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POLITICS-THAILAND: Dissent Grows Against the Thaksin Juggernaut

Analysis - By Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Sep 2 2004 (IPS) - Sensing political trouble after the weekend’s election for Bangkok’s governor, Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra is making a valiant effort to appear as a moderate by extending the hand of friendship to the opposition Democrat Party.

Sensing political trouble after the weekend’s election for Bangkok’s governor, Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra is making a valiant effort to appear as a moderate by extending the hand of friendship to the opposition Democrat Party.

At the first cabinet meeting since the Democrat Party’s Apirak Kosatodhin won the poll with a comfortable majority, Thaksin called on his ministers to support Apirak’s plans to improve the capital’s sagging image – sullied by its notorious round-the-clock traffic jams.

The prime minister requested all ministers to back Apirak’s agenda and to respect the mandate given to him by the citizens of Bangkok, government spokesman Jakrapob Penkair told the media after this week’s cabinet meeting.

Although the governing Thai Rak Thai (Thais Love Thai – TRT ) Party had not fielded a candidate, the government went out of its way to throw its weight behind Apirak’s most formidable challenger, Pavena Hongsakul, who came second.

Thaksin’s tone at the cabinet meeting was a stark contrast to his first reaction after Sunday’s poll, where Apirak received 911,441 votes and Pavena got 619,039 votes.

He dismissed the triumph of the Democrat Party, which heads the opposition in the country’s 500-seat parliament, as a sign of the TRT’s declining support in the city.

”Pavena’s defeat has nothing to do with Thai Rak Thai, which did not field any candidate in the Bangkok election,” Thaksin was quoted as having said in Tuesday’s ‘The Nation’ daily newspaper.

And in explaining why his party did not field a candidate, Thaksin said if they had done so and the candidate won, it would have added to growing public concern about the dominance of TRT in the country’s political life.

The TRT swept to power with an unprecedented majority at the January 2001 general elections – just short of an absolute majority. In no previous election since 1979 had any party garnered one-third of the seats in Parliament.

The prime minister has hinted that he is seeking to secure 400 seats at the next parliamentary election, due in five months – to get a two-thirds majority in the House.

But the Thai media are drawing another message from the weekend’s gubernatorial race – that neither Thaksin nor his party are invincible and there is dissent in the air.

”Bangkokians sent a clear message to the ruling party that it cannot run the country without listening to the voice of the people,” the ‘Thai Post,’ a Thai language newspaper commented in an editorial.

”Some political analysts believe Mr. Apirak’s victory was due in large part to Bangkokians’ fear that Thai Rak Thai’s growing power would lead to a ‘parliamentary dictatorship’ after the next general election,” added the paper.

A similar view was echoed by Anuraj Manibhandu, columnist for the ‘Bangkok Post’ newspaper. ”Mr. Thaksin should now know that most of Bangkok opposes his authoritarian style,” she wrote in Tuesday’s edition of the paper.

Such concern is grounded in the spate of political realities Thais have been forced to stomach since Thaksin’s party won. In parliament, his ruling alliance enjoys a sufficient majority to prevent the opposition party presenting a motion in parliament to examine hints of corruption or political misdeeds linked to the prime minister.

That this parliamentary majority can increase was amplified this week when the Chart Pattana Party, which has few seats in parliament, was dissolved by its leaders to become one with the TRT.

And prior to this, parliamentarians from other parties, including members of the Democrat Party, declared that they were crossing over to join the TRT.

Furthermore, Thaksin’s image as an autocrat has grown during his rule due to the covert and overt pressure the government has applied to some of its trenchant critics, who have ranged from senior bureaucrats, academics, journalists and non-governmental groups.

On Wednesday, the New York-based rights lobby Human Rights Watch drew attention to an emerging court battle that could have serious consequences on the limited space for press freedom in the country.

Shin Corporation, the telecoms and media conglomerate founded by Thaksin and now controlled by his relatives, recently filed a 400 million baht (9.6 million U.S. dollar) suit against Supinya Klangnarong, head of the Campaign for Popular Media Reform (CPMR), and editors of a local newspaper.

Media and non-governmental groups here are shocked over the price on Supinya’s head for stating in a seminar last year that Shin Corporation had gained financially due to its founder being the current prime minister.

”When business mixes with politics at the highest level in Thailand, it’s impossible to distinguish a libel suit from an attempt to silence the prime minister’s critics,” said Brad Adams, executive director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia Division, in a statement.

Over the past three years, the Thai Journalists Association and the Thai Broadcasters Association have documented more than 20 cases in which news editors, as well as print and broadcast journalists, have been dismissed or transferred, or have their work tampered with, to appease the government, Human Rights Watch said.

”Thailand’s once-vigorous free press is being slowly squeezed to death,” added the rights lobby group.