jesse89

Shows how out of touch the Thai Visa news section regulars are with the opinions of the majority of Thai people IMO.

Great day for Thailand - putting the military and elite firmly in their places once and for all.

Agreed!

Military pressure leading to the Democrat led coalition gaining power, over 500 Burmese refugees dead in the Rohingya boat incident, increasing abuse of lese majeste laws to prosecute political enemies, abuse of the computer crimes act to restrict freedom of speech, the killing of many unarmed protesters last April and May... I cannot understand the unquestioning support of the Democrats by some of the regulars on this forum.

Good riddance.

The Thai people have voiced their will. As long as the election result is not yet again overturned by the powers that be democracy has been returned to Thailand.

By all appearances he was told he was not being re-instated and to submit his resignation for botching the election and dividing the nation gravely. And he than made the best of it by appearing to step down himself.

Just to clarify,

The Thai general elections of 2006 were "botched", due to the choice of the opposition parties to refrain from running in the election not through any direct action by Thaksin. Thailand was certainly divided over Thaksin's rule, however, it was the strategic choice of the Democrats, the Mahachon Party and Chat Thai to boycott the election that led to the political uncertainty in the election's aftermath.

theres no mention of how these mega projects might be paid for though?

after they have given a 10,000 baht computer to 12 million students in their election promises, will there be any money left in the kitty?

Correct.....obviously Thais do not read foreign news - the 3 gorges dam project is a massive financial and ecological disaster.

Any more river dams anywhere on the planet are just going to wreck the place......more than it already is....

That's just Yingluck strongest point,most of her supporters wouldn't be able to read the news if it was written in Thai.

I don't think that will be a problem given that Thailand's literacy rate is at 95%, but do keep spouting unsubstantiated nonsense

:jap:

Somsak has now written a second open letter to the princess. I don't think a direct link to the letter would be allowed on here due to the sensitive subject matter, but an English translation of the letter is available somewhere on New Mandala. It proves to be quite a compelling read.

She has been accused of LM for not quickly enough removing LM posts on her web site put there by others.

I have had the feeling for sometime there was an organized effort to shut her openminded forum down, because it was open minded, and was a detriment to a certain persons return. So a boiler room operation was directed to overwhelm her site with LM content while pointing sympathetic police at the site at perfectly timed moments of overload. This appeared to happen twice.

It also had the desired affect of allowing spin to make the government LOOK oppressive for shutting it down. And has anyone who was posting this 'SOURCE LM content' been hung out to dry, or only some little people who comment around it?

But there is a difference between watermelon police working to silence dissenting opinions, and 'the government' directing the same for completely opposite reasons.

Glad she got the award. Embattled is the perfect phrase for this.

I believe that you are correct in saying that there was an organized effort to shut the observant Prachatai Forum down, however, Chiranuch Premchaiporn herself has stated that the threats that she received were from the military and from the state post the 2006 coup.

http://asiapacific.a...-prachatai-com/

Perhaps there is another agenda behind attempting to silence Prachatai, a news forum that has been rather critical of the 2006 coup and the questionable establishment of the Democrat led government?

Needless to say the points made in the post under reference by Andrew Marshall (Reuters) are simply ignored.

Andrew Marshall's overview of the events that occurred in April and May is one of the most concise that I have read. I agree with the sentiment that a greater effort to determine what happened on the Bangkok streets at that time needs to occur. The Thai Government not allowing the families of those who died during the protest to have closure by not properly investigating the incidents that caused the deaths of numerous civilians is deplorable. Particularly the case where the Thai Army and Government are still not accepting any accountability for the actions that led to the deaths of six unarmed sanctuary seekers at Wat Pathum Wanaram, despite mounting evidence against them.

You can say what you want about the bias of Robert Amsterdam (Given who he is paid by clearly he will promote a particular side of the argument), but at least he has tried to investigate and analyze the incidents during the protests in his report he is submitting to the ICC. This is unlike the current Thai Government, whose response to calls for comprehensive inquiries seems to have been limited to "We did nothing wrong and the army killed no civilians".

There is no difference with how the PPP came to power and how the Democrats came to power. The only difference was the timing.

The PPP didn't win enough seats to form government. They came to power after a parliamentary vote (the only way a government can be formed). They were able to "persuade" smaller parties to support them in the parliamentary vote in electing Samak as PM (the only way someone can become a PM).

Please provide a link for the Democrats "being found guilty of vote buying".

Please explain the difference between the Democrats "buying smaller parties" and the PPP "persuading smaller parties", and actually, of the Australian and British governments of forming minority governments.

But lets not let facts get in the way of your lies.

There is a difference. The PPP formed a minority government after the 2007 General Election, in which they won 233 seats in comparison to the Dems 165 seats. The Democratic Party came to power on the back of the 2008 - 2009 political crisis, in which the PAD forced Thailand to a standstill in part leading to the Thai Constitutional Court taking the decision to dissolve the PPP to end the crisis. On the back of these events ex PPP coalition party MP's were coerced to cross the floor and endorse a Democrat led coalition government.

Thanks a lot for this info!

Given that the discontent of a large portion of Thai society seems to be expanding after the recent events it would not surprise me if some of the more extreme supporters do become increasingly militant. I doubt that they would turn to suicide bombings though. What is the point when the inept Thai Police Force seems incapable of finding the majority of the perpetrators of bomb plantings allowing them to get off scot free?

I was on holiday in Koh Chang a day before this happened, It was lovely weather all week while I was there. I did get the feeling that it was too good to be true that the rain storms hitting the mainland kept missing us. Sympathies for all of those affected.

Does anyone have any experience of fishing on Koh Chang? If so any tips on locations to fish, techniques and what species to target would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

Australia

Our Prime Minister was kicked out of power should we now get all the poor people together and form a revolt if the Liberal party win

Can Mr R Amsterdam tell me when he will come to Australia to help

The situations that led to the Kevin Rudd's resignation and those that led to the Thai political crisis are polar opposites, so I do not think that a revolt will be necessary. Though the way that the election campaign is going I wish there was a group throwing a few bricks just so that Australian media had something to talk about other than Gillard's latest hair style and Abbott's budgie smugglers.

Maybe you should move to Burma.

Maybe Burma lifestyle is moving to Thailand.

I agree, this case and the Sombat Boon-ngarmanong case show how low this current government and its institutions are willing to stoop to silence critics. It is a dangerous road.

I hope that the high profile that that this is getting the media will deter others

From the right to protest, and from speaking their minds? Maybe you should move to Burma.

1) How often do you see of listen to your candidate when voting in a local election? They guy got more publicity by being IN prison than he would have if he was out campaigning. Red shirts supporters voted for him BECAUSE he was jail. The PTP probably only put him up as a candidate BECAUSE he was in jail.

2) Red shirt supporters are going to vote FOR him because he is charged with terrorism. They don't think he should be charged so that's a plus for him and why he was put up as a candidate.

3) With only a 50% voter turnout, it's pretty much unknown (probably except by statisticians) what the result would have been if all eligible voters had voted. IMO, the reds would have done everything that they could to get their voters out there - and they still lost by a clear margin.

I am not sure that being publicly slandered as a terrorist is good publicity at all. I was more surprised that the number of Red Shirt supporters, who I am sure would vote for him if he was in or out of jail, were so high. The Red Shirts protests having being broken and the movement slandered by the current government and the Thai media. There seems to be very little drop in PTP popularity, after the recent events in Bangkok.

As to 50% turn out I believe that the poll being held on a holiday would be the cause. What proportion of voters who did not turn out due to celebrating the holiday would vote for either party, or turn up to an election vote at all is hard to say in my opinion. I am pretty sure the Democrats would have tried all they could to get voters out there also, after all it is their job, so I fail to see your point. Also, the point of the above article and others like it that we are discussing was that the results were hardly a clear margin in favor of the Democrats.

I find it interesting that the PPP candidate received such a high percentage of votes, despite being incarcerated and banned from participating in any campaigning. Mr Korkaew has been in prison and has not been able to communicate with his electorate in any fashion for weeks. The Democratic Party would have expected to do better than this in the polls after all of the Anti-Red-Shirt campaigning that has been in the media, and I would imagine would be worried after these results.

The results show that the Thai public are as divided as ever when it comes to politics. The fact that such a high percentage voted for a man under terrorism charges shows that many feel that the Red Shirt Movement's actions were just. Mr Korkaew is an awfully popular accused and imprisoned terrorist. While the high percentage of voters who voted for the Democrats candidate shows that another large portion feel that the Abhisit's heavy handed treatment of the Red Shirt's was warranted. There seems to be very little middle ground. Hopefully the peoples differences can be sorted out democratically this time, rather than by another coup d'etat or further violence.

There is clearly enough evidence to disregard at least part of this statement, for instance.

"• the army hasn't been shooting women and children ... or indeed anyone at all, except in self-defence. Otherwise this would all be over, wouldn't it? It's simple for a big army to mow down 5,000 defenceless people."

Some valid points, some questionable ones.

Presenter: Linda Mottram

Speakers: Stephen Smith, Australia's Foreign Minister; Alexander Downer, former Australian Foreign Minister

LOPRESTI: Australia has a close relationship with Thailand, how has it reacted to this political crisis?

MOTTRAM: Well it has repeatedly said that the Thai democratic process is going through a difficult time, that the situation is indeed grave and it continues to urge both publicly and privately that all sides show restraint. There's also been expressions of regret from the Foreign Minister and the Prime Minister over violence and the loss of life. The last thing that Australia wants to see according to the Foreign Minister is a reversion to military rule in Thailand. The Foreign Minister Stephen Smith is traveling in Japan at present, on morning radio this morning here in Australia he was also asked about speculation that Thailand could be headed for civil war:

SMITH: Well I don't want to use a phrase like that which of course would be pejorative but I do want to underline the very grave difficult circumstances that Thailand is confronted with. It has deteriorated significantly in the course of the last week and that is why we have changed our travel advice and why we are constantly monitoring the position. But we do urge the Thai political process to restore order and to resolve these matters in a peaceful way.

MOTTRAM: Australia's Foreign Minister Stephen Smith.

LOPRESTI: Well given the extent of the threat to Thai democracy and the inability to resolve it over these many, many months now. Are Australia's calls for restraint enough?

MOTTRAM: Well certainly some believe Australia could be doing more, some academics are saying that Australia could play a broker role given its economic influence in the region and its status as a principle democracy. The former Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer also believes that there are more practical efforts Australia could be undertaking. Of course the parenthesis there is that we're not sure what's going on behind the scenes. But Mr Downer really echoes what Robert Amsterdam was saying there about the need for a third party role, and the really grave sort of situation with many Thais feeling alienated from the political process. I spoke to Mr Downer a short time ago about what he thinks is needed in Thailand now.

DOWNER: What they actually should do is call a fresh election to lance the boil in Thailand. And of course the government there have been very reluctant to call a fresh election and we all know why they've been reluctant to call a fresh election because they think they'll lose it. They think that again what you might call ordinary working people and small holding farmers in Thailand want to vote for the sort of Thaksin movement, which is extremely popular there. And for as long as they're effectively in practice they're disenfranchised the tension is simply just going to remain I'm afraid.

MOTTRAM: Is there a role then for Australia in trying to encourage a new election more overtly and perhaps even trying to be a broker, a much more public broker in this situation?

DOWNER: Well I wouldn't have thought in the first place it would be wise for Stephen Smith or Kevin Rudd to come out and say that publicly. I think what they do they should do privately. But I think privately what they should do is work with other key democracies in encouraging the Thais to do that. I think they could work with some of the ASEAN countries, they probably these days could work with the Indonesians, with the Indonesian Foreign Minister, with even possibly the President. They could certainly work with the Americans as well, because the Americans will listen to Australia on an issue like Thailand, they'll if you like in terms of the bilateral relationship they'll see Australia as the lead country on Thailand. I don't know of course what privately Stephen Smith and Kevin Rudd have been doing on Thailand but I certainly think that that's the sort of thing that they could do, corralling democracies with an interest in Thailand together to go to the Thais and say you've got to lance the boil, you need to have a general election which is free and fair and open and transparent, political parties should be allowed to run in the election, the military or the constitutional court shouldn't decide to ban political parties. And I think if that happens then the problem will be pretty much solved. But it probably would mean by the way that the present Prime Minister of Thailand wouldn't get re-elected.

MOTTRAM: So that's the former Australian foreign minister, Alexander Downer.

I think comparing Abhisit to Lincoln is a bit of a stretch.

Took the words right out of my mouth.

The TPI scandal, the Rohingya Myanmar refugee boat people deaths, and the Thai Khem Khaeng corruption scandal all occurred under Abhisit's Government. Comparing Abhisit to Lincoln? I guess this is the 40% increase in government advertising spending implemented by the Abhisit Government in action.

Not to mention the allegations of unusual wealth accumulation against him, which still have not been resolved.

"Please heed my call for an end to the rally so that we can continue fighting to advance democracy for the future," he said.

PRICELESS quote......continue fighting to advance democracy, yeah right. PATHETIC attempt. next?

Funnier still, this government boycotted an election, most probably will get caught out for electoral fraud shortly, are responsible for killing dozens of unarmed protesters and unarmed foriegn reporters, muzzle the media, got into power via a parlimentary deal rather then through elections , and only because the opposition was disqualified for a cooking show. And the most ironic thing of all, is that these people call themselves the DEMOCRATS !

At least the foriegn media for the most part knows that this goverment is full of sh## , pity some of the expats are still clueless though.

Mate,go back to sleep and try again when you wake up

If you really think that was all that happened here in this country then you are wasting peoples time making comments

Have some respect ,and do some research first on a subject,so we dont have to all suffer your infantile remarks

Just to cover your remarks

If an opposition party boycotts an election (the democrats),and the only party in the election (Thaksins proxy) still cant win enough votes which is what happened

They dont really have a valid mandate ,do they

You say they have killed dozen of innocent unarmed protesters,thats a non starter really isnt it as i could mention all the attatcks previously on innocent bangkok civilians who is resposible for their deaths then ?

No one there after the continuing statements by the goverment to clear the area are innocent,incredibly stupid but not innocent.

As for the last statement on parlimentary deals etc etc,welcome to the real world and guess what that how it all works

It is generally believed, and was reported by intellectuals in Thailand and overseas at the time, that the Democrats boycotted the 2006 elections because they knew that they would lose that election. Do some some research yourself.

Watch at 32 seconds (look at man on right) and you will see why Reds are using fireworks and why fireworks & bottle rockets always precede attacks such as the grenade attacks on the SkyTrain.

This is the most amazing video I have seen.

Did you also see the red who empties a machine gun clip while the string of firecrackers is set off???

Who would be filming these? Maybe the video comes from a confiscated camera.

It is clearly not a real machine gun. They are just pretending to shoot with a piece of wood or something while the firecrackers are going off. Still an amazing scene though. You would think that they would have a bit more of a sense of self preservation.

RIP

Nice pics.

It's such a shame that so many posters on Thai Visa call for bloodshed.

It's very strange that these people calling for bloodshed are not banned.

I wonder why ?

The perfect thing to do is to draw a borderline around Issan and make it a separate country. Then all the Issaners can live and breath amidst their tire fires. This would be a perfect solution. I know that the vast majority of Bangkonians and Southern Thais would support this

What a joke of a comment. I bet you believe all of the "Bangkonian" discrimination against Thais from the Northern Provinces, stating that they all are uneducated and worthless. By posting such a moronic comment you have just proven that the vast majority of the Issaan Thais are much more intelligent than you, though that seems like it would not be a difficult thing to achieve.

Here are some photos of today's Red Shirt rally on the main street of Ubon Ratchathani, near the Ubon Royal Thai Air Force Base.

Ubon Ratchathani Rally

Thanks for the photos - a worrying situation

Good picture, but are we talking Ubon Ratchathani or Udon Thani? Yet again TV members seem to be confused between the two.

Have to drive to Ubon airport at 7am tomorrow which shares with the Thia Air Force - hope all is clear!

The rally took place in Ubon Ratchathani. There have been no reports of any trouble at the entrance of the Airport, but you may want to give yourself a bit of extra time before your flight leaves just in case.