Myanmar’s constitutional tribunal will hold a hearing on October 6 to decide if accusations that led to the impeachment of former Kayah state chief minister L Phaung Sho were admissible under the country’s 2008 constitution.

The tribunal announced on Thursday that it would hold an e-court hearing after L Phaung Sho, who was impeached last month following claims that he used public money for personal gain, applied for a review of the Kayah state Hluttaw’s handling of the case. 

The first of three hearings will determine if the former chief minister will be allowed to file a report to the tribunal.

The review will focus on the legality of the state Hluttaw’s decision to proceed with the impeachment despite the withdrawal of one of five accusers who filed a complaint against him. It will be determined if this action violates article 263(b) of the constitution.

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Under article 263(b), at least a quarter of all representatives in any state or regional Hluttaw must be included in a complaint before it can go forward. There are 20 representatives in the Kayah state Hluttaw.

The tribunal said a hearing would also be held to determine if the inclusion of three of the accusers in the team that subsequently carried out the investigation against L Phaung Sho could be considered a violation of article 263(c).

L Phaung Sho will be represented in court by lawyer Min Min Soe, while Hla Htwe, the speaker of the Kayah state Hluttaw, has applied to appear in person at the hearings. 

Myanmar Now reached out to both L Phaung Sho and Hla Htwe for comment, but has not received any response.

Five state parliament representatives filed an impeachment motion against L Phaung Sho on August 13 and an investigation team was formed by the speaker the next day.

The following week, on August 20, one of the accusers, Thein Aung, also known as Sae Yal, submitted a letter to the speaker stating that he no longer wanted to be involved in the accusations.

Despite this development, Hla Htwe, the state Hluttaw speaker, moved forward with the proceedings.

“The law states that we form an investigative body if one-fourth of the Hluttaw files a complaint. So we did that immediately. The law doesn’t mention anything about withdrawing accusations afterwards,” he told Myanmar Now on September 3.

He added that the investigation team included members of the three major parties active in the state—the Union Solidarity and Development Party, the National League for Democracy, and the Kayah State Democratic Party—and insisted that the decision on who to include in the team was not informed by an unfair agenda.

“The constitution states that we need to form an investigative body, but it doesn’t say anything about who should be on that team, except that they have to be sitting members” of the state Hluttaw, said Hla Htwe.

Speaking to Myanmar Now before his impeachment, L Phaung Sho said that the inclusion of his accusers in the investigative body would result in an unfair decision.

On September 3, the day of his impeachment, he submitted an application to the constitutional tribunal through the President’s Office requesting that it define the terms of articles 263(b) and 263(c).

President’s Office spokesperson Zaw Htay told reporters at a press conference held the next day that L Phaung Sho asked for help in submitting the request to the constitutional tribunal before his impeachment.

Under article 325 of the constitution, only six people are allowed to directly submit appeals to the constitutional tribunal: the president, the speakers of the upper and lower houses of parliament and the Union Parliament, the chief justice, and the chair of the Union Election Commission.

The current constitutional tribunal, formed after the 2010 general election, has made 14 decisions related to questionable provisions in the constitution since 2011.

This will be the first time for the tribunal to hold hearings on the impeachment of a chief minister.