About 30,000 protesters launched a ‘people’s coup’ on Thailand’s government on Sunday, swarming state agencies in violent clashes, taking control of a state broadcaster, and forcing the prime minister to flee a police compound…
It is the latest dramatic turn in a conflict pitting Bangkok’s urban middle class and royalist elite against the mostly poor, rural supporters of [Prime Minister] Yingluck and her billionaire brother, Thaksin Shinawatra, a former prime minister ousted in a 2006 military coup.
(Reuters, December 1, 2013)
Frankly, Thais seem caught in a vicious cycle of people’s coups. I began commenting on them in 2006, when I admonished against their practice of resorting to street protests primarily to overturn the results of national elections.
Even a benign (i.e., popular and bloodless) military coup is not only inherently inconsistent but also politically untenable in a democracy. After all, no matter the extent of Thaksin’s corruption (highlighted by an insider’s deal where he allegedly sold his family’s stake in a state telecommunications company to Singaporeans for $1.9 billion), constitutional provisions were in place to either impeach him or vote him out of office at elections that were due within months.
Of course, given that, throughout their 74-year democracy, Thais have changed their government by coups as often as by elections, I suppose it’s no surprise that even former Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai seems resigned to military coups as an oxymoronic staple of Thai democracy…
Even though martial law has been declared, it’s reasonable to expect that democracy will soon be restored and all will be well in Thailand … until the next military coup….
(“Thailand’s Benign Military Coup…,” The iPINIONS Journal, September 20, 2006)
Sure enough, here is what I wrote just two years later:
After months of protests – growing so formidable in size and nihilistic determination that not even the country’s vaunted military could squash them – the court ruled yesterday, again somewhat expediently (not to mention belatedly), that PM Somchai’s governing coalition committed electoral fraud. Then, affirming mob rule, the court banned him from politics.
So here’s to hoping that Thailand’s third prime minister this year can prove beyond all doubt that he not only thoroughly hates Thaksin but is also completely loyal to the king. Otherwise the protesters are bound to return to the streets and to the airports [where protesters barricaded themselves on this occasion]….
(“Thailand Suffers Another Coup – This Time by an Angry Mob,” The iPINIONS Journal, December 3, 2008)
This is why, when Thaksin’s sister Yingluck became prime minister in 2011, instead of hailing her as the latest in my pantheon of women leaders taking over the world, I remonstrated:
It seemed almost schizophrenic when Thailand descended into years of political instability after [the 2006] coup, pitting Thaksin loyalists (aka Red Shirts) against opposition forces (aka Yellow Shirts).
Most commentators are hailing the outcome because Thailand elected its first female prime minister. But I fear her election will only set the stage for more civil unrest; not least because she happens to be Thaksin’s wholly inexperienced younger sister, Yingluck Shinawatra (44), who everyone believes is just his political puppet…
I doubt the Yellow Shirts will stand by and allow Thaksin to rule over them again – by proxy from exile in Dubai. Especially because Thaksin seems to believe that his little sister’s top priority should be forcing the government to grant him amnesty and return the $1.2 billion in assets it confiscated after he fled…
(“Alas, Thailand’s First Female PM Is Just a Puppet,” The iPINIONS Journal, July 12, 2011)
Sure enough….
Therefore, even though the Groundhog-Day events unfolding there today are eminently newsworthy, I hope I can be forgiven for having nothing more to say. Instead I shall end with this ominous bit of reporting yesterday by the BBC:
Thai protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban says he has met PM Yingluck Shinawatra and given her two days to ‘return power to the people’…
The protesters had declared Sunday the decisive ‘V-Day’ of what they termed a ‘people’s coup’.
They say Ms. Yingluck’s Administration is controlled by her brother, exiled ex-leader Thaksin Shinawatra, and they want to replace it with a ‘People’s Council’.
NOTE: Ukraine seems caught in a similar vicious cycle – as the hundreds of thousands of anti-government protesters rampaging the streets of Kiev today will attest. I began commenting on its oxymoronic march towards democracy in 2005 and will publish a similar update tomorrow.
Related commentaries:
Thai PM flirting with Obama incites riots…
Thailand Benign coup…
First female PM…