by behappyalways » Mon Feb 02, 2015 10:05 am
Thailand’s politics: Moral disorder
Whatever the generals think, smashing Yingluck Shinawatra and her brother is no cure for Thailand’s ills
FOR 15 years Thaksin Shinawatra has dominated Thai politics—and for most of that time the country’s generals and their supporters around the ailing king have tried to destroy him. The populist billionaire fled into exile two years after a coup deposed him in 2006, but his sister, Yingluck, still won an election in 2011 and ruled as his proxy, with Mr Thaksin pulling the strings from Dubai.
But she was ousted last May in a constitutional wrangle—and soon afterwards the army took over. Now rampant abuses stemming from a rice subsidy programme that was overseen by her government, have led to a sham impeachment of her. Criminal charges will follow.
This time, finally, the generals and courtiers may have cornered the Shinawatras (see article). Ms Yingluck is in effect a hostage in negotiations with Mr Thaksin, whose position has weakened. He has lost the backing of Thailand’s crown prince, while a purge in the police force has weakened a key bastion of his support. Mr Thaksin may now sacrifice his political ambitions to safeguard his family and fortune.
Some Thais will cheer, longing for calm after years of political stand-offs and street protests that often spilled into violence. But the junta’s determination to abolish democratic politics spells trouble, probably the bloody kind, in the future. It should think again.
The worst form of government, except for all the others
There was much to fault in the way Mr Thaksin ran his country, both before and after he fled abroad to avoid a jail sentence for abuse of power. With support from a poor, rural heartland in the north and north-east, neither he nor his sister paid enough heed to the interests of Bangkok’s middle classes or the southern provinces. In office Mr Thaksin favoured his own considerable business interests and weakened public institutions. He was a Berlusconi with less of the bunga-bunga. Appallingly, in 2003-04 he ordered an extrajudicial assassination programme that killed thousands of supposed drug dealers. His sister was less authoritarian but also less competent.
And yet the Thaksinite governments were probably no more corrupt than their predecessors were. Crucially, the Shinawatras did much to transform the lives of some of the country’s worse off. They built country roads, boosted education and provided health care for the poor. The old elites resented this, not least because they liked to think of the king traditionally atop an ordered hierarchy with deferential peasants at the bottom grateful for royal charity. Without putting it in so many words, Mr Thaksin implicitly challenged that dispensation, and a majority of Thais approved. But soon after he or his loyalists were back in office, the political stand-offs and the street violence would resume.
Last May the generals intervened to break the dismal cycle, claiming impartiality. They spoke of reconciliation and tried to start discussussions with Mr Thaksin. But recently they have changed their minds, perhaps to please the establishment around the court of the old king. Impeaching Yingluck is only part of it. The generals are drawing up a constitution designed to keep populist parties like Mr Thaksin’s Pheu Thai from power. They intend to rule for as long as it takes to restore a supposed moral order.
This will do Thailand no good. The lesson of the past 15 years is that ever more Thais want a say in their country. Banishing the Shinawatras will not change that. The West should make clear to the generals that a constitution that bans Thailand’s most successful party from power is a step backwards. If they still go ahead, military ties should be broken. The era of Thaksin may be ending; but the democracy that he so imperfectly represented is Thailand’s only hope.
Source: The Economist
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