Constitution of Myanmar

The Constitution of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar (ပြည်ထောင်စုသမ္မတမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော် ဖွဲ့စည်းပုံအခြေခံဥပဒေ) is the supreme law of Myanmar. Myanmar's first constitution adopted by constituent assembly was enacted for the Union of Burma in 1947. After the 1962 Burmese coup d'état, a second constitution was enacted in 1974. The country has been ruled by military juntas for most of its history. The 2008 Constitution, the country's third constitution, was published in September 2008 after a referendum, and came into force on 31 January 2011. The Tatmadaw (Myanmar Armed Forces) retain significant control of the government under the 2008 constitution. 25% of seats in the Parliament of Myanmar are reserved for serving military officers. The ministries of home, border affairs and defense have to be headed by a serving military officer. The military also appoints one of the country's two vice presidents. Hence, the country's civilian leaders have little influence over the security establishment. Before independence, Myanmar had two quasi-constitutions, The government of Burma Act, 1935 and Constitution of Burma under Japanese occupation, 1943. After independence, Myanmar adopted three constitutions in 1947, 1974 and 2008. The 2008 constitution is the present constitution of Myanmar. The 1947 constitution, officially the Constitution of the Union of Burma (), was drafted and approved by the Constituent Assembly of Burma in 1947, and was used from the country's independence in 1948 to 1962, when the constitution was suspended by the socialist Revolutionary Council of the Union of Burma, led by military general Ne Win. The national government consisted of three branches: judicial, legislative and executive. The legislative branch was a bicameral legislature called the Union Parliament, consisting of two chambers, the 125-seat Chamber of Nationalities ( Lumyozu Hluttaw) and the Chamber of Deputies ( Pyithu Hluttaw), whose seat numbers were determined by the population size of respective constituencies.