ESTABLISHED political parties will be hit hard by the latest National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO)’s order on re-registering existing members, according to leaders of several parties.

Nipit Indarasombat, a former Democrat Party MP, said the NCPO order will negatively affect the party’s membership base of 2.8 million people since there are only 30 days from April 1 to April 30, 2018 for members to show up and keep their membership.

As a result, the Democrat Party’s members could fall sharply even though there could be another 30-day extension of the April 30, 2018 deadline to comply with the NCPO order.

According to Nipit, the order would cause problems for all political parties that existed before the 2014 coup since most would not be able to meet the deadline on re-registering members in accordance with the new order from junta leader and Prime Minister General Prayut Cha-o-Cha.

“We discussed this order among former MPs and shared the opinion that it would be lucky for the Democrat Party to have 100,000 members left in May 2018 because most people would not be able to show up and pay the membership fee in time as required to keep their membership.

“Political parties will then have less funding and less membership participation. In fact, we’ve been building the party’s membership base for the past 71 years. It would be demolished in a matter of 30 days,” he said.

Regarding deputy premier Wissanu Krau-ngam’s reassurance that the election road map is not affected by the NCPO order unless there are other factors, Nipit said such a statement reflects a perception among the powers-that-be of returning the country to a democratic path.

Nipit also noted that some people had cheered Prayut to stay on as PM, as happened during a recent visit to the Northeast, so there could be a general election just to legitimise his premiership.

Udom Rathamarit, spokesman for the charter-drafting committee, said the NCPO order will facilitate political parties to move on with their activities after April 1, 2018, even though there are criticisms that harsher conditions would be imposed, including disqualification of executive members as well as general members.

There are a total of 19 items barring individuals from being party executive members under the new regulations.

On re-registration of members, Udom said the process has to be completed on official forms provided by the Election Commission and should not be seen as an additional burden. He said that the requirements under the new order concerning the political parties’ funding base is aimed at creating an equal footing for both legacy parties and new parties which would be set up.

However, Nikorn Chamnong, director of Chatthai Pattana party, said the NCPO order appears to be a tactic to revamp the whole political party system via requirements about re-registering members.

He said those who drafted the new conditions did not consult with political parties so there could be future problems when enforcing the conditions.

Kept in check

“The order is designed to overhaul the whole system for all old and new parties to start anew, which is worse than the previous conditions which allow members to re-register within 90 days and this deadline could be further extended three times by up to another 270 days, compared to the new conditions which give a total of only 60 days, including one 30-day extension,” Nikorn said.

Nikorn also dismissed as groundless an allegation of many redundant memberships of political parties, reasoning that duplication is not possible given that all members submit their 13-digit ID number.

Analysts said the NCPO order would effectively keep previous political parties in check until April next year as they are not allowed to undertake other activities beyond those outlined in the NCPO mandate for fears of triggering sensitive issues that could affect peace and order.

In addition, the order also states that members of the general public will have the freedom to make their decision on joining any political parties without pressure or pre-conditions imposed by any entities. Law drafters have denied that the order is aimed at diluting the membership base of established major parties.

Paiboon Nititawan, a leader of the People’s Network for Political Reform, said the NCPO order would ensure that old and new political parties are on an equal footing, adding that new parties would have time to hold meetings to establish their new grouping after April 30.

From March 1 onwards, new political parties may apply for registration with authorities after which they could seek permission to hold meetings to complete the registration process around April.