JUNTA LEADER Prayut Chan-o-cha yesterday vowed he would not step down as prime minister while stating clearly that if he was to return as the PM, it would be through normal means – as a candidate on a party’s list.

Circumstances now clearly point to General Prayut topping the PM list of the pro-junta Phalang Pracharat Party, but the coup leader yesterday remained officially non-committal, repeating that he had not been contacted by any party.

However, Prayut seemed to keep his options open, saying: “I am waiting for invitations. And I need time to study their policy proposals and their practicality. If I am to join them, I have to see their policies.”

He said he expected to make his decision by February 8, the date when the Election Commission (EC) requires PM-candidate lists to be submitted by parties. He was much clearer on two other matters – that he will not give up his premiership during the election period, and he will not return to power as an “outsider” PM.

“Don’t press me now,” Prayut said. “Who will do this if I quit? I will stay no matter what. The law doesn’t say I have to leave. I can stay until the new government is in place.”

If he were to return as the premier, Prayut said, “I have to be on the list. Let’s just say that. Otherwise, they’ll say I’m an outsider [PM]. It’ll just get too chaotic if I am not on the list.”

With the election fast approaching and the strong possibility of Prayut keeping his hold on power after the polls, critics are calling for the PM to step down to ensure a fair election.

If he stays on during the lead-up to polling day and before the new government takes office, political observers say the regime will use its absolute power and current status to manipulate the poll.

They said the government could conveniently use the government’s major “Pracharat” scheme, which shares the same keyword as the pro-junta party “Phalang Pracharat”, to gain popularity over other parties.

This criticism was especially severe when the government handed out cash to low-income earners as a New Year gift.

Also, mobile Cabinet meetings have been held in different provinces, allowing Prayut to meet with voters and respond to their demands.

State resources should not be exploited for the gains of a particular party, critics said.

In a worst-case scenario, given that the junta enjoys absolute power allowed by Article 44, political scientists have voiced concern that Prayut could use his absoute power to do anything – including cancelling the election altogether.

Attasit Pankaew, a political scientist from Thammasat University, warned yesterday that these criticisms would put much pressure on Prayut unless he steps down now.

“Of course, if Prayut is on the PM-candidate list and refuses to give up power, he has to bear the criticism that he is abusing state power for his own political gain,” Attasit said.

Questions about whether the election is free and fair will haunt Prayut throughout the campaign, if he continued in power, Attasit said.

And after the election, if the pro-junta camp comes out on top, and Prayut remained premier, questions would be raised about his victory, he added.

If Prayut insists on keeping his position and power throughout the electoral campaign, the expert advised that he exercise his power discreetly to avoid public criticism that would make his premiership after the election difficult.

In a related development, the four ministers who occupy key positions in the pro-junta Phalang Pracharat yesterday resigned from their positions after weeks of criticism. Industry Minister Uttama Savanayana, Commerce Minister Sontirat Sontijirawong, Science and Technology Minister Suvit Maesincee, and PM’s |Office Minister Kobsak Pootrakool bowed out.

Uttama is the Phalang Pracharat leader while the other three are party executives.

Prayut said he will not reshuffle the Cabinet but only assign their duties to other Cabinet members.

The current Constitution requires each party to name up to three candidates for the country’s top job – a political stipulation designed by the charter writers.

Parties have until February 8 to submit their PM candidate list to the Election Commission.

After the election, a party or a group of parties with the highest number of House seats will nominate a candidate for the premier’s job in a joint House and Senate sitting. The House will be comprised of 500 elected members of Parliament and the Senate will be made of 250 senators handpicked by the National Council for Peace and Order.

The winning candidate will require at least 376 votes from both chambers.

So far, former transport minister Chatchat Sitthipan and Khunying Sudarat Keyuraphan, chair of Pheu Thai’s election strategy committee, will be among Pheu Thai’s PM candidates.

Chartthaipattana has chosen Kanchana Silpa-archa, daughter of late former prime minister and party patriarch Banharn, as PM candidate, while Bhum Jai Thai will nominate its leader Anutin Charnvirakul.

Prachachat Party, formed by Muslim politicians of the Wadah group, will name three candidates – namely ex-House speaker and party leader Wan Muhammad Noor Matha, former secretary-general of the Southern Border Provinces Administrative Centre and party secretary-general Pol General Tawee Sodsong, and former deputy government spokesperson and deputy party leader Nahathai Tiewpaingam.

The Democrat Party has said it will release its list on Friday, though it is widely expected to nominate former prime minister and party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva.

However, all eyes will be on Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha, who is likely to be in the candidate list of the pro-junta Phalang Pracharat Party. The premier announced on Tuesday that if he was to return as prime minister, it will be through normal means – as a party-list candidate.

THE WEBSITE for early-voting registration crashed yesterday morning after a huge number of voters rushed to secure their balloting rights, leading to speculation that the upcoming election could see a high turnout.

The March 24 poll will be the country’s first general election in seven years.

The online registration opened after midnight on the website of the Department of Public Administration (DOPA). But the website went down in the morning after too many voters tried to access the site at the same time.

According to Election Commission (EC) deputy secretary-general Nat Laosisavakul, the crash was due to a large number of people entering the website. The failure, in particular, affected those registering for overseas voting, Nat said.

However, the issue was resolved soon after and yesterday, from 8.30 to 9am, at least 1,000 voters had successfully registered to vote early outside their home constituencies, he added.

The registration is also available offline via DOPA offices or Thai embassies until February 19, he said. But the EC has recommended online registration as the most convenient channel, he added. The deputy secretary-general said the agency expected the total number of those registering to exceed 2 million. It could be due to the new electoral system that makes every vote count, he said.

Under the Mixed-Member Apportionment (MMA) system, each vote goes to both the constituency candidate and the party. Even when the candidate loses, the party would still get the vote, which could be useful in gaining party-list MPs.

According to data provided by the EC website, in 2011 and 2007, 3 million and 2.3 million people respectively registered to vote early.

Early voting this year will take place from March 4 to 17 while the general election has been set for March 24.

Political scientists saw the crash of the website yesterday as a demonstration of voter enthusiasm and speculated that the turnout of voters might be high this year.

Sukhum Nualsakul, former rector of Ramkhamhaeng University, said yesterday that the enthusiasm could be due to people not being able to vote for many years.

“It’s been seven years since the last successful election. That’s almost two terms. People must be so frustrated,” he said. “It’s such a long time since they voted. So, they would want to express their political views through the ballot in this general election.”

Sukhum also said the election has been a hot topic in the last couple of years, hence people would be enthusiastic to exercise their rights.

Starved of elections

Another political scientist Attasit Pankaew, from Thammasat University, said that it was a good sign that the registration website had crashed.

“The website going down means that at some point, more people tried to access it than the system could take,” he said. “This is a very positive thing. The fact that they tried to register on the very first day shows that the voters are indeed very alert.”

The expert said that the country’s failure to hold any general election in the past years could have contributed to the enthusiasm. Regardless, this clearly reflects that voters are eager to participate in politics, Attasit said.

Meanwhile, political parties are humming with activity now that the election date has been announced.

Pheu Thai Party’s senior figure, Phumtham Wechayachai, said yesterday that the party’s members had already agreed on two PM candidates: its core leader Khunying Sudarat Keyuraphan and popular figure Chatchart Sittipan. The party would submit three names, the most number allowed by the law, but had yet to finalise the third candidate, he said.

The party was also working on finalising its list of MP candidates and expected the final decision to be made this week, according to Phumtham.

Meanwhile, Democrat leader Abhisit Vejjajiva revealed yesterday that the party was considering a candidates list for 150 constituencies as well as the PM candidate. The names were expected to be finalised by February 1, he said.

The Democrat leader declined to comment on arch rival Pheu Thai’s choice of PM candidates, saying that no matter who were on the list, there would be a competition.

Finally, almost five years after ousting the elected government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shina-watra with the barrel of a gun, the military junta has called for an election.

The March 24 elections will end the military rule that began in 2014. Army chief Prayut Chan-o-cha led a bloodless coup that toppled the government then led by the Pheu Thai party. The coup leader took over as prime minister.

What happened to Shinawatra then was history repeating itself.

In 2006, the military launched a coup against her brother, then Prime Minister Thaksin Shina-watra, when he was in New York City to attend the United Nations General Assembly.

I remember that coup. At that time, I was The Star’s Thailand correspondent based in Bangkok and also the Asia News Network (ANN) editor.

That night, I was home in Bangna near Bangkok when I received a phone call saying there was an ongoing coup. I rushed to the nearby The Nation office where I worked.

Thasong Asvasena, a journalist from The Nation, told me not to worry as friendly soldiers had arrived to secure the newspaper’s premises. I looked out the window and saw armed soldiers surrounding the building.

It was called the Happy Coup as many Bangkokians hated Thaksin. They were delighted to see the end of his reign.

But that was not the end of Thaksin’s political grip on Thailand. The billionaire is like the Terminator. He’ll be back – through political parties linked to him.

Although he was in self-imposed exile, his party, the People Power Party (PPP, a reincarnation of his Thai Rak Thai party which had been banned by the military junta) won the election in 2007.

A year later PPP lost power in a “judicial coup” in which Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, who is married to Thaksin and Yingluck’s sister, was forced from office by a Constitutional Court ruling. The court disbanded PPP for electoral fraud and barred its leaders from participating in politics for five years.

Opposition leader Abhisit Vejjajiva, from the Democrat party, formed a coalition and became Prime Minister.

In 2011, an election was called. Pheu Thai (the reincarnation of the banned PPP) won in a landslide victory and Yingluck became Thailand’s first female prime minister.

In 2014, the military seized power. It was the country’s 12th coup d’etat since the first in 1932.

Now, in 56 days, Thais will go to the polls. The big question is, can the self-exiled Thaksin, whose party has never lost an election, make a political comeback through his Pheu Thai alliance?

On Friday in Bangkok, I met Sean Boonpracong, a former national security adviser to Prime Minister Yingluck, and Cod Satrusayang, the managing editor of ANN, to get their insights into Thai politics.

“Can Thaksin make a comeback?” I asked them in separate interviews.

“Absolutely, because essentially the Thai Rak Thai, PPP and Pheu Thai parties – which are the incarnations of Thaksin’s political base – know how to capture the political aspirations of the people,” said Boonpracong.

After more than four years in power, the military junta could not deliver what the people wanted, he said.

Boonpracong said early polls – by various credible pollsters – indicate that Pheu Thai and its allies, such as Thai Raksa Chart and Future Forward (led by auto parts billionaire Thanathorn Juangroong-ruangkit), could win 272 to 300 seats for MPs out of 500.

“It looks like Pheu Thai will still win. Despite the odds stacked against them, despite the military drafting a Constitution that’s supposed to be anti-them, despite the redrawing of the constituencies, they will still win,” said Satru-sayang.

The question now, said the ANN editor, is not whether Pheu Thai will win – “But whether they’ll win by a large enough margin so that the other side can’t call in the clause that can put in place an unelected prime minister who is not an MP,” he said.

The electoral odds are stacked in favour of the military junta, though.

There will be 750 representatives – 500 MP posts (constituency and party lists) from the lower house of Parliament (like our Dewan Rakyat) up for grabs and 250 from the upper house (like our Dewan Negara) comprising junta appointees and military brass. These 750 people will decide who will be prime minister.

In theory, the junta needs parties aligned to it, such as Phalang Pracharat, to have 126 MPs win seats as it has 250 senators (who are not elected, remember). The math is 126 + 250 = 376, which is a simple majority.

Whereas Pheu Thai and its allies have to have 376 MPs win to form the government, as the 250 senators are all junta appointees.

In a nutshell, the junta leaders can still remain in power even without an elected representative majority.

Even if Pheu Thai and its allies win most of the votes, there is no guarantee that it can form the government because the electoral system favours the military junta, said Boonpracong.

“Pheu Thai (and its allies) have to win the lower house seats overwhelmingly,” he said.

When I was working in Bangkok from 2006 to 2010, Thailand was divided into two groups: “I love Thaksin” and “I hate Thaksin”. There was no middle ground. And those who loved Thaksin hated those who hated Thaksin. And those who hated Thaksin had no love for those who loved Thaksin.

Thaksin has been in voluntary exile since 2006, and I was curious to know whether he is still a divisive figure.

Well, after more than four years of junta rule, the divisiveness – based on social media postings – has reduced, Boonpracong said.

“As he has not been in power for 12 years, essentially, they (those who hate him) can’t blame Thailand’s ills on the bogeyman that is Thaksin,” he said.

Satrusayang said Thaksin is really popular in rural areas, especially in the north-east and north. The former prime minister, he said, is still popular among the poor because of his populist policies, such as cheap health care and loans when he was in power.

“They also have a feeling that they voted for this guy and the Bangkok elites keep overthrowing him over and over again – as if they know better. There’s an us (the poor in the north and north-east) against them (elite Bangkokians) mentality,” he said.

Boonpracong said: “Thaksin is just a politician who we should not overpraise. But overall he has he has done a lot of good for the people on the periphery who make up 70% of the bottom rung of Thai society.

“He has moved the earth to make their life better economically,” he said.

Bangkokians, Boonpracong feels, are less angry at Thaksin. “They feel that Thailand’s economic performance the last five years under the junta has been less dynamic than our neighbours’,” he said.

Satrusayang, however, feels that Thaksin is still hated by most Bangkok people. But there’s not as much intensity between the red shirts (pro-Thaksin) and yellow shirts (anti-Thaksin), he said.

“The yellows and reds agree that they hate the military more because it has been in power for too long,” he said.

“The yellows aren’t going to vote for Pheu Thai and reds won’t vote for the Democrats (or junta aligned parties) but the military is the central figure of hate now.”

According to Satrusayang, this is because when the military came into power it promised that it would be gone in a year.

“Now it has been more than four years. They kept on postponing the elections, they keep on lying, they keep on infringing on civil liberties.”

The military junta, except for Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha, is not popular, said Satrusayang.

“Prayut is decently popular because he is seen as a funny uncle. But Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan is hated because of his watch scandal,” he said. (Wongsuwan is said to own a collection of undeclared luxury watches.)

It looks like Thaksin’s alliance will win the popular vote but it won’t be easy for it to form the government.

It needs about 100 senators to switch sides or for the junta (under pressure from a higher power) to blink on polling night.