Thai Constitutional Court Accepts Petition Seeking Dissolution of MFP

Thai Constitutional Court Accepts Petition Seeking Dissolution of MFP

Thailand’s Constitutional Court yesterday accepted a petition seeking the disbanding of the opposition Move Forward Party (MFP), in connection with the party’s pledge to amend the country’s severe lese-majeste law. The court said that it agreed to take on a complaint filed by the Election Commission on March 12. The complaint requested that it disband … Read more

Thai Election Commission Requests Dissolution of Move Forward Party

Thai Election Commission Requests Dissolution of Move Forward Party

Thailand’s Election Commission (EC) has taken another step toward the disbanding of the Move Forward Party (MFP), which finished first in last year’s general election on a progressive platform. In a decision yesterday, the Commission said that it would ask the Constitutional Court to dissolve the MFP, because of its campaign promise to amend Article … Read more

Former Thai PM Thaksin Freed on Parole After 6 Months

Former Thai PM Thaksin Freed on Parole After 6 Months

On Sunday, Thailand’s former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was released on parole from a police hospital in Bangkok, bringing a two-decade-long political conflict to a close. The billionaire former leader, who returned from self-imposed exile last August, has spent the past six months in a hospital bed serving time for corruption-related offenses dating from his … Read more

Thai Constitutional Court Clears MFP Leader of Breaching Election Law

Thai Constitutional Court Clears MFP Leader of Breaching Election Law

Pita Limjaroenrat, the former leader of Thailand’s Move Forward Party (MFP), has been found not guilty of violating the country’s election law, allowing him to be reinstated to Parliament. In a long-anticipated ruling yesterday, the Constitutional Court ruled by eight votes to one that Pita had not broken rules banning candidates for public office from … Read more

Thai Prison Officials Again Defend Treatment of Jailed Former PM

Former Thai PM Thaksin Returns From Self-exile as PM Vote Looms

Thailand’s Department of Corrections has asked people not to refer to former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra as an “inmate,” even though he is serving a prison sentence, as it comes under fire for allegedly according to the former leader preferential treatment. In a statement yesterday, the department said that it referred to offenders as inmates … Read more

Thailand’s Buffet Cabinet 2.0: A Case of Political Indigestion

Thailand’s New Prime Minister: The Parliamentary Vote and the Aftermath

The Pheu Thai-led government of Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin is a Frankenstein’s monster cobbled together from some 10 political parties, and includes ministers from six parties. The fact that junior coalition partners Bhumjaithai, Palang Pracharath, and Thai Raksa Chart managed to get 16 of the 36 total ministerial portfolios, including the interior, agriculture, energy, and … Read more

Embattled Chief of Thailand’s Opposition Move Forward Party Steps Down

Thai Parliament Readies for Second Prime Ministerial Vote

ASEAN Beat | Politics | Southeast Asia Pita Limjaroenrat has been suspended from his duties as a member of Parliament pending a court ruling on whether he violated election law. Advertisement The embattled head of the Move Forward Party, which finished first in Thailand’s general election in May but was denied power by Parliament, announced his resignation on Friday … Read more

A Role Reversal for Bangkok’s Middle Class

A Role Reversal for Bangkok’s Middle Class

Advertisement Thailand has a long history of rural and peripheral citizens concentrated in the country’s north and northeast voting into government political parties and politicians, only for these later to be removed by the conservative royalist establishment with the support of the large Bangkok middle class. Thaksin Shinawatra and his political parties won every Thai … Read more

Real Estate Tycoon Srettha Thavisin Secures Votes to Become Thailand’s Next Prime Minister

Real Estate Tycoon Srettha Thavisin Secures Votes to Become Thailand’s Next Prime Minister

Advertisement Srettha Thavisin from the populist Pheu Thai Party secured enough votes in parliament to become Thailand’s 30th prime minister Tuesday, hours after former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra returned from years of self-imposed exile and began an eight-year prison sentence. While the vote was still ongoing, Srettha had enough votes to win. A real estate … Read more

Changing Thailand: New Ideology, Old Politics

Changing Thailand: New Ideology, Old Politics

Advertisement The victory of the opposition parties, the Move Forward Party (MFP) and Pheu Thai Party (PTP), at Thailand’s May 14 election marked the end of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha’s eight-year long administration. Prayut, a military general who came to power after the 2014 coup and maintained his position after the highly disputed 2019 election, … Read more