Red shirts being mobilised for long rally

United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship chairwoman Thida Thavornseth said some 80,000 to 100,000 red shirts would rally today at Rajamangala Stadium in the lead-up to tomorrow’s judicial decision on the charter amendment bill related to election of the Senate.
Thida told the red shirts to be restrained and not use violence before hearing the court’s ruling.
However, another leader, Jatuporn Promphan, mobilised people.
“On November 20, the [court’s] ruling could be extremely bad, moderately bad or slightly bad. There’s no way that it will not be bad. But no matter how the ruling turns out, we red shirts will stick together to get through the obstacles,” he said.
“It’s up to the Constitutional Court’s ruling. But I will tell the red shirts that once they come out from home, they’d better not set a date to return,” he said.
Nisit Sinthuprai, another red shirt leader, said at least 100,000 people were ready to be the “first batch” to rally for about one week to 10 days. After that, a “second batch” of 100,000 protesters would take turns to protest.
Yesterday, about 200 police were dispatched to beef up security at the Constitutional Court in the Government Complex at Chaeng Wattana.
The so-called Democratic Force group was also rallying in front of the court – to provide moral support to the top court’s judges.
Police put up barricades at the stairs up to the court and the front gate. Police also used prison vans to block the entrance to the court.
Nitirat leader Worachet Pakeerut said that in his view, the high court had no purview over the legislative mandate to amend the charter.
Worachet said the verdict might cite flawed voting procedures, such as a conflict of interest involving certain lawmakers or false votes cast by impostors, to derail the charter change.
He saw a very slim chance for the “ worst-case” scenario – that the ruling party would face dissolution.
The most likely outcome was the court issuing an instruction for the government to rectify flawed procedures, he said.
In another scenario, the court might ban the bill’s sponsors from holding office, which would be tantamount to a collapse of the coalition, he said, but he thought this was unlikely.