Myanmar voters do their "patriotic duty"

By Aung Hla Tun

HLEGU, Myanmar (Reuters) - With explicit orders to vote "yes" to an army-drafted constitution, nervous voters turned out on Saturday for the first exercise in democracy in military-ruled Myanmar in nearly two decades.

After weeks of relentless exhortations to the country's 53 million people to do their "patriotic duty" and approve the charter, state television ran a final Burmese-style "get the vote out" propaganda blitz.

"Let's go voting" and "Come along for voting", five jaunty actresses sang to a boppy disco beat on army-controlled MRTV.

The message was more explicit on the front page of the New Light of Myanmar, the main mouthpiece of a military that has ruled the impoverished southeast Asian nation with an iron fist for the last 46 years.

"To approve the state constitution is the national duty of the entire people today," the paper said.

Later on Saturday, Myanmar's top General Than Shwe made his first appearance on TV since Cyclone Nargis slammed the southwestern Irrawaddy delta and the former capital Yangon.

He was shown at a voting booth with other generals in Naypyidaw, the remote new capital 400 km (250 miles) north of Yangon.

Despite some dismay at the generals' decision to proceed with the vote only a week after the death and destruction wreaked by the storm, the message appeared to have hit home.

Of 20 people interviewed near polling stations in Hlegu, 50 km (30 miles) northeast of Yangon, only two admitted voting against the charter, which cements the army's grip on power and part of its "roadmap to democracy".

"I don't belong to any political party, but I voted no," one man said in a whisper after a nervous glance over his shoulder to check he could not be heard.

The charter gives the army one in four seats in parliament, control of key ministries and the right to suspend the constitution at will -- conditions that have attracted fierce criticism from Western governments and opposition groups.

Voting in the cyclone-hit city of Yangon and the Irrawaddy delta, where as many as 100,000 people are feared dead and 1.5 million homeless, has been postponed for two weeks.

JUST FOLLOWING ORDERS

Unsurprisingly in a country where everybody is terrified of the government, some of the small numbers of voters who turned up said they were simply following orders.

"I voted yes. It was what I was asked to do," 57-year-old U Kyaing told Reuters outside a brick primary school that doubled as a polling station in Hlegu.