Workers arrange a portrait of King Vajiralongkorn, who recently made two changes to Thailand’s new constitution. Photo: Getty Images
Thailand’s junta is trying to sell ‘dictatorship as democracy’
Source: Southeast Asia GLOBE
May 5, 2017
Rejecting the lessons of history, Thailand’s rulers are doing everything in their power to stop the people from choosing who controls their country, writes exiled journalist Andrew MacGregor Marshall
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(Excerpt)
The new charter is a blueprint for dictatorship dressed up as democracy. The junta is trying to achieve an outcome similar to Singapore, where regular elections are held but the ruling oligarchy remains in control regardless. Infuriated by the tendency of voters to support the political proxies of exiled tycoon Thaksin Shinawatra whenever they get a chance, the junta and its royalist elite backers have emasculated parliament and ensured it will be dominated by an unelected senate packed with generals and royalists.
One of the most respected Thai political analysts, Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a professor at Chulalongkorn University, is a member of the Thai elite, and tends to adopt conservative – and careful – positions. But he is scathing about the new constitution, calling it “a throwback to Thailand’s undemocratic past based on an engineered legislature that gives the 250-member military-appointed Senate latitude to hold the elected Lower House in check”.
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