Going to polls remains the only solution

Going to polls remains the only solution

At issue in the immediate aftermath of the Constitutional Court’s ouster of caretaker Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra is whether her successor will be allowed to steer the caretaker government without debilitating street protests and whether the landmark verdict will be sufficient for Thailand to return to the electoral system as a way out of its political quagmire. Thailand is still in the thick of the woods as prospects on both counts remain murky. The only way out and the ultimate way forward in this flawed electoral democracy is still to stick to the popular mandate as the least problematic of all options. An unelected outcome is likely to bring more tumult and turmoil.

The Constitutional Court’s verdict against Ms Yingluck for malfeasance will be taken by the two main sides of the Thai divide correspondingly. Nepotism was difficult to deny as much as it is not uncommon. That Ms Yingluck oversaw the transfer of Thawil Pliensri from National Security Council secretary-general to an inactive post in order to be replaced by Pol Gen Wichean Potephosree and thereby vacate the National Police Chief post for Thaksin Shinawatra’s ex-brother-in-law Pol Gen Priewpan Damapong to fill carries weight. This happens in Thai bureaucratic shuffling and rotations where favouritism and nepotism are rife. Even though Thaksin and Khunying Potjaman na Pombejra had divorced, the charge that her brother was fast-tracked into the top police post by the Yingluck administration had a familiar ring to it. Where politics these days is about power plays, it was enough to oust Ms Yingluck.

The anti-government side will rejoice at seeing the back of Ms Yingluck. Whether the People’s Democratic Reform Committee, led by former Democrat Party executive Suthep Thaugsuban, is sufficiently satisfied with the court’s decision will be crucial. If the PDRC maintains its line and logic of not allowing an election until its reforms are enacted, then we will have more crisis and confrontation. Similarly, if the Democrat Party continues its election boycott, then the planned election in July is moot. With the election at a dead end, the temptation for a non-elected outcome will grow. This option would raise political risks immeasurably. So the key going forward is whether the PDRC packs up after Ms Yingluck’s demise and whether the Democrats re-enter the electoral fray. The choice of Niwatthamrong Bunsongphaisan as interim successor to Ms Yingluck does not bode well. He lacks stature and is seen as an underling of Ms Yingluck and her brother. Another deputy prime minister like Phongthep Thepkanchana would have been more acceptable to all sides and less of a lightning rod.

Supporters of the government, particularly the red shirts under the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship, are unlikely to do much for now even though Ms Yingluck has been dislodged. As long as the ruling Pheu Thai remains in the caretaker government and as long as the electoral system proceeds to election day, they are unlikely to go on the kind of rampage that we saw in 2009-10. But if there is an outright ouster of the caretaker administration and an ensuing unelected outcome, then another red-shirt uprising is likely in store.

Much of the huff and puff in Thailand is tragically unnecessary. Those who are arrayed against the kind of corruption and abuse of power, as personified by Thaksin and his ilk, should know and must try to win at the polls.

They have been led by a lousy and lazy opposition party, which has boycotted two of the last four elections and lost the other two, the last after being in power for two-and-a-half years. It is high time to change the leadership of the Democrat Party. The opposition party has essentially forfeited the electoral arena to Thaksin’s Pheu Thai Party. It is time to re-enter and regain the electoral momentum by fighting for the hearts and minds of the electorate the hard way. That the Democrat Party has boycotted and undercut the electoral process will now make it harder for it to win and therefore more tempting for it to look for shortcuts to power. These short-cut manoeuvres must stop. The Thaksin party machine can be beaten at the polls in which the constitutional rules have already been written in 2007 against him.

At the end of the day, the Thai electorate will have to play judge and jury. If others do so in disregard of the voices of the people, we can count on more political hardships and hard times ahead in Thailand.


Thitinan Pongsudhirak is associate professor and director of the Institute of Security and International Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University.

Thitinan Pongsudhirak

Senior fellow of the Institute of Security and International Studies at Chulalongkorn University

A professor and senior fellow of the Institute of Security and International Studies at Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Political Science, he earned a PhD from the London School of Economics with a top dissertation prize in 2002. Recognised for excellence in opinion writing from Society of Publishers in Asia, his views and articles have been published widely by local and international media.

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