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Thailand heading for a showdown

P. S. Suryanarayana

Several groups take out rallies in Bangkok

SINGAPORE: Opponents of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra of Thailand on Sunday stepped up their campaign for his resignation. Serving an ultimatum that he step down by midnight on Sunday or face a "people-power showdown," several groups mobilised his opponents for rallies in Bangkok.

The rallies, expected to go on until past midnight, were planned to counter the "show of political support" — nearly 150,000 — that Mr. Thaksin had put up in Bangkok two days earlier.

Security forces tightened measures to prevent clashes between the opponents and supporters of the Prime Minister. Fearful of political instability, some academics petitioned the much-revered King, a constitutional head, to stem the crisis.

Regional experts expressed doubts whether the monarch would intervene, given he had already agreed to a snap general election, scheduled for April 2, on the advice of the Prime Minister.

Crux of crisis

The crux of the crisis is the demand that Mr. Thaksin, who had won a massive parliamentary majority just over a year ago, should quit instead of seeking a fresh mandate.

The litany of charges against him read as follows: abuses of authority, including "human rights violations" in the campaigns against drug-traffickers and Muslim "insurgents" in the majority-Buddhist kingdom; alleged crackdown on the independent media; corrupt practices, and nepotism.

The spark was the suspicion that Mr. Thaksin's family had made illegal gains in the sale of a family-owned firm to a foreign buyer.

This charge, which the Constitutional Court has dismissed for want of evidence regarding the Prime Minister's own complicity, is being projected by his opponents to try and tarnish his pro-poor image.

Mr. Thaksin is trying to shore up that image through rallies of his own.

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