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Thais to vote amid Opposition boycott

P. S. Suryanarayana

Thaksin opponents ask electors to choose "no-vote" option to thwart the Premier's comeback bid

SINGAPORE: As Thailand entered the "cool-off period" on Saturday, ahead of Sunday's mid-term general election, political calm prevailed across the country. However, it masked the moves by opponents of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra to create a "no-vote" constitutional crisis.

By and large, the entire campaign period too remained peaceful, although political tensions ran very high because of competitive "people-power" rallies by the Prime Minister and his opponents.

Mr. Thaksin had called the snap poll just a year after winning a landslide re-election. By this, he sought to ride out a political crisis over his alleged corruption and abuse of authority in the tax-free sale of a family-owned mega firm to a Singapore company.

The Opposition parties and the Alliance for Democracy, said to be a larger people's forum, have called for boycott of the general election.

Political ruse alleged

The established Opposition parties have not fielded candidates at all. And, Mr. Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai (Thais Love Thailand) Party is now facing the candidates of newly-sprung marginal outfits. The Opposition has blamed the Prime Minister for his alleged "political ruse" of creating a notional contest.

Significantly in this context, the established parties and public interest activists have called upon the voters to exercise their franchise by choosing the "no-vote" option on the ballot paper instead of a candidate. Voting is compulsory.

Under the Thai electoral laws, said to have been designed to safeguard the country's relatively new democracy, even the unopposed candidates should secure a minimum of 20 per cent of the vote in the constituency for victory. If not, byelection(s) will follow until the mandatory requirement is met.

It is this legal nicety that Mr. Thaksin's opponents are seeking to exploit by asking the electors to exercise the "no-vote" option as a political tactic. The transparent objective is to try and delay or even derail the formation of the next Parliament.

Call for reconciliation

Should Mr. Thaksin be stopped in his tracks as a result, the revered King can, under the untested Section 7 of the Constitution, become the executive Head of State, the "no-vote" campaigners say. This scenario is uncharted politics, and Thailand had abolished absolute monarchy over 70 years ago.

Xinhua reports:

Mr. Thaksin renewed his call for national reconciliation, saying he is willing to consider all proposals following the general election, even suggestions about self-sacrifice, or suspending his political role.

The embattled caretaker Prime Minister said that every party must end conflicting ideologies out of respect for the beloved monarch, as Thailand is celebrating the 60th anniversary of the King's ascension to the throne this year. ``Let's reconcile after the snap election in honour of our beloved monarch and for the sake of national solidarity amid fiercer global competition,'' he said. He said he is willing to consider even suspending his own political role.

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