Minor parties to establish online identity

Three leaders from the new parties in Chulalongkorn University’s political science department on Friday shared the similar political stance of not aiming to enter to power by expecting to win many seats in parliament.
Instead, they founded parties to publicise rarely discussed matters.
Sombat Boonngamanong plans to use digital platforms to gather voices on minority issues as they are the key focus of his Gean Party.
“We don’t think any major party will spend time brainstorming on so-called ‘trivial’ issues such as stray dog management or prisoner issues. That is what our Gean Party plans to produce policies on,” Sombat said.
While policies for major parties are produced mostly by their boards, Sombat’s Grean party plans to build a “policy-producing” digital platform where interested people can discuss, gather and formulate matters to the point that they can become policies.
Sombat, a political activist who has often appeared with his fancy costumes and props, noted that it is important to engage normal people. “While technology helps us to keep in touch with the public base, we also have to put some effort in to keep our communications going with people,” he said.
Chumpol Krutkaew, founder of Klang Party, said that while his party is not meant to be politically “klang” – or neutral – as the name may suggest, the party would instead aim to be a “klang” – or public – platform for discussions on development.
Chumpol said technology can play a crucial part in driving democracy by engaging more interest from outsiders.
“While MPs represent us in a traditional democracy, today’s technology enables everyone with the internet to have a voice on or even suggest policies,” he said. “Thanks to technology, politics has become more and more in our hands.”
His idea is that he may start from his Klang Party first by developing mobile applications to facilitate the party’s domestic voting process.
However, Chumpol is also aware of the cons of gathering the direct voices or votes from the public. “The question is do voters have equal access to information before they cast votes,” he said.
“It will certainly be a challenge to use digital platforms creatively and not to create conflict,” he added. “As much as we make use of technology, we have to keep up with its complexity. Information from a few sources won’t ever be enough to make informed decisions in this fast-changing world.”
Pakorn Areekul from Samun Chon Party or “ordinary people’s party” said while 57 million of 69 million Thais have online access and 51 million of them are active on social media. The junta does not pay enough attention to online political engagement.
“They may press charges against dissenters, but they ignore the 300,000-name online petition against the Computer Crime bill,” Pakorn said, referring to how the junta-appointed legislators ignored the petition over the much-opposed bill.
Pakorn pointed to the importance of not only access to the internet but speeds.
“The slower they can access, the slower they can keep up with the rest of the world,” he said. “To me, slow internet obstructs social change.”