A controversial count

M

yanmar’s junta has announced that the country will be holding a “free and fair” general election either this December or in January 2026 in an apparent bid to legitimize its continued hold on power. 

But if the conduct and results of its recently concluded census are any indication, the upcoming poll will end up chaotic, and the numbers it yields to decide the winners suspect.

From Oct. 1 to 15 last year, the State Administration Council or SAC – as the junta calls itself – conducted a nationwide census in rushed conditions and amid a raging civil war. The process stretched to the end of October, but large areas were still left unenumerated.  SAC said that at least 63 percent of the population were successfully enumerated, but that has been questioned by many who point to the circumstances surrounding the census.

“It is a total failure of the SAC,” says a political analyst based in Thailand. “Even the data they claim to have enumerated likely contain significant errors and lack any accuracy. The actual figures they collected could be much lower. This is just another tactic by the SAC to fabricate facts and figures for elections, in stark contrast to the NLD.”

The NLD is the National League for Democracy led by Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been in detention since the military staged a coup in February 2021. To justify its power grab, the military had claimed that the voter lists used in the 2020 elections contained at least 11,305,390 fraudulent entries, and that the NLD’s landslide victory then was therefore a sham.

But the junta may well be facing the same accusation if it pushes through with an election that will be using voter lists based on the recent census.

In large part, the deep skepticism over the recent census numbers stems from the fact that the junta now has full control of only 20 percent of the country. Most areas are currently under ethnic armed groups and the People’s Defence Force (PDF). The United Nations also says that at present, Myanmar has at least 3.5 million internally people (IDPs) because of the fighting; many of these IDPs tend to move around as well.

SAC reported varying levels of completion across regions, with only Naypyidaw and the regions of Yangon, Ayeyarwady, and Bago (West) fully enumerated. At least 58 townships were not enumerated at all, while the rest of the country was just partially enumerated.

SAC says that while the census was able to enumerate only 32,191,407 people, it was able to estimate the rest of the population – which it says is currently 51,316,756 – by using “census data, remote-sensing technology, international expert estimates, and departmental records.” 

According to a post on the Ministry of Information’s website, these were employed in areas that were “inaccessible due to security and transport conditions.” By SAC’s count, those that were not enumerated reached 19,125,349.

Myanmar is not the first country to use remote-sensing technology in a census, as the likes of Nigeria and Sudan have previously employed it. But while SAC says that it relied on satellite imagery to help it come up with its estimate, it has yet to show verifiable evidence to support its claim. 

Moreover, some experts have cast doubts on the reliability of any data gathered through this method in Myanmar, given the escalation of fighting in many areas, frequent population movements, and widespread destruction in the regions under SAC control. 

“Remote sensing using satellite technology, which relies on proxies like dwelling density or land use, often fails to capture smaller or temporary settlements, leading to undercounting,” points out Ko Tun, a Geographic Information System (GIS) expert.  “It is particularly ineffective in conflict zones with numerous IDP camps and constant displacement of people fleeing the violence.”

A process meant for peacetime

Having a census at least every 10 years is important for proper governance, as the data it produces helps in better policy-making and sometimes even in determining districts and representation shares in the legislature. 

The U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA), which had assisted Myanmar in carrying out its 2014 census, says that census data are also used for  “development planning, crisis prevention, mitigation and response, social welfare programs, and business market analyses.”

“The population and housing census is among the most complex and massive peacetime exercises a nation can undertake,” UNFPA says. “It requires careful planning, resourcing, and implementation – from mapping an entire country, mobilizing and training large numbers of enumerators, and conducting major public awareness campaigns, to canvassing all households, carefully monitoring census activities, and analyzing, disseminating and using the resulting data.”

For sure, Myanmar was technically up for another census in 2024. But it was and is a country with active combat going on in the majority of its regions.  Observers have noted as well the seemingly haphazard preparations for the recent census, including a mere 10-day training for the 42,000 teachers and government workers who were apparently pressured to become enumerators.

Interestingly, Myanmar’s 2014 census had employed 110,000 enumerators, or more than double those who were sent out to do the census a decade later. Yet the teams that set out to do the census last year looked bigger to the public because the enumerators were accompanied by security men. 

There was need to protect the enumerators after the parallel National Unity Government (NUG) and many ethnic armed groups, such as the New Mon State Party–Armed Wing (NMSP-AD), the Mon Liberation Army (MLA), the Karen National Union (KNU), and almost all Chin revolutionary organizations publicly expressed their opposition to the census and pledged to resist it. 

The Chin Brotherhood Alliance, representing ethnic armed groups in western Chin State, echoed even non-Chin armed organizations in stating that the census was a tool to extend SAC’s rule. It then issued a warning that any participation in the census within its region would result in direct action against the enumerators and supporters of the census.

On Oct. 1, the Chinland Defense Force (CDF) clashed with junta security in Hakha, Chin State, forcing census teams to retreat. Three days later,  the PDF arrested a junta member involved in the census in Tedim, Chin State.

A Jan. 3, 2025 article by the Thai publication The Nation quoted Myanmar’s Central Census Commission chief U Myint Kyaing as saying, “Terrorist organizations that want to disrupt this work have killed a census committee member, and 21 have been arrested. Nineteen of them have been rescued and two remain. I would like to say that we are continuing our efforts to release them. One member of the census committee who died while taking the census was awarded the medal of honor, and we are in the process of awarding honorary degrees for the auditors and enumerators who worked hard to succeed in the risky work.” 

Shared fear

Observers argue that because the enumerators knew very well that they were practically moving targets of those opposed to the census, many of them rushed the process, thereby probably polluting the data collected. Indeed, some relatives of enumerators tell ADC that they themselves feared for their own safety and would pray before they ventured out.

But fear was also felt by those who answered the census questionnaire, which required participants to identify themselves and family members, contrary to the anonymity that is characteristic of most census processes. Given the distrust most of the Myanmar public already have toward the junta, this, as well as the nature of many of the questions, had many census participants giving inaccurate or downright false replies, further corrupting the census data.

Not a few noticed that the list of census questions had grown longer. The 2014 census had only 41 questions; the 2024 version had 68. While it is not unusual for census questions to grow in number or vary in topic after every round, the additions to Myanmar’s 2024 census questionnaire most probably had many people thinking twice – even thrice – before answering. 

The new questions focused on migration (with one even asking for the reason for a household member being overseas), education (being out of school meant providing a reason why the discontinuation of education), and internal displacement. 

For many census participants, the nature of the questions opened them up to the risk of conscription or extortion. There were also fears that the military would use the information to track members of the resistance or those involved in the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM), as well as to identify and target those fleeing conscription or military persecution.

As one political analyst puts it, “These data could be misused by SAC officials at all levels, from ward administrators to soldiers, to intimidate, threaten, and extort money from the public. The SAC’s lack of a data safety plan only exacerbates fears of systemic misuse for oppressive purposes.”

Ironically, the presence of police and military personnel who were tasked to protect the enumerators only scared many people all the more and convinced them that they had to protect themselves – by providing inaccurate answers. 

Says one Yangon resident: “I gave incorrect information about some of my family members because I’m certain they could use it to extort money or pressure my relatives who fled abroad to return under the conscription law.”

A Myanmar national now living overseas also tells ADC, “I told my parents to give false answers. I’m sure the military would use the information to blackmail us – not only for forced conscription but for other forms of coercion as well. They know that once they have our data, they can use it to make us vulnerable in so many ways.” ◉

Jesua Lynn is an independent and research consultant. A research fellow at Chiang Mai University, he has an M.A. in Peace and Conflict Studies from the University of Manchester.