Yangon/Bangkok, Aug 15 (EFE).- A second auction of the historic lakeside Yangon mansion where elected Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi spent years under house arrest ended Thursday with no bids.
At around 10 am (04:30 GMT) a court official began the auction outside the two-storey family home with a starting price of 300 billion kyats (just over $140 million at the military junta’s official exchange rate), an exorbitant amount compared to other houses in the former capital.
“Anyone willing to bid?” an official asked three times before ending the auction when no buyer emerged.
In January, the military-junta controlled Supreme Court gave the go-ahead to auction the historic home, which is central to a dispute between Suu Kyi and her estranged US-based brother Aung San Oo, who has petitioned through the courts since 2000 for the sale the residence to collect a share of the proceeds.
In late June, a court ordered the second auction after a request from Aung San Oo to drop the price by 15 million kyats, compared to the first auction attempt in March, which also ended without a bid.
Suu Kyi occupied the house and 1.9 acres of land from 1988, when she arrived in Myanmar to care for her sick mother from the United Kingdom, where she had lived with her husband and two children. She then joined the pro-democracy movement that would cost her 15 years of house arrest.
The house has been the scene of historic moments such as Suu Kyi’s speeches to protesters during the Saffron Revolution in 2007 and when she was released from her last house arrest in 2010.
Later, the Nobel Peace Prize winner received leaders there such as then-US president Barack Obama in 2012, a few years before winning the 2015 election and assuming power in the country the following year.
Suu Kyi, 79, is serving a 27-year prison sentence from a series of trials for crimes brought by the military junta, including violating the official secrets act, which she denies, and amid calls from the international community for her release along with all other political prisoners.
The military coup in February 2021 ended 10 years of democratic transition and plunged the country into political, social and economic crises as well as exacerbating decades of armed conflict.
The junta justifies its coup by alleging mass fraud during the 2020 general election, the result of which it annulled and in which Suu Kyi’s party won by a landslide with the backing of international observers. EFE
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