Resistance forces across the country have launched multiple recent attacks on junta personnel collecting data from residents in preparation for military-controlled elections scheduled for later this year.
Guerrilla groups have killed three administrative staff in Mon State and Mandalay since last Friday, and used explosives to target a military security detail for the data gathering process in Magway Region on Sunday.
As a pretext for the February 2021 coup, the military rejected the results of Myanmar’s 2020 election—in which the governing National League of Democracy won a majority—and pointed to widely unsubstantiated claims of fraud.
Since then, the junta has planned to hold new elections under its own authority. Various ethnic armed organisations, the publicly mandated National Unity Government (NUG) and its affiliated People’s Defence Force (PDF) are among those who have declared that they will not recognise the legitimacy of a military election. The NUG has stated that all personnel participating in the collection of data for such a junta-controlled vote would be subject to severe punishment under the Counterterrorism Law.
However, the coup council began gathering information from locals nationwide on January 9 to compile updated voter lists. Within two days, there were several bomb attacks in Yangon and Mandalay targeting infrastructure necessary to this surveying process; a police private involved in the data collection process was killed in another assault by the resistance in Tanintharyi Region’s Launglon Township.
Bomb attack in Magway
On Sunday, the Garuda PDF and Black Panther Column used makeshift explosives to strike a convoy of 12 junta troops on six motorcycles leading administrative personnel through Magway Region’s Natmauk Township on a data collection trip.
The attack, which involved eight bombs, was followed by a 30-minute shootout and occurred between the villages of Thabutpin—where the troops had been stationed—and Phat Taw Ye. While one member of the resistance was injured by a gunshot to the thigh, according to a Garuda PDF spokesperson, it was not known if there were any junta casualties.
“We retreated after we ran out of ammunition as more reinforcements arrived from [the military’s] side,” he told Myanmar Now.
In retaliation, 100 soldiers stationed at a nearby weapons storage facility and the No. 17 arms factory under the Directorate of Defence Industries raided villages around the attack site on Monday.
Locals claimed that the data collection process was put on hold in the area after the ambush.
Assassinated administrators
The Thaton People’s Defence Team (PDT) shot and killed two junta administrative staff in the township by the same name in Mon State on January 13 after it became known that they were collecting lists of residents to be used to draft the military council’s voter list.
Soe Thein, the administrator for Taung Tsun village, and a clerk whose name was not known at the time of reporting, were both shot twice at their office and died at the scene, according to members of the resistance force that claimed responsibility.
“The villagers were forced to come to the office to submit their lists of household members, so we conducted the operation in the evening, when there were no civilians,” a Thaton PDT officer said. “The administrators collect the lists at the people’s doorsteps in some regions but the female clerk threatened the public, saying that if they failed to submit the lists at the office, they would arrest them and send them to prison.”
The officer urged locals to not cooperate with the data gathering process, which he said was being conducted in Thaton by village administrators as well as personnel from the Myanmar Red Cross, the fire department, and social welfare groups affiliated with the junta.
An administrator from Mandalay Region’s Maha Aungmyay Township was also shot dead at his home on Sunday by members of an urban guerrilla force, after locals said that he was seen conducting checks of household residents in his ward.
It was not known at the time of reporting if the data he was gathering was for the junta’s electoral use.
The Special Task Force-Mandalay (STF-MDY) claimed responsibility for the attack on U Saw, who was in his 50s, and released a 20-second video of the incident depicting gunmen entering his home on 69th St and chasing him down before shooting him.
The statement released alongside the footage explained that U Saw had been targeted due to his cooperation with the military council, despite warnings by the resistance to resign from their jobs or risk assassination.
STF-MDY also bombed a community hall in Chanmyathazi Township at 2pm on January 12 while junta administrative staff were holding a meeting, as well as an administration office in Maha Aungmyay’s Than Shay ward, seriously injuring two staff.
Reporting by Esther J, Khin Yi Yi Zaw, and Myat Thwel
