Some 30 Burmese MPs, including a number of regional ministers, are currently under investigation following allegations of corruption and mismanagement, said Monywa Aung Shin, the chairman of the Complaints Committee for the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD), speaking to reporters yesterday.

“We [NLD] have received several complaints from the public regarding everything from corruption to issues like a lack of communication,” he said. “We are currently reviewing the allegations into about 30 politicians, most of whom are lawmakers, and probably some members of the cabinet at either a state or regional level. However, no Union-level ministers are under investigation.”

Among the NLD’s election promises during the election campaign in 2015 was a pledge by party leader Aung San Suu Kyi to form a clean government, free of corruption.

“As I have said quite often, when we campaign for the elections we prefer not to make promises we cannot deliver on,” she told a crowd at a campaign rally in in Naypyidaw’s Zayarthiri Township in September 2015. “Giving false promises means disrespecting the people. We don’t see how a party that lies to the public during its campaign can rule the country righteously.”

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She concluded: “However, I can make one promise here – that when we get to form a government, we will make sure that it is a government free from corruption.”

That same month, a report by US-based Global Financial Integrity said that Burma had lost almost US$20 billion in dirty money linked to corruption, crime and tax evasion over the past five decades.

In a Transparency International survey released in January 2017, listing 176 countries worldwide in terms of corruption, Burma was ranked 136.