Pheu Thai PM Candidate Yingluck Takes Campaign Trail To South

[webfact]

Opposition PM candidate takes campaign trail to South

BANGKOK, June 14 - Yingluck Shinawatra, Pheu Thai No.1 party-list candidate, on Tuesday led her team to campaign for votes in the upcoming July 3 general election in the southern border region, the first campaign stop in the stronghold of her party’s main rival, the Democrats.

Other key Pheu Thai candidates including the red shirt core leader Nutthawut Saikua, and party spokesman Prompong Nopparit accompanied Ms Yingluck to the region.

Speaking to journalists before leaving Tuesday morning for Narathiwat, Ms Yingluck said since the southern region is not a political stronghold of her party, she could not estimate how many seats her party will win in the South.

But she travelled to the region to listen to the problems of local people and to give them moral support.

Taking her campaign to the insurgency-plagued far South, the opposition’s top candidate presented her party’s platforms to designate the three southern border provinces (Narathiwat, Yala and Pattani) a special local administrative zone modelled on Bangkok Metropolitan Administration and Pattaya City but said her party must first solicit local people’s opinions.

Thai and Saudi Arabian relations should be restored and Muslim pilgrimage quotas should be increased, Ms Yingluck said.

The southern border provinces will be supported as a hub of halal food production, she said, and the land bridge project linking the Andaman coast and the Gulf of Thailand will be developed to boost local economy, she added.

Meanwhile, Suthep Thepsuban, Deputy Prime Minister and secretary-general of the Democrat Party, commented that his party was unworried over the Pheu Thai’s top candidate’s campaign stop in the South, as he believed that the Pheu Thai party will not win votes among the southerners.

“People in the three southern border provinces will never forget what Mr Thaksin Shinawatra did when he was prime minister and how he had hurt them,” Mr Suthep said without elaborating. (MCOT online news)

-- TNA 2011-06-14

[webfact]

Muslim women in Yala welcome 'Yamila' Yingluck

Yala - Pheu Thai Party prime ministerial candidate Yingluck Shinawatra receive warm welcome from Muslim women when she campaigned in this southern border province Tuesday.

Yingluck wore a red hijab, prompting Muslim women to call her Yamila, meaning a beautiful woman.

Yingluck was accompanied by Pheu Thai leader Yongyuth Wichaidit and several candidates, including Natthawut Saikua, Nitibhum Naowarat and Pracha Promnok.

Yingluck campaigned at the house of former House speaker Wan Muhamad Noor Matha at 11:10 am.

About 3,000 people came to listen to her speak.

Yingluck spent about 15 minutes telling them how she would turn the southern provinces into a special administrative zone.

-- The Nation 2011-06-14

[dominique355]

Will she visit Tak Bai?

[samurai]

“People in the three southern border provinces will never forget what Mr Thaksin Shinawatra did when he was prime minister and how he had hurt them,” Mr Suthep said without elaborating.

Thai Nation = Chart Thai

For the Motherland = Puea Pandin

[samurai]

^

After the dissolution the PPP dude from Narathiwat constituency moved to the the new founded Matubhum Party.

PPP won also 1 of the 10 Zone 8 proportional/party list seats in the south. Areephen Uttrasin leader of the Wadah faction. After the Dissolution he joined Matubhum Party.

Matubhum Party leader is Sonthi Boonyaratglin.

[rubl]

The table on this wiki page is also interesting, although given the situation after the January 2009 by-election.

Pheu Thai Party (formerly PPP)			Yongyuth Wichaidit	189
Democrat Party‡					Abhisit Vejjajiva	172
Bhumjaithai Party‡ (formerly NDP)		Chaovarat Chanweerakul	32
For the Motherland‡				Chanchai Chairungrueng	32
Thai Nation Development Party‡ (formerly CTP)	Chumpol Silpa-archa	25
Thais United National Development Party‡	Dr. Varnarat Chanukul	9
Royalist People's Party				Sanoh Thienthong	8
Social Action Party				Thongphun Diphrai	5
Matubhum Party					Sonthi Boonyaratglin	3
						total		475

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Representatives_of_Thailand#Composition

Mind you with all changes in parties, increase of seats to 500 (including 125 party list) it's getting increasingly difficult to compare results or even polls. 19 days, then we'll know

[whybother]

^

After the dissolution the PPP dude from Narathiwat constituency moved to the the new founded Matubhum Party.

PPP won also 1 of the 10 Zone 8 proportional/party list seats in the south. Areephen Uttrasin leader of the Wadah faction. After the Dissolution he joined Matubhum Party.

Matubhum Party leader is Sonthi Boonyaratglin.

That's another of those ones where there might (or might not) be a back lash for him jumping ship.

[samurai]

^

After the dissolution the PPP dude from Narathiwat constituency moved to the the new founded Matubhum Party.

PPP won also 1 of the 10 Zone 8 proportional/party list seats in the south. Areephen Uttrasin leader of the Wadah faction. After the Dissolution he joined Matubhum Party.

Matubhum Party leader is Sonthi Boonyaratglin.

That's another of those ones where there might (or might not) be a back lash for him jumping ship.

I guess it will be not a back lash.

But looks like Matubhum has no issues with PT and remain friendly even if their party leader was the coup leader too.

2005 Wadah group members run under TRT and lost. In the very deep south everything went to the Democrats except one seat for Chart Thai. In 2007 was it different.

[webfact]

JULY GENERAL ELECTION

Yingluck promises peace in South

By The Nation

Pheu Thai candidate Yingluck Shinawatra yesterday put on hijab head covering to meet Muslim constituents in Narathiwat, Pattani and Yala.

"I want to highlight the Pheu Thai platform to transform the three southernmost provinces into a special administrative area similar to Bangkok Metropolitan Administration and Pattaya City Administration," she said on board a charter flight before arriving for the first leg of her campaign in Narathiwat.

Yingluck said she would seek to improve Thai-Saudi ties, paving the way for a larger number of Thai Muslims to make their religious pilgrimage to Mecca without having to make advance payments for the trip.

She said her party had sound policies to promote halal food and to introduce electric-train services in the South.

She conceded that her party had limited presence in the region, having won one of its 11 House of Representatives seats in the last general election, but she was hopeful that her campaigning could rectify the situation.

Veteran politician Wan Muhammad Noor Matha was on hand to greet her at the airport.

Flanked by Pheu Thai candidates for House seats from Narathiwat, she made a walking tour of various public places to meet supporters before making a stop to pay her respects to local religious leader Abdulrahman Abdul Samad.

She made a rest stop at the party branch office before the second leg of campaigning in Yala.

Around midday, she kicked off the Yala campaign rally. Several female supporters greeted her as yamilah, a popular name meaning "beautiful girl".

In her 15-minute speech, she outlined her party's platforms for the Muslim-dominated region. She pledged to tackle problems in the violence-plagued region via peaceful means.

She said she would try to overcome violence by promoting the economy, education and culture in the region.

She played down the allegation that certain Pheu Thai candidates were linked to the insurgency, saying she believed every candidate wanted to address the plight of their constituents and that they had no link to violence.

Reacting to Yingluck's campaigning in the South, Democrat secretary general Suthep Thaugsuban said he believed the local residents could still remember the outbreak of violence under the government of her brother Thaksin Shinawatra.

-- The Nation 2011-06-15

[whybother]

Yingluck promises peace in South

...

Yingluck said she would seek to improve Thai-Saudi ties, paving the way for a larger number of Thai Muslims to make their religious pilgrimage to Mecca without having to make advance payments for the trip.

...

Credit cards for muslims, and peace in the south in 6 months ................