Thai voters could drive out pro-military party in pivotal vote Sunday

Cheers from the crowd could not be avoided at a Pheu Thai Party rally in Chiang Mai in the final days of Thailand’s general election campaign, just as many opinion polls show the main opposition party’s prime ministerial candidate, Paetongtarn Shinawatra, is poised to crush the seat. former incumbent army chief.

It will be a triumphant return for the country’s most prominent political family, after Paetongtarn’s exiled father, Thaksin, was ousted in a 2006 coup.

His various political parties have won the most seats in every Thai election since 2001, but those victories have been overturned by the military establishment aligned with the monarchy or the parties dissolved.

But as polling day approaches on Sunday, the election will be a once-in-a-generation battle to topple Thailand’s pro-military government and usher in democratic reforms to a country that has endured nearly a decade of military rule, following another coup. in 2014.

The second pro-democracy party, more progressive, Move Forward, is also rising in the polls, galvanizing young Thai voters with a call to review the country’s political structure and military dominance, even going to propose a rethink of the sweeping. the power of the Thai monarchy, a topic that was once taboo.

The Pheu Thai Party has been more evasive in its stance on curtailing the monarchy, preferring to focus on the push for democracy, but it still commands large crowds in public meetings, and is a popular choice among rural and working-class voters.

“We will together bring democracy back,” Shinawatra said at a campaign rally after a campaign rally.

“Vote for Pheu Thai by a landslide,” she urged the crowd at another rally, before the 36-year-old gave birth to a baby boy on May 1 and stopped campaigning.

What is the cause of the landslide?

At a rally on Wednesday before Election Day in Chiang Mai, the historic center of the Pheu Thai Party where its rural base is located, enthusiasm for the Shinawatra political dynasty was not strained.

“I love Thaksin,” said Nikom Mahawong, 55, with a big grin, showing the red shirt he was wearing, with Paetongtarn Shinawatra’s face on it.

“I think he will be a good leader. He will take Thailand to a better place,” he said.

Other supporters also want to see Shinawatra take power.

“I always have faith in the Pheu Thai Party,” said Wichapat Siraksa, 43. “I want them to move Thailand forward,” he added. “I want Pheu Thai to win by a landslide.”

The country’s complicated electoral rules, introduced after the coup, meant pro-democracy parties needed a landslide victory to overcome a system skewed in favor of pro-military candidates.

The junta elects 250 senators who, together with the lower house of Parliament, choose who becomes prime minister. They are expected to back pro-military candidates, as they did in the last election in 2019, which watchdog groups said voted “heavily lopsided” in favor of the military junta.

Call for structural reforms

The system made it possible for young voters to participate in the Move Forward event in Bangkok on May 9, to promote marriage equality and gay rights.

While some spoke of concerns about election rigging, others were more optimistic about the prospects for democratic reform in Thailand.

“The Move Forward party, this is a new party and brings hope back,” said 18-year-old Supanid Phumithanes, who will vote for the first time on Sunday.

“This time I want to see real people who want to do better for Thailand… The new government,” he added.

His friend, Patita Wattananupong, 19 and also a first-time voter, nodded in agreement, saying that a few years ago, he had no hope that change would come to his country but “now the hope is bigger and bigger. ”

In 2020, after the previous incarnation of the Move Forward Party was disbanded, pro-democracy protests erupted, with tens of thousands of young people taking to the streets to demand change. The government cracked down on the movement, responding with mass arrests before demonstrations fizzled out during the pandemic.

Pinda Puropakanonda, 32, told CBC News that Thai “society is broken.” He said people today are “waking up from the narrative they’ve been told all their lives, how they should respect the monarchy.”

The current prime minister, Prayuth Chan-o-cha, a former army chief who led a 2014 military coup, spoke directly of the surge in support for structural reforms at a campaign rally two days before Sunday’s vote.

“We don’t want changes that will overthrow the country,” Chan-o-cha said. “Do you know what damage it will do? We can’t suddenly change everything at once because we don’t know what’s on the side.”

There is still support for the conservative military establishment, especially among the older generation.

“I love Prayuth’s party. He loves the king and he loves the nation,” Muay Sae-Ue, 77, told CBC News moments after he greeted the local conservative candidate outside a fresh egg stall in Bangkok’s old town.

He felt that the younger generation did not like King and “will destroy our country.”

‘That’s enough’

For political scientist Thitinan Pongsudhirak, the “rising and hot momentum” of Move Forward is a game changer that makes this election more important than ever.

Pongsudhirak thinks that the battle over which party can become more populist is over, and a new political battleground that requires deep attention is the structural reform of Thai institutions: military power, the role of the judiciary in maintaining the status quo, and the dominant monarchy. .

“The democratic process in Thailand has always been twisted, oppressed, destroyed. And now there are people who say that enough is enough,” said the professor of politics and international relations at Chulalongkorn University.

The big question is what will happen after the vote: whether the pro-democracy parties will be able to form a government if they win big, or whether the military establishment will fight them.

“I think a military coup would be the last option,” Pongsudhirak said, because it would be difficult to rationalize and explain to the rest of the world.

“Short of the coup itself, we have seen the dissolution of the party, so there may be another one,” he speculated. But if that happens, “you can bet that [young supporters] will wake up and you will see it in the streets,” added Pongsudhirak.

“If [the military establishment] they are hunting for another war… then we will see more tension and confrontation, as we have seen in the past twenty years.