Myanmar President Thein Sein sacked Shwe Mann as ruling party chairman last week because he supported controversial bills in Parliament and had ties to rival party leaders, the information minister told Reuters in an interview yesterday.

The comments by Ye Htut, who is also Thein Sein's spokesman, are the most detailed yet by the government on why Shwe Mann was ousted just three months before a general election.

In a post on Facebook yesterday, Shwe Mann said he had worked toward creating a more robust role for Parliament in the nation’s democracy.

The battle between two of Myanmar’s most powerful figures played out in dramatic fashion on Wednesday when security forces surrounded the headquarters of the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) in the capital Naypyitaw.

Shwe Mann had made some ‘very questionable’ decisions in Parliament

Shwe Mann had antagonised the military by building ties with Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and backing her campaign to change the constitution. The military handed power to a semi-civilian government in 2011 but retains an effective veto over changes to the political system.

Both Thein Sein and Shwe Mann are former generals who played prominent roles in the junta that ruled Myanmar for 49 years.

Members of the USDP’s governing body sent Thein Sein a secret letter a few weeks ago to express concerns about party policy under Shwe Mann, Ye Htut said.

They were also concerned about a lack of transparency in his relationships with rival party leaders, he said, although he declined to say with whom.

While acknowledging Shwe Mann’s ouster was not good for the party’s image ahead of the November election, Ye Htut said Shwe Mann had made some “very questionable” decisions in Parliament over the past year that reflected his own political ambitions rather than what was best for the party and the country.