BANGKOK (AP) – Thailand’s opposition won a stunning majority of the 500 seats up for grabs in the race for the House of Representatives, dealing a major blow to the establishment parties and the former general who has led the country since Southeast Asia since taking power in a 2014 coup.
The results of Sunday’s general election are a sharp repudiation of the country’s conservatives and reflect disenchantment, particularly among young voters who want to limit the military’s influence in politics and reform the monarchy.
But the exact shape of the new government is less clear as post-election coalition talks and behind-the-scenes negotiations take center stage.
THE RESULTS
With almost all votes counted on Monday, Partit Avança emerged as the big winner. It won a projected 151 seats in the Lower House by winning more than 24% of the popular vote for 400 electoral seats and more than 36% of the 100 seats allocated by proportional representation.
In second place is the main opposition party Pheu Thai, whose total number of seats is projected at 141.
The party of incumbent Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, a former army general who came to power in a 2014 coup, ranked fifth in the electoral vote and third in the preference count of the party, with a projected total of 36 seats.
Electoral participation was around 75% of the 52 million registered voters.
WHAT TO FOLLOW?
Who becomes the next prime minister will depend on a vote set for July that includes all House lawmakers plus the military-appointed 250-seat Senate, whose members share conservative establishment policies. The winner must get at least 376 of their combined 750 seats.
Opposition parties have criticized the process as undemocratic. It is a legacy of the 2014 coup and a new constitution drafted in its aftermath that was aimed at ensuring that the army and state bureaucracy, the main defenders of royal order, continue to dominate.
Analysts have noted that much can still happen before the Electoral Commission even declares the results valid, a process that could take up to 75 days and will almost certainly include legal challenges.
In the past, the commission and the courts have used their authority to disqualify opposition parties.
WHAT DOES THE OPPOSITION WANT?
Move Forward leader Pita Limjaroenrat tweeted that he is ready to bring about change as the country’s 30th prime minister.
“Whether you agree or disagree with me, I will be your Prime Minister. Whether you voted for me or not, I will serve you,” he wrote.
While energizing younger voters with his progressive agenda, the 42-year-old businessman has alarmed conservatives with calls to reform the monarchy, an institution that has traditionally been treated as sacrosanct.
In 2019, the Constitutional Court dismissed his colleague from Parliament on charges of breaking electoral law and dissolved the Future Forward party, which later changed its name and leadership to Move Forward.
He had been supporting changes to the draconian law punishing defamation of the monarchy, which critics say has been used as a tool to stifle political dissent and jail pro-democracy student activists.
Student-led protests that began in 2020 openly criticized the monarchy, once a taboo subject, and led to vigorous prosecutions under the law. They were also dismayed by the dissolution of the Future Forward party, which they believed was an unfair use of state power.
THE SHADOW OF THAKSIN
Pheu Thai is run by Paetongtarn Shinawatra, the 36-year-old daughter of billionaire former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra who was ousted in a 2006 coup.
The power struggle between Thaksin’s supporters, many of them rural poor who benefited from his populist policies, and his conservative opponents has been fought out — sometimes in the streets, sometimes at the polls — for nearly two decades
In the 2014 coup, Prayuth overthrew the government of Yingluck Shinawatra, Paetongtarn’s aunt, Thaksin’s sister, as prime minister. And Pheu Thai led the field in the 2019 vote, only to be denied power when the military-backed Palang Pracharath party found partners to form a coalition government.
Thaksin, 73, said before Sunday’s vote that he wants to return to Thailand from exile, even if it means facing justice, including several convictions on charges including abuse of power and corruption.
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Hranjski reported from Zagreb, Croatia.
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