BANGKOK, May 1: Myanmar’s referendum next week on a new constitution is a “sham” aimed at entrenching the military, which has ruled since 1962, an international rights watchdog said on Thursday.

The generals say approval of the constitution at the May 10 vote will pave the way to elections in 2010 under their “roadmap” to democracy.

In a May Day message, Senior General Than Shwe urged workers to vote for the charter, the New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported.

“I would like to urge the mass of the workers to take part in the tasks whatever role they are in for approval of the draft constitution,” the reclusive junta leader said.

But Human Rights Watch said widespread repression, a lack of media freedom, bans on political meetings and arrests of opponents of the constitution showed conditions for a free and fair vote did not exist.

The vote is being held just months after the junta last September violently suppressed mass demonstrations led by Buddhist monks, leaving 31 dead according to the United Nations.

“The Burmese generals are showing their true colours by continuing to arrest anyone opposed to their sham referendum, and denying the population the right to a public discussion of the merits of the draft constitution,” Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement on the release of a report on the referendum.

The draft constitution emerged from a 14-year-long military-backed National Convention of mainly handpicked delegates, which was boycotted in its later stages by the opposition National League for Democracy headed by detained Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

In its report titled “Vote to Nowhere: The May 2008 Constitutional Referendum in Burma,” the New York-based rights group said the proposed charter entrenched the junta’s role by reserving a quarter of seats in both houses of parliament and cabinet posts for the military.—AFP