Thet Thet Khine (also spelt Thet Thet Khaing; born 19 August 1967) is a Burmese politician, physician and businesswoman who is the Minister for Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement appointed by the
military junta
A military junta () is a government led by a committee of military leaders. The term ''junta'' means "meeting" or "committee" and originated in the national and local junta organized by the Spanish resistance to Napoleon's invasion of Spain in ...
after the
coup d'état
A coup d'état (; French for 'stroke of state'), also known as a coup or overthrow, is a seizure and removal of a government and its powers. Typically, it is an illegal seizure of power by a political faction, politician, cult, rebel group, m ...
in 2021. She was a member of parliament in the
House of Representatives
House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...
for
Dagon Township
Dagon Township ( my, ဒဂုံ မြို့နယ် ) is located immediately north of downtown Yangon. The township comprises five wards, and shares borders with Bahan Township in the north, Ahlon Township in the west, Mingala Taungnyunt T ...
constituency
An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger State (polity), state (a country, administrative region, ...
in
2015 elections
The following elections were scheduled to occur in the year 2015.
Africa
* 2015 Beninese parliamentary election 26 April 2015
* 2015 Burkinabé general election 29 November 2015
* 2015 Burundian legislative election 29 June 2015
* 2015 Burun ...
but did not win her seat at
Mayangone Township when she ran in
2020 elections on her newly established People's Pioneer Party platform.
She owns a number of gold, jewelry, and gem production companies as well as a real estate business.
Early life and education
Thet Thet Khine was born on 19 August 1967 in
Mogok
Mogok (, ; Shan: , ) is a town in the Thabeikkyin District of Mandalay Region of Myanmar, located north of Mandalay and north-east of Shwebo.
History
Mogok is believed to have been founded in 1217 by three lost Shan hunters who discovered ...
, Burma (now Myanmar). She is the youngest child of three siblings, having an elder brother and an elder sister,
Htun Eaindra Bo
Htun Eaindra Bo ( my, ထွန်းအိန္ဒြာဗို, ; also Htun Aeindra Bo; born 1 May 1966) is a three-time Myanmar Academy Award winning actress and singer. The Mogok native began her film career in 1991, and has achieved fame ...
, an actress and singer. She graduated with M.B.B.S from
Institute of Medicine, Yangon in 1993, MBA (General Management) from
Yangon Institute of Economics
The Yangon University of Economics (formerly the Institute of Economics, Yangon; my, ရန်ကုန် စီးပွားရေး တက္ကသိုလ် ) is the finest university of economics and business in Myanmar. Founded as ...
in 2004, MBA (Nanyang Fellows) from
Nanyang Technological University
The Nanyang Technological University (NTU) is a national research university in Singapore. It is the second oldest autonomous university in the country and is considered as one of the most prestigious universities in the world by various inte ...
's
Nanyang Business School
The Nanyang Technological University (NTU) is a national research university in Singapore. It is the second oldest autonomous university in the country and is considered as one of the most prestigious universities in the world by various int ...
in 2008, and then International Management Program, MA, (USA) from MIT Sloan School of Management in 2008. She started her PhD (Public Management and Leadership) course in
Walden University
Walden University is a private online for-profit university headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It offers Bachelor of Science, Master of Science, Master of Business Administration, Master of Public Administration, Master of Public Healt ...
in 2012 and finished it in 2019.
Career
She owns a number of gold, jewelry, and gem production companies, including Forever Gems and Shwe Nan Taw
gold and jewellery, country's largest gold and jewelry retailer. She is also managing director of Jewel Collection Manufacturing Co.Ltd and United GP Development Co.Ltd.
She had served as joint secretary General of the Union of Myanmar Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industries (UMFCCI) from 2013 to 2016. She is also the vice president of Myanmar Women Entrepreneurs Association (MWEA) since 2013, and vice president of Infinite Myanmar Metta Foundation since 2012. Thet is an treasurer of Myanmar Gold Entrepreneurs Association (MGEA).
2014–2018: Entry into politics
Her political aspirations first began in 1988, at the time of the
8888 pro-democracy uprising, when she was a student and joined the protests. She was an active supporter for the pro-democracy movement by the
National League for Democracy
The National League for Democracy ( my, အမျိုးသား ဒီမိုကရေစီ အဖွဲ့ချုပ်, ; Abbreviation, abbr. NLD; Burmese abbr. ဒီချုပ်) is a liberal democratic political party in Myanm ...
in Mogok during the
1990 Myanmar general election.
In 2014, she became a member of the National League for Democracy. In the
2015 Myanmar general election
General elections were held in Myanmar on 8 November 2015, with the National League for Democracy winning a supermajority of seats in the combined national parliament. Voting occurred in all constituencies, excluding seats appointed by the mil ...
, she contested the
Dagon Township
Dagon Township ( my, ဒဂုံ မြို့နယ် ) is located immediately north of downtown Yangon. The township comprises five wards, and shares borders with Bahan Township in the north, Ahlon Township in the west, Mingala Taungnyunt T ...
constituency winning a majority of 84,31 votes, won a
House of Representatives
House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...
seat. She also serves as the member of Banks and Financial Development Committee for
House of Representatives
House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...
.
In 2016, Thet Thet Khine criticized Yangon Region government's announcement to halt more than 200 high-rise construction projects due their non-compliance with building regulations.
Thet Thet Khine herself was a major investor in one of the most controversial high rise projects, the 68 Residence in
Bahan Township
Bahan Township ( my, ဗဟန်း မြို့နယ်, ) is located in the north central part of Yangon. The township comprises 22 wards, and shares borders with Yankin Township and Mayangon Township in the north, Sanchaung Township and ...
.
2018–present: Dismissal from NLD and founding of the PPP
In September 2018, Thet Thet Khine and
Kyaw Zeya, a
Yangon Region Hluttaw
Yangon Region Hluttaw ( my, ရန်ကုန်တိုင်းဒေသကြီးလွှတ်တော်) is the legislature of the Burmese region of Yangon Region. It is a unicameral body, consisting of 123 members, including 92 electe ...
MP were suspended from their duties by the NLD Central Committee for allegedly criticizing the party in the media. Thet Thet Khine told the public media at a discussion on the anniversary of the November 2016 election that "
Aung San Suu Kyi
Aung San Suu Kyi (; ; born 19 June 1945) is a Burmese politician, diplomat, author, and a 1991 Nobel Peace Prize laureate who served as State Counsellor of Myanmar (equivalent to a prime minister) and Minister of Foreign Affairs from ...
could not decide her role in the government and was like a player who plays everywhere on the football pitch".
After her dismissal from NLD, she founded People's Pioneer Party and became its chairperso
Her party was approved by Union Election Committee, Myanmar in October 2019.
Kyaw Zeya also joined the newly founded People's Pioneer Party in 2020 as the Vice Chairman. Thet Thet Khine claimed that her party would enlist the help of professionals and experts to come up with programmes to promote and protect public welfare.
She contested in the
2020 Myanmar general election as the chair of the People's Pioneer Party (PPP) and suffered a landslide defeat. She lost her bid to win a seat in the
House of Representatives
House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...
representing Yangon's
Mayangon Township
Mayangon Township ( my, မရမ်းကုန်း မြို့နယ် ; is located in the northern part of Yangon. The township comprises ten wards, and shares borders with Insein Township and Mingaladon Township in the north, North Dag ...
by an overwhelming margin. She garnered mere 7,498 votes (7.03% of votes),
less than a tenth of the number won by her National League for Democracy (NLD) rival, Dr.
May Win Myint, who finished with 89,548 votes.
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 ...
, the military regime, the
State Administrative Council, appointed Thet Thet Khine as the
Minister for Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement.
Her acceptance of the role was widely criticized, reinforcing her image as a "turncoat" doing the Burmese military's bidding.
Burmese netizens called for the boycott of her jewellery businesses in response.
Controversies
Thet Thet Khine garnered controversy for her ties with
Ma Ba Tha, a renowned xenophobic and ultranationalist organisation led by
Wirathu
Wirathu ( my, ဝီရသူ, pi, ; born 10 July 1968 in Kyaukse, Mandalay Division, Burma) is a Burmese Buddhist monk, and the leader of the extremist 969 Movement in Myanmar. He has been accused of supporting the persecution of Muslims ...
in addition to her People's Pioneer Party fielding ultranationalist candidates in the
2020 general election.
She was also one of the sponsors for Ma Ba Tha's third anniversary conference in 2016 and made donations to Insein Ywama Sayadaw, former chairman of Ma Ba Tha, during her election campaign in 2020.
Her party included at least ten former Ma Ba Tha members.
She was also present at a controversial meeting with
Min Aung Hlaing
Min Aung Hlaing ( my, မင်းအောင်လှိုင် abbreviated: MAL ; born 3 July 1956) also known as Alaungsithu is a Burmese politician and army general who has ruled Myanmar as the chairman of the State Administration Coun ...
, the
Commander-in-Chief of
Myanmar military
Tatmadaw (, , ) is the official name of the armed forces of Myanmar (formerly Burma). It is administered by the Ministry of Defence and composed of the Myanmar Army, the Myanmar Navy and the Myanmar Air Force. Auxiliary services include th ...
, where 34 of Myanmar's 95 registered political parties sought the military chief's support in the 2020 general election.
She has also denied the
Rohingya Genocide
The Rohingya genocide is a series of ongoing persecutions and killings of the Muslim Rohingya people by the Burmese military. The genocide has consisted of two phases to date: the first was a military crackdown that occurred from October 2016 ...
.
She was also critcised for voicing to collaborate with the military as well as backing its role in politics.
In August 2020, Thet Thet Khine drew further criticism when she praised a controversial music video released by
Yone Lay, which depicted an assassination attempt on Aung San Suu Kyi and praised the military as saviours.
The music video was widely criticised as a pro-military propaganda piece and was promoted by social media pages with ties to the military and the military-backed opposition party,
USDP. Thet Thet Khine stated that she respects Yone Lay for his efforts in making the music video and gave her thanks to him.
She was also heavily criticised for accepting a position in the cabinet set up by the military 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 ...
.
Awards
She was awarded Outstanding ASEAN Women Entrepreneurs Award.
She was also awarded Thudhamma Theingi for her contributions to the nation.
She holds two
Master of Business Administration
A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...
degrees from
University of Yangon
'')
, mottoeng = There's no friend like wisdom.
, established =
, type = Public
, rector = Dr. Tin Mg Tun
, undergrad = 4194
, postgrad = 5748
, city = Kamayut 11041, Yangon
, state = Yangon Regio ...
and
Nanyang Technological University
The Nanyang Technological University (NTU) is a national research university in Singapore. It is the second oldest autonomous university in the country and is considered as one of the most prestigious universities in the world by various inte ...
under the Nanyang Fellows program. She also completed an online Doctor of Philosophy in Public Management and Leadership from
Walden University
Walden University is a private online for-profit university headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It offers Bachelor of Science, Master of Science, Master of Business Administration, Master of Public Administration, Master of Public Healt ...
, a controversial, online,
for-profit university
Proprietary colleges are for-profit colleges and universities. They are operated by their owners or investors, rather than a not-for-profit institution, religious organization, or government. Because they are not funded by tax money, their long ...
based in Minnesota.
Personal life
Thet married Aung Kyaw Win, a businessman and physician, on 3 April 1994. They have one daughter, Thet Yadanar Kyaw Win.
References
{{authority control
National League for Democracy politicians
1967 births
Living people
People from Mandalay Region
Burmese physicians
Burmese women physicians
Burmese businesspeople
Women government ministers of Myanmar