Bangkok - Hundreds of pro-government demonstrators wearing
red shirts and carrying clubs rallied against the convening of the
Thai Constituion Court Tuesday to prevent the reading of a verdict
expected to lead to political changes and perhaps more turmoil.
The nine judges on the case shifted the trial to the
Administrative Court building in northern Bangkok to avoid a
gathering of the pro-government Democratic Alliance Against
Dictatorship (DAAD), who had planned to gather outside the
Constitution Court in an effort to block the verdict.
Even so, the Administrative Court was quickly surrounded by more
than 1,000 DAAD members. The court was under the protection of Thai
Army troops armed with M16 rifles.
The Constitution Court has sped up the final hearing of three
election fraud cases involving the People Power, Chart Thai and
Matchimathipataya parties, which comprise the current coalition
government.
Based on past court precedents, it is expected that all three
parties will be found guilty of violating election laws in the polls
of December 23, 2007, on the grounds that top party executives have
already been found guilty by the court of vote-buying.
Under the Thai constitution, parties must be dissolved and their
key executives banned from politics if even one of their members is
found guilty of election fraud.
If the People Power Party, the lead party in the coalition, is
dissolved by the court, it would mean that current Prime Minister
Somchai Wongsawat must resign along with most of the cabinet.
In the ensuring power vacuum, several scenarios are possible.
The remaining members of the People Power party, which won about
230 out of 480 contested seats in the 2007 general election, are
expected to shift to the Puea Thai party, which would hold enough
seats to form a new coalition government with remnant members of the
Chart Thai and Matchimathipataya parties.
Under the constitution, the Constitution Court in an emergency can
also set up a Supreme Council to rule the country on an interim basis
prior to a new election.
While this option is favoured by many Thais as a means of
placating the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), an anti-
government group that has held Bangkok's two airports hostage to its
demands that the government step down for the last two months, it is
not expected to be accepted by pro-government forces.
The Democratic Alliance Against Dictatorship (DAAD), a reverse
image pro-government civic grouping opposed to the PAD, had plans to
block the Constitution Court verdict Tuesday and would certainly
object to a 'judicial coup' that installed an unelected government.
Pro-government politicians suspect the Constitution Court is
working hand-in-hand with the PAD, a loose coalition of groups united
only in their desire to prevent a political comeback by fugitive
former prime minister Thaksin Shinwatara, a populist politician who
dominated Thai politics during his two-term, 2001-06 premiership and
now lives in self-exile.
Although the PAD has lost a good deal of its former popularity by
seizing Bangkok's two airports last week, causing the Thai economy
incalculable damage, the movement remains untouchable for security
authorities who have refrained from cracking down.
The PAD is known to have the support of members of Thailand's
political elite, including leaders of the Army, which toppled Thaksin
with a coup in September 2006.
'Backers of the PAD have been playing a high-stakes game,' said
Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a political scientist from Chulalongkorn
University.
There are worries that the DAAD will launch the kind of street
protests and civil disobedience tactics practiced by the PAD over the
last six months that have brought the country to its knees.
They could also unleash their fury on the PAD.
'Then, who can stop the DAAD? Only Thaksin,' said Thitinan.
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