Aung San Suu Kyi’s long-suppressed opposition will hold its first ever party congress on Friday, cementing its new place in Myanmar’s political mainstream as it aims to sweep to power in 2015.
Hundreds of delegates will flock from across the country for a meeting aimed at redefining the National League for Democracy leadership, in a major milestone for a group silenced for two decades under the former military dictatorship.
“There has not been a party congress like this in Myanmar’s history,” NLD spokesman Nyan Win said.
He said the conference, which will draw around 850 representatives for three days of talks, would see the party elect a core leadership executive of 15 people as well as a wider 120-member Central Committee.
Observers are eyeing signs that party head Suu Kyi could revitalise her cabal of advisers to better prepare to steer the country through its myriad challenges – from a dysfunctional economy to the near-absence of infrastructure, healthcare and education provision.
Many senior party figures are veterans of a massive student uprising in 1988 that was brutally crushed by the then-ruling generals, who ignored an NLD victory in 1990 polls and locked up activists.
