25 May 2026 By Mon Lay
NAYPYIDAW, Myanmar — Khin Yi, the leader of the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) and nominal speaker of the regime’s unrecognized Pyithu Hluttaw (House of Representatives), has asserted that the junta-created assembly must act as a primary mechanism to shield the state from what he termed domestic and international aggression.
Addressing the USDP Central Executive Committee conference on Thursday, 21 May, Khin Yi argued that a parliamentary track is essential for regional stability and the rule of law. He claimed that assisting the state apparatus through legislative channels represents the best path forward to ensure ordinary citizens can live safely under the protection of the law.
The proxy party chief’s remarks explicitly targeted Myanmar’s pro-democracy Spring Revolution and the parallel multi-layered diplomatic sanctions enforced by the international community. However, democratic activists and independent political analysts quickly criticized the speech, characterizing it as a transparent propaganda stunt designed to sanitize systemic military violence.
“To hear him speak about the ‘protection of the law’ is deeply offensive given the grim reality on the ground,” a local human rights activist told MPA. “In townships like Kyaukpadaung, the military is currently weaponizing its conscription law to abduct elderly residents for forced labor and extort massive ransoms from families. Even inside public hospitals, patients and their caretakers are being aggressively forced to pay systematic bribes just to receive basic treatment. This is not legal protection—it is state-sponsored extortion.”
Monitors emphasized that instead of finding safety under the state apparatus, civilians inside Yangon and other urban centers are living in a permanent climate of fear due to warrantless late-night raids conducted by regional ward administrators.
Veteran political observers noted that the military high command and its political proxy, the USDP, traditionally rely on rubber-stamp legislative bodies and heavily engineered, fraudulent elections whenever they face a critical structural or military crisis.
“Rather than facing a vague foreign conspiracy, the country is collapsing internally because of the junta’s illegal 2021 coup and its ongoing scorched-earth operations,” an independent political analyst stated. “The regime is facing unprecedented battlefield defeats, and they are desperate to use this mock parliament as a political exit strategy. It is a calculated attempt to construct a facade of civilian governance, but it will fool no one.”
Since the military takeover, the state’s official legal institutions have been entirely dismantled, with independent legal bodies considering the regime’s parliament to be completely illegitimate. Revolutionary networks maintain that Khin Yi’s rhetoric is part of a broader psychological campaign aimed at manufacturing domestic legitimacy while the high command struggles to retain administrative control over central Myanmar.
