As the leader of Burma’s National League for Democracy (NLD), Aung San Suu Kyi will in April run in the first ever by-elections in which she and the NLD are eligible. After struggling under the yoke of a military junta from 1962 to 2010, Burma is now poised for a transition from dictatorship to democracy.
Suu Kyi is the daughter of General Aung San, an independence leader who led Burma towards freedom from British colonial rule, but was assassinated in 1947 shortly before it became reality. Although political leadership lies in her blood, her politicization was by no means straightforward. Her young adult life was spent in Britain, where she had moved in 1964 to pursue a degree at Oxford.
There she met her future husband, Michael Aris, and after marrying in 1972, they settled down to a relatively comfortable and quiet life with their two sons in the suburbs of Oxford. Her life took a dramatic turn in 1988, when she was called to Burma to care for her dying mother. Upon arrival, she found herself in the midst of a political upheaval where the government was killing civilians for opposing them. Seen by many to be the rightful leader, Suu Kyi decided to take up the mantle of democratization and ran as the leader of the NLD in the 1990 elections. Despite the NLD winning the election in a landslide, she could not assume her role as prime minister, for the election results were declared invalid by the dictatorship. As the junta clung to power, Suu Kyi was placed under house arrest, where she would remain for 15 of the next 21 years. In the ensuing decades she suffered not only solitude and imprisonment, but also endured hunger strikes and assassination attempts.
For her courage, she was in 1991 awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Her determination however has not been without an immense sacrifice. Although she was freed from her house arrest between 1995 and 2000, she was forced to remain in Burma while her husband was terminally ill. Throughout her 22 years in Burma, she saw her husband and children only twice, as leaving the country would mean giving in to the dictatorship.
Next month’s elections will hopefully provide her and the Burmese people much reason to look positively towards a more open and egalitarian future.
—Kristian Jebsen
