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U Htin Kyaw: From Aung San Suu Kyi's childhood friend to Myanmar's president

By FnF Desk | PUBLISHED: 15, Mar 2016, 19:59 pm IST | UPDATED: 15, Mar 2016, 20:28 pm IST

U Htin Kyaw: From Aung San Suu Kyi's childhood friend to Myanmar's president For many outside Myanmar, Htin Kyaw, the man confirmed on Tuesday to become Myanmar's first civilian president in more than five decades is an unknown entity — certainly when compared to his much more famous party colleague and Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

Commonly described as Suu Kyi's childhood friend, senior aide and even occasional driver (the last by the Myanmar Times in a profile posted online), the 69-year-old was recently nominated for the position by the National League for Democracy (NLD) party after many weeks of speculation.

Within NLD circles, Htin Kyaw, the son of respected author and poet Min Thu Wun, has the reputation of being a party loyalist who ran as an NLD candidate in elections in 1990. He went to school in Yangon alongside Myanmar’s pro-democracy icon Suu Kyi before winning a scholarship to study in Britain.

The president-elect has been a senior executive at the Daw Khin Kyi foundation named after Suu Kyi’s mother, which provides development aid and skills training to Suu Kyi’s Kawhmu constituency and other areas of the impoverished country.

It is a position that commands respect from NLD MPs, many of whom spent years as activists and dissidents before entering parliament, said a recent report by The Guardian newspaper.

He is married to NLD lawmaker Su Su Lwin, whose father U Lwin is one of the party’s founding members.

"U Htin Kyaw ...is a stellar choice, well-respected, unimpeachable integrity, and a very nice man," said a 10 March Twitter post by Thant Myint-U, an author and historian who is also the grandson of the former UN secretary general U Thant.

But it was Thant Myint-U’s Twitter post on Tuesday that captured the historic importance of Htin Kyaw’s election. "U Htin Kyaw first elected president w/out army background since Mahn Win Maung in ‘62," said Thant Myint-U’s post.

According to the Singapore-based Channelnewsasia website, Htin Kyaw has had a varied career, working as a university teacher and also holding positions in the industry and foreign affairs ministries in the late 1970s and 80s before retiring from government service as the military tightened its hold over the country in the late 1980s.

Myanmar's electoral system requires that the president be voted in from a selection of names put forward by lawmakers, including at least one nominee chosen by the military, which retains a quarter of seats in parliament.

With the NLD securing a huge majority in the polls held in November, it has the legislative power to pick a winner. The other presidential contenders in the fray – the army-backed candidate and retired general Myint Swe, and Henry Van Thio, an ethnic minority Chin MP who was the NLD’s second contender – become vice-presidents.

Myanmar’s constitution, written by the former ruling military junta, blocks Suu Kyi – often referred to as the Lady by her supporters – from assuming the presidency because her children are British. Talks to amend or suspend the clause ended without success.

Suu Kyi has made it clear she intends to rule 'above' the president. In a statement published on the NLD website last week, the Nobel laureate asked supporters to support the party's choices “gracefully”, adding: “This is an important step in implementing the desires and expectations of voters who enthusiastically supported the NLD.”
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