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THAILAND: Army Back as Arbiter of National Politics

Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Aug 28 2008 (IPS) - By throwing a protective net around the government of Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej, this week, the Thai military has removed little doubt that it is the final arbiter of national politics in this kingdom, not the country’s electorate.

The move by the military leaders, to prop up the Samak administration, stands in stark contrast to events nearly two years ago, when the then administration of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra was turfed out of power during the Sep. 19 military coup, this South-east Asian nation’s 18th putsch. That coup paved the way for army-backed rule in Thailand for the next 15 months, ending in a general election that saw Samak’s coalition government voted in.

The military’s power play was confirmed during a tense political drama that began in Bangkok on Tuesday morning, pitting the Samak administration against an anti-government protest group that has mounted street demonstrations in the Thai capital since late May to force a democratically-elected coalition from power. The protest group calls itself the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) and draws supporters from among middle-class, urbanised Thais, and the conservative entrenched elite.

But the PAD’s violent actions since Tuesday morning, to force Samak to step down, have raised questions here about its leaders’ claims to be advancing the cause of democracy. Thousands of PAD supporters stormed the office of a pro-government television station on the morning of Aug. 26, while hundreds of others charged into three leading ministries and the police headquarters.

The crowning achievement of the PAD’s protests was the targeting of the seat of executive power, known here as Government House. They laid siege to the prime minister’s office in the thousands, forcing Samak to take refuge within the compound of the Royal Thai Armed forces, north of Bangkok. And they have refused to leave since then, converting the grounds of Government House into a continuing political rally.

‘’It has been like a chess game, with the PAD trying to corner the prime minister. The PAD’s leaders thought they may have won when Samak had to run his government since Tuesday from the army compound,’’ says a source close to the military, who spoke on condition of anonymity. ‘’But the PAD’s hopes that the hardliners in the army will act against the government didn’t happen, at least for now.’’

The PAD’s attempt to provoke the government to respond violently and then cry for the military to step in as a protector of the people has also failed. Samak opted for a policy of restraint, choosing to limit police action against those who broke the law and turning to the civil and criminal courts to target the PAD leadership.

‘’The police will not do anything to spark violence. They want that,’’ the prime minster told foreign journalists this week. ‘’They want to overthrow this government; this is illegal.’’

But the PAD, led by men such as Sondhi Limthongkul, a media firebrand, and Chamlong Srimunag, a former Bangkok governor, are not budging. Nor have they given up their regular call for the military to step in and replace the Samak administration, which the PAD accuses of being a puppet of Thaksin Shinawatra, now in exile in London to escape corruption cases.

‘’As the police have so far shown restraint and resisted efforts to disperse the crowd by force and shoulder the consequences, the PAD is pinning its hopes on some men in green (the army) sharing its goal of toppling the government,’’ wrote Nattaya Chetchotiros, president of the Thai journalists association, in a commentary in Thursday’s ‘Bangkok Post’ newspaper.

‘’The problem is that while the majority view of the situation is that it is not yet at that stage where such radical action is required, the PAD believes it is long overdue,’’ she added. ‘’The PAD cannot push any harder than it has.’’

The political hand that the military is playing also stems from the damage to its image following the coup in September 2006, when tanks and troops moved in to oust Thaksin whose administration had been hounded for months that year by PAD-led street protests. The junta-led administration was criticised by the end of its term for failing to improve the country’s political and economic fortunes.

‘’The military’s current stand has been shaped by concerns over its image after the 2006 coup and other factors,’’ says Panitan Wattanayagorn, a national security expert at Bangkok’s Chulalongkorn University. ‘’The recent events have confirmed that it is the most powerful institution in the country and is in a position to direct the country’s politics without mounting a coup.’’

‘’It finds itself playing a behind-the-scenes role of king-maker,’’ he told IPS. ‘’It is able to remain close but not in the circle of power, so it won’t be blamed for any mistakes as happened after 2006.’’

Such a shift marks a return to Thai politics as it prevailed till 1992, where coups were the order of the day and where military commanders determined the fate of the country’s political destiny.

‘’Thailand was supposed to have moved beyond that phase during the 14 years after the last military-regime was forced out in 1992,’’ says David Streckfuss, an U.S. academic specialising in Thai political culture. ‘’People believed that the military’s role in politics had been rolled back and a parliamentary democracy and rule of law allowed to grow.’’

Then came the coup of 2006, marking a return to the old dependence on the military to solve the country’s problems. ‘’This comes from the weird idea of Thai-style democracy,’’ Streckfuss explained in an interview. ‘’The military becomes important when things get out of whack and when Thai politics goes into default mode.’’

‘’Since 2006, the momentum to build a parliamentary democracy has been lost. The country is back to zero,’’ he added. ‘’The military is back in its old role because a section of the people has no faith in the parliamentary system.’’