The Argument For Who Deserves To Govern Thailand

[virtualtraveller]

(writers note! Sorry it's a bit long, but I spent hours researching bits of this, and some sensible evaluation of recent election outcomes is called for).

At the heart of Thailand’s politic crisis is the question: who should be the rightful government of the country? If you remove the various side issues (not withstanding their relevance), it boils down to a vicious power play between the neo-Thaksin party (TRT/PPP/PT) and the Democrats. Across the heartland of Thailand it’s a battle of numbers and 500 baht + 500 baht doesn’t always add up to 480.

Since the Thaksin-clique enjoyed such a dominant grip on power, unprecedented in Thai democracy, his supporters understandably believe that they have a virtual monopoly on election victory. They believe in an unchallenged right to govern and feel confident that come election time they will almost certainly triumph. This then is the basis of their ire and demand for the present Democrat government to dissolve the house and call a fresh election. If Thailand was a ‘true’ democracy, they argue, they would be the rightful choice of the people and ought to run the country, and push for a pardon of their leader. However, when you crunch the numbers, they are quite mistaken about their democratic dominance, here’s why.

1. On the strength of constituency victories (MPs) in the 2007 election the PPP overwhelmingly won;

PPP 199 49%

Democrat 132 33%

Chart Thai 33 8%

Peua Pandin 17 4%

Others 19 4%

2. Now lets look at it according to votes (noting that every voter effectively had two votes since they chose two MPs per constituency)

PPP 26,293,456 36%

Democrat 21,745,696 30%

Chart Thai 6,363,475 9%

Peua Pandin 3,395,197 4%

Others c10,500,000 15%

We see the real picture of percentage voting which shows the PPP captured just over a third of the votes, hardly an overwhelming people’s choice.

3. Now, let’s look at the proportional vote, ie a count of the voting intentions per person nation-wide regardless of constituencies.

PPP 14,071,799 39.60%

Democrat 14,084,265 39.63%

Chart Thai 1,545,282 4.35%

Peua Pandin 1,981,021 5.57%

Others 3,852,000 c11 %

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Representatives_of_Thailand

So, by a hairs’ breath the Democrats really are the party that comes out tops as the ultimate choice of the electorate. This is when you count the secondary ballot for preferred party.

In other words, if Thailand followed a federal democracy similar to the US, Abhisit might have been elected as head of the government but would face an unco-operative house of representatives dominated by the opposition (much like President Clinton faced).

Huh? How’s that? The poor masses all love Thaksin but somehow the numbers have been cooked here to show the Dems come out tops? Numerical coup perhaps? No, it’s because in the areas that were won by the Democrats, specifically the South and certain areas of Bangkok, very few people voted for the PPP, while the Democrats and others enjoyed support in many PPP areas but simply not enough to win any of the seats in their North and Northeastern stronghold. For example, in Chiang Mai lots of people support the Democrat party, but they are outnumbered by Thakin loyalists.

When you look at the proportionate representation, it’s really skewed in the PPP’s favour since the North and Northest (where they enjoy their strongest support) have an advantage in constituency mapping. This is most obviously a geographical intention, since MPs need to get to their constituents who are spread out in remoter Isarn, so they have fewer people selecting a single MP.

In fact there are 8 electoral regions, each with about 7.8 million people (and presumably equal proportions of eligible voters), but now let’s look at the MP allocation for each

Bangkok 35 9%

North 77 20%

Northeast 135 (67 upper + 68 lower) 33%

Central & West 70 18%

East 26 6%

South 56 14%

Source: http://mp.parliament.go.th/map2550/

Now we start to see how the electoral map changes, each of the eight regions equally have roughly 12% of the population, but Bangkok gets only 9% of the house seats, Isarn gets nearly a third more than it should, probably absorbing some from the East. Combined, the Central and West region are also under represented.

No matter, Thailand’s quirky electoral system also comprises a Party list, where 10 seats are allocated to each of the 8 regions and people get to vote not only for their local MP but also the party they favour, and this is quite telling. It means you could possibly vote for the local candidate who ‘promises’ the most (whatever that may mean) while still giving a nod to the party you have more confidence in.

Let’s look again at the party list results from 2007:

PPP 34 39.6%

Democrats 33 39.63%

Chat Thai 4 4%

Peau Pandin 7 6%

Others 2 2%

Note! You have to get at least 2% of the vote to secure a party list seat, therefore 10% of the voters are ‘not represented’ here.

I’m not sure why the PPP got one more seat than the Dems, but if the MPs were chosen this way alone it would have been a dead heat, and down to coalition swings.

All the same, rules are rules, and Democrat party know that because they’ve been contesting elections longer than all the other present parties put together, despite the glaringly unfair electoral map that sees them lose 16 percentage points to their rivals, resulting in the PPP gaining 55 more MPs than they really deserve. But that’s democracy for you!

Luckily the PAD and hardcore Democrat supporters didn’t take to the streets of Bangkok demanding that correct democracy be restored to Thailand and that the system or outcome were illegitimate.

To continue the argument in light of more recent developments, let’s lay down some truisms of democracy. Each truly democratic country functions according to their own constitution which results in variations on the procedure to select a government. Different countries have different quirks, resulting in minority governments and even US Presidents who came ‘second’ in the popular vote.

Thailand is regarded by the international community to be acceptably democratic in its method, and its elections free and fair. Quibbles of the 2007 charter aside, this lays down the laws of the election, and all participating parties agree to abide by the rules and accept the results, even if they might favour one particular group at the time. There are courts in which to challenge biased election laws, or results.

Regarding the present parliamentary make up, let’s recap how we got here: much of the present disagreement, though not all of it, stems from the 2006 coup which prematurely ended the tenure of Thaksin Shinawatra. Be that as it may, a new constitution was written and put to the public for approval, gaining a comfortable 60% acceptance, after which an election was held, judged free and fair by the international community. One problem with this election was that the ruling party prior to the coup did not contest since they were banned (somewhat unfairly using a new law retroactively), however this is academic since its leadership regrouped and won convincingly as the newly formed PPP. They accepted the reigns of government and this sealed the validity of the new constitution and endorsed democracy as being properly re-installed in Thailand. From a legal perspective the coup was now history. With a strong coalition they had a chance to amend some of the grey areas of the constitution but this stalled due to what I shall call ‘complications of agendas’. This is democracy for you, even when you enjoy a majority in the house you need to be accountable in your motives.

Now, the present dissatisfaction with Thailand’s democracy, is that this party that ‘won’ are no longer in power. Has democracy been cheated? Is Thailand suddenly no longer a democracy? The answer is yes and no. Yes, the spirit of the ‘people’s choice’ was cheated, and no Thailand’s democracy has not changed. The funny numbers, demonstrated earlier, have simply been moved around. What worked in favour of the Thaksin-clique has also worked against them. It’s still the same rules that brought the PPP and Samak and Somchai to power. And the process by which a government is elected, through parliamentary vote, hasn’t changed one bit since the times of Thaksin and beyond. It’s really got nothing to do with the constitution. Politics works like this, including all the skulduggery and behind the scenes wheeling and dealing that takes place about a dozen times a year across the planet in various inconclusive elections, including Whitehall this year involving one of the world’s oldest democracies.

Apparently the Thai army forced this present coalition upon the nation, but this is speculation. I don’t recall seeing anyone in the chamber voting at gunpoint. In fact there were many factors, many players, and all sorts of wealthy powerful lobbyists on both sides tugging at the coalition fence-sitters right up until the morning of the house session. As we know, Thai politicians are a mercurial bunch and Newin saw a chance to advance his career at the expense of Thaksin’s misfortune and he will be judged for it at the next election. I’m quite sure the army was indeed involved for Thailand has a disproportionate number of military or police personnel involved in politics and the largest number of them, funny enough, belong to the Peua Thai and its allies*. At the end of the day, those who are against Thaksin and his clique won this particular round no doubt with plenty of persuasion and incentives, and this isn’t unlike the manner in which Thaksin cobbled together his first coalition in 1999. That’s politics for you, the next round might go to Thaksin. It’s worth noting that one of the key ‘accidents’ occurred when Democrat deputy leader Suthep and PPP faction leader Newin flew back from London on the same plane at the time and had 12 hours to wheel and deal.

* Presently there are 19 MPs with rank (12 PT, 4 Dem, 2 BJT, 1 PP, 1 CTP),

So, how did the party with almost half of the seats in parliament become the opposition? Was it a judicial coup as the Thaksin supporters claim? A common misconception among many Red Shirts unfortunately, is that the PAD forced this govt out by holding the airport ransom. This is regrettable since it no doubt had a strong bearing on the belief among Red shirts at Rachaprasong that they “too” should triumph in forcing out the present govt. The only influence the PAD had on the verdict was to force the panel to expedite the ruling date by a week. By then the Supreme Court had concluded a year-long investigation into the vote fraud, applying the letter of the law (the correct thing to do given the fractious sentiments in the country presently). It was a keenly watched verdict internationally which was presented thoroughly and transparently and so far has not been criticised by independent observers. Regardless of who appointed these judges, they were under enormous pressure to make a decision that was legally justified. Moreover the PPP government had spent a year in power acknowledging the authority of this judges.

In fact 5 of the 7 red cards dished out in the 2007 election and 10 of the 13 yellow cards were issued against PPP candidates. It’s not surprisingly the party was disqualified and disbanded. Herein lies another flaw in the PPP/PT claim that they overwhelmingly represent the people. If 75% of all proven vote fraud cases were against them, then how many of the 199 seats did they legitimately win? Was it, like so many apparent woes in our system, the result of a coup appointed EC. Or perhaps it was because they weren't the incumbent with the luxury of a compliant EC as was the case in the voided 2006 election.

Perhaps the correct thing to do would have been to call a fresh election. Having just come to power Abhisit should have done the right thing and called a ‘fresh mandate’ as Julia Gillard did in Australia. But that is his prerogative, all PMs call elections only when the timing is best for them (witness Gordon Brown’s sudden about face on this shortly after taking power). The person who really got it wrong was Somchai Wongsawat who had the chance to dissolve the house and force a new election that they would’ve won, but elections are expensive things to win in Thailand, besides they really didn’t believe that dissatisfied factions would have the gall to cross the floor.

But they did, and not for the first time in the history of democracy, but the manner in which they did it was legal, according to procedure and within their rights. Furthermore, it was not a mass defection, since the PPP party had been dissolved and was regrouping. The Newin faction decided that, quite realistically, Thaksin was becoming a liability and they would rather go on their own as the Bumjaithai Party. The same thing happened with the Peau Pandin forming upon the demise of TRT. Funnily the Red Shirts didn’t protest this at the time. In fact Thailand has a long history of parties suddenly forming, merging, and selling out.

Can democracy be manipulated from the streets then?

If the government of Thailand, or any country for that matter, were to accede to a mob on the streets demanding a new election (and immediately no less!) it would be counter to democracy. This group in Ratchaprasong were calling for ‘democracy’ without realising the complete irony of their action. Afterall, if this government had given in, it would have set an appalling precedent, particularly considering the Peau Thai probably would have won the ensuing election and then had to face down a similar demand from yellow shirts. It doesn’t matter what the excuse (illegitimacy, proxy, fraudulent, dictatorial), if you force a government out by holding it hostage, and then expect it to restore itself democratically, you face a future where mobs and coups have a role to play. That a government does not command the majority approval, or mandate, is irrelevant. You can protest all you want as a show of public sentiment (which ultimately did encourage Abhisit to offer an early election), but the moment you ‘demand’ then you have stepped outside the democratic process. If the present government has come to power through correct and conventional democratic procedure then your demand for a democratic reset becomes an oxymoron. By this method Republicans in the US would be calling for President Obama to step down since he has an approval rating below 50%, or the Government of Gordon Brown would be ignored since he wasn’t personally chosen as Prime Minister.

Prime Minister Abhisit offered an early election as an admission that gaining a mandate was the correct thing to do. The specific date was withdrawn as we all know. It’s very likely he will keep that promise way before his term is up, but what is important is that the democracy agenda was not dictated by a threatening and dangerous mob. Considering the numbers in Thailand's democracy favour the Thaksin clique in forming a government the UDD at Ratchaprasong should be very thankful that they didn't succeed. They should also hope that a large civic group doesn't snowball into demanding that the electoral map and representation be re-drawn, for it is clearly unfair in it's current set up.

Now, in conclusion, let’s look at the present MP numbers;

Peua Thai 187**

Democrats 160

Bumjai Thai 56* (counting Peau Pandin defectees)

Chart Thai (Pattana) 32

Puea Pandin 14 (faction which left the government)

Ruam Jai Pattana 8

Pacharaj 6

Others 14

** (estimated 25 from NE faction threatening to abandon PT party)

Note! Estimate figures – loyalties of some presently unknown

Looking at this makeup, it’s not inconceivable that Peua Thai (the former PPP/TRT juggernaught) could well shrink to less than 160 MPs, no longer the automatic largest party in the house.

Of course this could all change come election time. Newin might well experience a backlash in Isarn for his disloyalty to Thaksin, but other factions might take their chances and break ranks, it all depends on money for ‘campaigning’. Then there’s the possible outcome that the victor will have their term cut short by party dissolution following a year-long investigation into vote fraud (which may or may not be blamed on that coup we had five years earlier!)

Claims from both the Democrats and Peua Thai that they will get as many as 250 MPs in the election are ‘interesting’, we shall see. But the true reality is that either party can claim their legitimacy to govern by bending the figures as I have shown here. Perhaps, given the lopsided outcome, a government of national unity would be the fairer answer but I wonder how they would agree on what to do about the ‘guy in Dubai’ left out in the cold.

[way2muchcoffee]

Nice summary.

[Ulysses G.]

I agree that Thaksin would probably won a majority in the past, but that was before May 19. It is likely that he has lost a lot of support.

[Mario2008]

He who can form a majority in parlement governs.

[ballpoint]

He who can form a majority in parlement governs.

Precisely. The numbers have been raked over on numerous threads, but given the stance of many of the minor parties before the election, particularly the CTP, that they would not be joining the PPP in a coalition, it is obvious that more people voted not to have the PPP in government than those that voted for it. Never the less, the minor parties deceived their voters, went back on their word and did join the PPP in a coalition. Funny how we never see the supposed pro democracy red posters complaining that the poor were effectively cheated of their votes.

Edited August 21, 2010 by ballpoint

[Abrak]

Virtual,

Thank you for doing the analysis in a detailed manner but please accept that my view is that you have used the data to perhaps get across a bias view rather than an independent one.

I will not argue with any of your statistics - house seats in particular understated the Democrat vote. I really wish you to read them in a very different light.

The Democrats high vote reflects various different factors - including an anti-Thaksin and a very large bias towards regional vote. Ultimately Thaksin has played, in my view, a very important role politics in that people actually believed in him rather than their local politician. I do not wish to debate this point or go through the figures.

The really important point is how it has changed the very focus of the Democrat party in my view. Before they were elitist and based on a guaranteed home base of support. They learnt from Thaksin that they need to appeal to the whole populace rather than their constitution. You are wasting your time arguing that either Thaksin did not have popular support for a reason or that he was massively popular in his absence. Look at the results when he was here.

One day the Democrat party will realize that opposing a democratic election against Thaksin was really a reflection of massive underlying failure on their behalf. And I believe that they have learnt so much that their very focus on truly democratic government makes up for the fact they are not one.

[virtualtraveller]

Quick reply to Abrak: yes, I make no apologies for coming across as biased against the reds. The point of this lengthy post was to put across a reasonable, factually backed account of the unfolding events of the past three years in terms of electing (both MPs and a PM). You can spin the figures in any way you want to describe democracy in this country, I just wanted to show that much of the complaining made by the red shirts for 'democracy' and 'new elections' is unfounded, built on half truths and ultimately incorrect in their confident assertion that the majority of this country want a new election and don't want this govt.

If anything the poor should be protesting for a complete overhaul in the electoral college of this country because the present one is just causing endless conflict due to the way it can be manipulated.

The various merits and shames of Thaksin and Democracy is another argument entirely.

[whybother]

I think they need to bring in preferential voting as done in Australia.

Getting less than 50% of the vote (even as low as 20%) and still winning doesn't really sit right with me.