Aung San Suu Kyi's party drops first hint on plans

YANGON - Myanmar's constitution makes it unlikely that Aung San Suu Kyi will become president after elections scheduled for late 2015, but her National League for Democracy is the favourite to emerge as the country's biggest party.

That outcome would increase the likelihood that the NLD will be in government in some form by 2016. But in her rare engagements with the foreign media, Suu Kyi, as party leader, has usually shunned any discussion of economic policy.

Han Tha Myint, a member of the NLD's central committee, was more forthcoming in a recent interview with the Nikkei Asian Review, saying the party is considering faster banking liberalization, leasing government land to investors to encourage manufacturing, and moving swiftly to quell destabilizing labour unrest.

"Some of our priorities will be the same as the current government - poverty alleviation, administrative reform. Everyone is agreed on these issues," Han Tha Myint said.

The government, which took office in 2011 following decades of military rule, is dominated by the Union Solidarity and Development Party, a military-backed group that will likely be the NLD's main competition in the upcoming election.

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