Sunday's election unlikely to end Thailand's political deadlock
2/4/2006 11:17
With many doubts and uncertain factors until the eve of todya, Thailand's
parliamentary election will go on within twelve hours as many people have
closely observed the snap election since last month's House
dissolution. However, many analysts predict that the election is unlikely to
be end-point of the political turmoil since many conflict elements still root
deeply in Thai political arena, which can not be simply resolved by
vote. Thailand's Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a telecoms tycoon-
turned-politician, called for a snap election on Feb. 24 amid a credibility
crisis since his family's 73.3 billion baht (US$1.9 billion) sale of the
Thaksin-founded Shin Corp to Singapore's Temasek Holdings late January. Since
then, by boycotting the April 2 polls, the opposition parties have allied
themselves to a mass movement determined to force Thaksin to resign and called
on voters to tick the "absent ion" boxes that appear on all Thai ballot
papers. Somchai Srisuthiyakorn, coordinator of the People's Network for
Elections (P-Net), a non governmental organization, predicted that since many
"absent ion" boxes will appear during Sunday's elections, by-elections will
definitely be held following and the first House of Representatives session will
not be able to convene within 30 days as required by law. According to the
constitution of Thailand, all the 500 seats of parliament's lower house must be
filled for a prime minister to be elected and a government formed. And even in
an uncontested constituency, a candidate must win 20 percent of the eligible
vote for that particular seat to win. Therefore, analysts estimated that
Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai (TRT) party will struggle to meet this 20 percent
threshold in at least 60 constituencies and by-elections would be held in these
constituencies where only one TRT candidate is contesting. There is also a
high possibility that by-elections would be held more than one times in some of
these constituencies, making it impossible for the House of Representatives to
hold its first meeting within 30 days of the election as required by law,
Somchai said. Otherwise, according to a recent survey conducted by local
universities, most eligible voters across Thailand are likely to exercise their
right by a kind of "absent participation" in the April 2 general
election. The survey found that 45.4 percent of voters interviewed in Bangkok
and 11 other provinces in all parts of Thailand said they would cast their
ballots on the Sunday's election, but would abstain from voting for any
candidate or party. Only 20 percent of the respondents revealed they would
still vote for the TRT Party of Thaksin. But Thaksin has reiterated that he
would not return to his post if his party candidates received less than half of
the votes cast in the general election. Meanwhile, deep-seated problems are
emerging since late last year when the anti-Thaksin movement began to stage,
such as the rifts between the advantaged urban classes and the rural poor,
between political groups that once could have compromised and even among family
members. Some local analysts said that the splits among the ideologies of
Thais are more important than the political itself. They will damage the
nation's holistic power at every aspect including economy, culture and
comity. Last week, Thaksin offered to form a government of national unity
that will include all his opponents. This seemed a unity solution for the
crisis. But it was suddenly rejected by the opposition parties and the
anti-Thaksin groups. As many efforts of Thaksin have failed working before
his opponents, Thai political crisis shows more blur factors. Anyway, Sunday's
snap election will go along, no matter to which direction the political tide
will be led.
Xinhua by Ling Shuo
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