The two main Arakanese political parties, the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP) and the Arakan League for Democracy (ALD), which merged in June into the Rakhine National Party (RNP), have formed a joint-committee with ALD chairman Aye Thar Aung as the new party’s chair and RNDP chairman Aye Maung as deputy-chair.

Khine Pray Soe, the general-secretary of the RNDP, said the parties held a meeting last weekend in Rangoon to discuss and decide on the RNP’s structure, policies and framework.

“We agreed that a true federal union should be a union based on national race and democracy,” he said. “As these are the two top priorities for nations across the world, as well as the ethnic people of Burma, we decided to adopt this policy to ensure non-disintegration [of the Union] alongside the country’s other ethnic people.”

He said the new party officials will head to Naypyidaw in the coming week to apply for registration with the Union Election Commission.

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The ALP, formed in 1989, won a majority of votes in Arakan state in the 1990 elections, but was abolished shortly afterwards by then ruling State Law and Order Restoration Council. It re-registered again in April 2012 after the Thein Sein government came in power.

The RNDP, formed in 2010, won a majority 35 seats in Arakan state during a general election that year.