P'doh Mahn Nyein Maung ( my, ဖဒိုမန်းငြိမ်းမောင်, born 1947) is a

Karen Karen may refer to: * Karen (name), a given name and surname * Karen (slang), a term and meme for a demanding woman displaying certain behaviors People * Karen people, an ethnic group in Myanmar and Thailand ** Karen languages or Karenic l ...

politician and former rebel leader. He is currently serving as a member of

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...

State Administration Council The State Administration Council ( my, နိုင်ငံတော်စီမံအုပ်ချုပ်ရေးကောင်စီ; abbreviated SAC or နစက) is the military junta currently governing Myanmar, established by Comm ...

. Mahn Nyein Maung was born between 1947 to 1949.

Career

1960s–2020: Activism

After the

1962 Burmese coup d'état The 1962 Burmese coup d'état on 2 March 1962 marked the beginning of one-party rule and the political dominance of the army in Burma (now Myanmar) which spanned the course of 26 years. In the coup, the military replaced the civilian AFPFL-g ...

, Mahn Nyein Maung became involved in underground political activism. He was arrested in July 1967 and imprisoned in the

Coco Islands The Coco Islands ( my, ကိုကိုးကျွန်း) are a small group of islands in the northeastern Bay of Bengal. They are part of the Yangon Region of Myanmar. The islands are located south of the city of Yangon. Coco Island gr ...

. He escaped in 1970. He was recaptured and imprisoned until April 1973, under a general amnesty. During his time in jail, he became acquainted with Mahn Aung Kyi, the secretary of the All Burma Karen Organization, who would become his political mentor. In 2000, he published a memoir entitled ''Against the Storm, Across the Sea'', describing his prison break from Coco Islands in the 1970s, a feat that earned him the nickname "Burma's Papillon." In December 2011, he was sentenced to 17 years in prison for "unlawful association" after being deported by China due to visa issues. In March 2012, he was sentenced to life in prison for participating in acts of war against the ruling government, but was released on 19 March via presidential amnesty. Mahn Nyein Maung became an admirer of

Thein Sein Thein Sein ( my, သိန်းစိန်; IPA: ; born 20 April 1944) is a Burmese politician and retired general in the Myanmar Army who served as the eighth President of Myanmar from 2011 to 2016. He previously served as Prime Minister ...

, who had pardoned him. Mahn Nyein Maung participated in negotiating the landmark

Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement The Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (NCA), officially the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement between the Government of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar and the Ethnic Armed Organisations ( my, တစ်နိုင်ငံလုံး ပစ်� ...

, which was signed by KNU on 15 October 2015.

2020–present: Entry into politics

He resigned from the central executive committee of the

Karen National Union The Karen National Union ( my, ကရင် အမျိုးသား အစည်းအရုံး; abbreviated KNU) is a political organisation with an armed wing, the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), that claims to represent the Ka ...

in July 2020, in order to contest a

Pyithu Hluttaw The Pyithu Hluttaw ( my, ပြည်သူ့ လွှတ်တော်, ; House of Representatives) is the ''de jure'' lower house of the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw, the bicameral legislature of Myanmar (Burma). It consists of 440 members, of whic ...

seat in his hometown of

Pantanaw Pantanaw ( my, ပန်းတနော်မြို့ ) is a town in the Ayeyarwady Region of south-west Myanmar. It is the seat of the Pantanaw Township in the Maubin District. It is the hometown of former United Nations Secretary-General U T ...

Ayeyarwady Region Ayeyarwady Region ( my, ဧရာဝတီတိုင်းဒေသကြီး , , ; formerly Ayeyarwady Division and Irrawaddy Division), is a region of Myanmar, occupying the delta region of the Ayeyarwady River (Irrawaddy River). It is bor ...

in the

2020 Myanmar general election General elections were held in Myanmar on 8 November 2020. Voting occurred in all constituencies, excluding seats appointed by or reserved for the military, to elect members to both the upper house - Amyotha Hluttaw (the House of Nationalities ...

, representing the

Kayin People's Party The Kayin People's Party ( ksw, ပှၤကညီဖိပၣ်တံၣ်; my, ကရင်ပြည်သူ့ပါတီ; Abbreviation, abbreviated KPP) is a political party in Myanmar (Burma). It was formed by retired Kayin government ...

. He lost the election, placing third, with 8.83% of the votes. Nyunt Thein, representing the National League for Democracy, won the race with 58.01% of the votes. He was appointed as a member of the

on 2 February 2021, in the aftermath of the

2021 Myanmar coup d'état A coup d'état in Myanmar began on the morning of 1 February 2021, when democratically elected members of the country's ruling party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), were deposed by the Tatmadaw—Myanmar's military—which then veste ...

. Following his appointment, the KNU distanced itself from Mahn Nyein Maung, and reiterated its opposition to the military coup.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mahn Nyein Maung People from Ayeyarwady Region 1947 births Living people Burmese people of Karen descent Burmese rebels Members of the State Administration Council Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List Individuals related to Myanmar sanctions