The son of the leader of the New National Democracy Party (NNDP) has reported his father to election authorities in a bid to have the party evicted from its headquarters in Yangon.
Nay Aung said he owns the land where the party is based on Lay Daung Kan road, and that he no longer agrees with the political views of his father, Thein Nyunt.
The NNDP is an ally of the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), which has stood down in Thingangyun township to improve Thein Nyunt’s chances of winning a seat there in November.
Nay Aung said he previously agreed to let the party rent the office for free but has now asked the Union Election Commission (UEC) to help evict them.
“Yes, he is my father. But that does not mean I accept his every political belief,” he told Myanmar Now.
“We sent a complaint letter to the UEC because we don’t agree with the chair’s policies, his alliance with the USDP, and the lack of transparency towards the central executive committee,” he added.
Nay Aung also alleged his father has a habit of drinking alcohol in the office.
Thein Nyunt published an announcement declaring he had disowned Nay Aung in the state-run Myanmar Alin newspaper in October last year. Nay Aung said he did not know why his father disowned him and only found out about it when it was announced in the paper.
He said he asked the UEC to remove the party from the Lay Daung Kan road office in December but he has not yet received a response.
Nay Aung was one of the NNDP’s 20 co-founders. His wife, Khaing Sandar, served as party secretary.
He left the party in 2016. He maintains that he quit because he disagreed with how close it had become to the military-backed establishment. But Thein Nyunt said he fired both Nay Aung and his wife for degrading the party’s reputation.
On August 14, Thein Nyunt was one of 34 party leaders who met with military commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing.
At the meeting, Thein Nyunt called for a National Defence and Security Council meeting before the election and hinted that there should be a state of emergency so the military can take control.
“I can’t accept that he would, as a politician, go up to the military and tell them to take control of the country,” Nay Aung said.
NNDP vice chair Than Tun said he would not comment on Nay Aung’s request for the party to leave the property as it was a family affair.
Nay Aung disagreed, saying the request concerned the party and its politics.
He said the land was transferred to him and his brother by his mother in 1978.
Thein Nyunt told Myanmar Now he would prefer not to answer questions about the dispute.
Dr Kyaw Soe Win, chair of the eastern Yangon district election commission, said Nay Aung’s report was sent up to the Union Election Commission.
Thein Nyunt stood for the National League for Democracy (NLD) in the 1990 election, which was annulled by the military after the NLD won.
He resigned from the NLD when it boycotted the 2010 election and formed the National Democratic Force (NDF), for which he ran and won to be an MP in Thingangyun the same year.
But he also left the NDF amid a dispute with other leaders and founded the NNDP in October 2011.
He lost his 2015 campaign to defend his seat from an NLD candidate.
The NNDP will only be contesting three seats in November: two in Thingangyun and one in Mingalardon.
