The Crisis Facing Thai Democracy
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2006/03/18/2003297996
One year after he was re-elected in a landslide,
Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has been
forced to dissolve the National Assembly and call a
snap election.
Although his Thai Rak Thai party commands a
75 percent majority in the assembly, Thaksin is embattled.
He remains immensely popular with rural voters and the
urban poor, who comprise more than 60 percent of
Thailand's electorate, but he has been battling a fervent
Bangkok-based insurrection against his rule by the
intelligentsia and middle classes.
They accuse Thaksin, Thailand's wealthiest businessman,
of corruption and treason for the tax-free sale of his family-owned
Shin Corporation to the Singapore government's Temasek Holdings
for US$1.9 billion.
Until recently, Thaksin appeared to be as unassailable
at home as he was bold and credible abroad. Exploiting
Thailand's deep urban-rural divide, Thaksin bulldozed his way
to power in 2001 on a populist platform.
He stirred up national pride and promised rural Thais that their
country would rise to greatness following the devastating 1997
economic crisis.
A raft of populist policies underpinned his first four-year
government, from rural debt suspension and cheap
universal healthcare to handing out US$25,000 to
each of 77,000 villages for entrepreneurial start-up funds.
Reminiscent of development strategies prevalent in East Asia,
Thaksin picked strategic niche industries to propel Thailand's
economic expansion, focusing on automobiles, fashion, food,
healthcare and tourism.
The shady sale of Shin Corp in February galvanized
long-simmering discontents. The deal was viewed as
the epitome of Thaksin's sophisticated corruption and
a betrayal of his proclaimed nationalism, thus exhausting
his moral authority and political legitimacy.
The company's value quadrupled during Thaksin's reign,
with assets such as satellites, a mobile phone service and
an airline having originated from state concessions that
were conditioned on majority Thai ownership.
For Thaksin's opponents, the sale of these assets to a
foreign company owned by a foreign government amounted to
putting Thailand's economic sovereignty on the block.
Thaksin's days appear numbered, for Thailand seems poised
to eject a popularly elected prime minister. The number of
street protesters has since swelled from five digits to six.
His predicament illustrates the common dictum in the politics of
developing countries where rural electorates elect governments
but urban elites get to throw them out.
Indeed, the anti-Thaksin coalition will settle for no less than
his ouster from office, permanent banishment from Thai politics
and possibly exile. But the opposition has decided to boycott
the snap election, which his Thai Rak Thai party would likely win
again by a large margin, because Thaksin has captured and
manipulated the institutions established by the Constitution to
safeguard against graft and uphold separation of powers
within the state.
What Thai democracy needs in order to mature is not a
political safety net, but a vigilant citizenry to ensure
disciplined enforcement of the Constitution's provisions and
institutions, so that they can no longer be hijacked by
the likes of a Thaksin.
__________________________________________________
So familiar.
.
|
