Thaksin Shinawatra & Thai Election

TheThai election has given most seats to the People's Power Party, which has promised to bring back ousted PM, Thaksin Shinawatra, but this could have dire results.

Thailand's election is all over bar the forming of a government, and the winning party has 30 days in which to persuade other, small parties, to join them in a coalition. With no alcohol sales allowed over the two week-ends in which voting occured, it was a quiet election in most places. Now comes the hard part.

The smaller parties have a good bargaining chip in that they know they are needed if the PPP is to be successful in forming a government, so a lot of wheeling and dealing is set to take place over the next few weeks. The Democrats, who also want to form a government, will be after these smaller parties as well.

The PPP is reckoned to be Thaksin Shinawatra's party in all but name, and the fear in metropolitan Bangkok is that the party will offer him an amnesty in order that he may re-enter politics. Accused of avoiding tax on the sale of his Shinawatra Telecom holdings and other embezzlement charges, he has placed himself outside the law by residing in Europe since he was deposed in a military coup last year.

His return would be popular with his grass-roots support in the North of Thailand. He was the first politician to offer the poor farmers and rice growers of the area, cheap loans, free medical care, and free education for their children, something the other parties have belatedly seen to be a vote catcher. However, he is markedly unpopular with the urban elite and the generals who deposed him. His return will spark fears of another coup, this one perhaps not so bloodless. We shall see.

Meantime, the mass of Thai people will forget the election, put on their party clothes and get ready to celebrate Christmas and New Year.