Flawed system preserves Thaksin’s relevance

Former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra is in the headlines again, this time criticising the draft constitution and the junta’s management of the economy, while at the same time seeking reconciliation talks.

After months of lying low, Thaksin has gone on the offensive with a series of interviews in the foreign media. The ex-premier denied reports he had struck a backroom deal with the military to leave his personal and family interests untouched in exchange for his agreement to keep away from politics. However, he did offer to engage in talks with the government on the country’s political future. That offer was rejected on the grounds that he remains a fugitive from justice. 

There is little doubt that Thaksin still views himself as the leader-in-exile of one side of Thailand’s unsettled political conflict. But far more dubious is his calculation that the military junta – the National Council for Peace and Order – and its post-coup government headed by Prayut Chan-o-cha could legitimately be “the other side” at the negotiating table.

Thaksin is correct in saying that, despite the junta’s best efforts, “there is no sign of reconciliation” more than 18 months after the coup of May 2014. But his camp is surely also to blame, at least partially, for that failure. Reconciliation, particularly after a full decade of ugly confrontation, can only be realised if both sides can come to terms and, given the circumstances, it would have to be done under the watchful eye of the military, acting as referee. Now, though, the ex-premier wants to drag the referee into the fight. 

Thailand’s political malaise is often depicted in the Western press as a battle between the rural poor who support Thaksin and the royalist, urban upper and middle class. This simplistic view is a hazardous distortion of reality.

In the wake of the Thaksin era, in fact, anger has steadily grown in all sectors of society against corrupt and greedy politicians as found in all parties. We are today more aware than ever of the damage done by their self-serving behaviour. If a champion of the common man arrives to clean up Thai politics and also halt the periodic flourishes of violence that threaten to boil into civil war, he will be welcomed by all. In the absence of that hero, we have for the time being the security of military rule. The country has been relatively peaceful for nearly two years and the capital free from disruptive street protests and violent attacks on demonstrators. 

Thaksin was a central player in our decade of conflict and clashes, in which two military coups served as bookends to mass protests by both his supporters and his opponents and caused death and mayhem. He might well end up documented as the most divisive figure in Thai history, having deliberately fomented street protests to gain his ends and inadvertently sparking others when his own or his proxy governments were seen by some to be abusing power. 

In 2010 his supporters took to the streets shortly after the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Political Office Holders seized Bt46 billion worth of the ex-premier’s assets. More than two months of protests led to unrest and riots, during which almost 100 people were killed.

The protests that led to the latest coup were sparked by widespread discontent at the push by his sister Yingluck’s administration for an amnesty law that would have benefited Thaksin.

Political leaders are rightly held to higher moral standards than are ordinary citizens. In Thailand, though, too many politicians fail to even achieve the lowest benchmark of compliance with the law. They abuse their power and then refuse to respect court verdicts against them, dismissing the rulings as ideologically motivated. If our legal system and agencies of scrutiny cannot force politicians in power to admit their faults and change their ways, how can Thai politics expect to progress further?