Thailand needs inclusive leadership from new PM
Hopes for an end to political instability in Thailand now rest heavily on an unelected leader. Forty-four-year-old Abhisit Vejjajiva is the country's third prime minister in four months, after the previous two were removed by the Constitutional Court. His political legitimacy rests on majority support in a parliamentary vote. Despite his lack of a popular mandate, political analysts expect his rule to usher in a period of relative stability, after months of political protest and violence that have deeply divided Thai society and damaged the country's economy. He has the support of business leaders and the private sector.
The peace may not last long, however. Mr Abhisit's elevation is a victory for opponents of exiled former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, ousted for corruption in 2006 and a force behind the People Power Party (PPP) elected to government last year. But it rests on a fragile parliamentary majority and is expected to trigger a new round of disruptive protests by pro-Thaksin forces.
There is no question about the legality of the removal of former pro-Thaksin prime minister Samak Sundaravej this year for holding two jobs, or the dissolution this month of the PPP government after the party was found guilty of vote buying. But the latest development represents a victory for the campaign by the anti-Thaksin People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), supposedly in the name of democracy, to roll back the results of democratic elections. This royalist alliance's true colours are to be found in its leaders' contentions that many Thais are too poorly educated and politically immature to vote, and that parliament should be half-appointed to neutralise their franchise. Sadly, so far, the politically influential military and the monarchy have been complicit in their silence, if not tacit support, for the PAD campaign.
Mr Abhisit's Democrat Party was the dominant political force until Thaksin swept to power. It remained on the sidelines during the political chaos, as PAD supporters occupied Government House and shut down Bangkok's airports. The dissolution of Somchai Wongsawat's coalition government played into its hands. The defection of a pro-Thaksin faction gave it the votes it needed for the prime ministership. But this will be an uneasy alliance between an English-educated Democrat leadership and an old-style, regional political powerbroker. And the winning margin was no more than the number of vacant parliamentary seats, mostly in pro-Thaksin northern areas. With an unelected government unlikely to be able to heal the divisions between the pro-Thaksin north and the elites in Bangkok, more instability seems likely, sooner rather than later.
The country has missed the customary guidance during a crisis of its revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who is 81 and ailing. The Democrats fear that Thaksin will eventually exploit a vacuum to seize power. Short of the sort of undemocratic constitutional change advocated by PAD leaders, the country seems fated to suffer unstable government until all sides accept the result of democratic elections and refrain from conducting vendettas against opponents.
Mr Abhisit, raised in England and Oxford educated, has said one of his first tasks will be bringing about reconciliation among politically divided Thais. He has his priorities right. But it calls for sensible, inclusive leadership to build respect for democratic values and fair elections, in what is still one of the region's freest and most independent nations. That will call on his undoubted intellectual abilities as well as his political skills.
