 starting today.
00:36 The body says that it needs more time to prepare for the upcoming elections.
00:41 The NDSC is nominally a constitutional government body but in practice it is entirely controlled
00:47 by the military.
00:48 The announcement amounts to an admission that the army does not exercise enough control
00:53 to stage the polls and has failed to subdue widespread opposition to military rule.
00:58 This includes increasingly challenging armed resistance as well as non-violent protests
01:03 and civil disobedience despite the army having a huge advantage in manpower and weapons.
01:09 The state of emergency was declared when troops had arrested Aung San Suu Kyi and top officials
01:15 from her government and members of her National League for Democracy on February 1, 2021.
01:21 The takeover had led to a reversal in years of progress towards democracy after five decades
01:26 of military rule in Myanmar.
01:28 The military had said that it had to cease power because of fraud in the last general
01:32 elections held in November 2020, in which the Nobel laureate Suu Kyi's party had won
01:37 a landslide victory while the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party had
01:42 fared very poorly.
01:45 The army takeover was met with widespread peaceful protests that security forces suppressed
01:50 with lethal force, triggering armed resistance that even UN experts have described as a civil
01:55 war.
01:56 The army-enacted 2008 constitution allows the military to rule the country under a state
02:01 of emergency for one year, with two possible six-month extensions if preparations are not
02:07 yet completed for new polls.
02:09 This means that the initial time limit had already expired on 31 January this year.
02:14 But the NDSC allowed the military government to extend emergency rule for another six months
02:19 in February, claiming that the country still remained in an abnormal situation.
02:24 The state of emergency allows the military to assume all government functions, giving
02:28 the head of the ruling military council, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, legislative, judicial
02:34 and executive powers.
02:35 This effectively means that democratic governance in the country is at least six months away
02:40 for the time being.
03:00 [MUSIC]
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