Myanmar bar on Aung San Suu Kyi presidency to stay for elections
Constitution preventing opposition leader from running in poll can't be changed in time: speaker
Myanmar's parliament speaker said yesterday the current junta-drafted constitution, which bars opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi from becoming president, cannot be changed before elections in November next year.
The speaker said a nationwide referendum would be held next May on constitutional changes being thrashed out amid heated debate in the legislature.
"We cannot perform constitutional amendments straight after the referendum," he said in the capital Naypyidaw, adding it was "impossible to change [the charter] at this time" because of the scope of the likely changes.
On Monday the powerful military voiced strong opposition to significant changes to the constitution, including clause 59f which is widely thought to have been written to thwart Suu Kyi.
Legislators will choose a new president after the general election next November.
But the veteran democracy campaigner cannot stand for the top post because the constitution bans those with a foreign spouse or children. Her late husband and two sons are British.