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Myanmar ruling party headed for rout

Aung San Suu Kyi looks set for electoral victory in Myanmar, which could give her party the presidency and loosen the military's grip on the country.

Supporters of Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi
Myanmar's ruling party has conceded electoral defeat as Aung San Suu Kyi's party heads for victory. (AAP)

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Source: AAP


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Myanmar's military-backed ruling party is heading for a massive rout at the hands of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The Nobel laureate is set for a historic electoral victory that could give her party the presidency and loosen the military's grip on the country.

With official results from Sunday's general elections slow to come, Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy started announcing its victories on Monday. By midnight, it had declared it had won virtually every seat in four of 14 states where counting was complete.

The announcement at the NLD headquarters set off a new round of jubilation among the party's red-shirted supporters, who already had been celebrating the result of Sunday's vote.

The NLD said it had won 154 of the 164 seats in four states for which results are known. The trend was expected to continue in Myanmar's remaining 10 states.

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The Union Election Commission announced on Tuesday that the NLD had won 11 of 15 seats in four other states, with the ruling party winning two and an ethnic party winning the remaining two.

Even without official results, it was clear that the ruling Union Solidarity Development Party was facing a rout. The party is made up former junta members who ruled the Southeast Asian country for a half-century and as a quasi-civilian government since 2011. Many of its leaders conceded personal defeats in their races.

Although the government's Union Election Commission did not announce the outcome of the Yangon races, the NLD has stationed representatives at counting centres and kept its own tallies.

Aung Kyaw Kyaw, a 29-year-old pharmacist, said he didn't vote for the ruling party because "they were only former military people. If I voted for them, that means I am asking my own enemy to come back into my life".

Suu Kyi has urged supporters not to provoke losing rivals who mostly represent the former junta in the country also known as Burma.

The US congratulated Myanmar on the election but noted that more work remains ahead on the country's road to democracy.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest praised the "meaningful, competitive election" as an "important step in Burma's democratic reform process".

But Earnest also noted "structural and systemic flaws" in Myanmar's system, pointing to the laws preventing Suu Kyi from becoming president.

"There are some imperfections - to put it mildly. There's also no denying the rather dramatic change we've seen inside of Burma," he said in a statement to reporters.


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