Old Identities Need Rethinking For A Fresh Start; Thai Opinion

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EDITORIAL

Old identities need rethinking for a fresh start

By The Nation

Divisive ghosts of the past have to be banished if Thai democracy is to flourish under Yingluck

Take Abhisit Vejjajiva's farewell speech any way you like. Supporters must have seen a nice touch, a non-provocative message to his successor and rival Yingluck Shinawatra. The other camp might have detected flavours of the very thing that the Democrats are infamous for and can never change - a holier-than-thou attitude. A gentlemanly farewell or the thinly veiled self-righteousness of a loser - people saw what they wanted to see.

What Abhisit did not quite emphasise - though it nevertheless stood out from the entire speech - was that the Yingluck government would live or die on its own. He did not give any guarantee that Yingluck would not face the political violence that plagued much of his tenure, but we sensed that if something was to happen to her - like angry mobs trying to crush her car or pouring blood in front of her house - he did not want to be a part of it.

We applaud Abhisit for keeping his promise to hold a clean and fair snap election, for taking a resounding defeat on the chin, and for displaying an attitude that is helping facilitate political transition from one extreme to the other. He presided over Thailand at a time when the country's "democracy" was much questioned and even ridiculed, and his controversial rise to power had a lot to do with that.

But for all the criticism of Abhisit, here we have his most bitter rivals returning to power having won an almost fairytale mandate from the Thai people.

That some of Abhisit's former allies turned against him because they thought he was too lenient or reconciliatory toward the red shirts may provide evidence that he was doomed from the start. Abhisit had to spend much of his stormy term defending charges that his rise to the top post was undemocratic, that he failed to get tough with enemies posing threats to key institutions and, lastly, that he was a dictator who massacred innocent protesters. He did not address these in his farewell speech, only asking the new government to maintain the "principles" he tried to keep in the aftermath of last year's infamy.

For Yingluck, the romantic tale has just ended and the real political life is about to begin. Thailand's first female prime minister faces an uphill road ahead. There will be conspiracies. There will be intense scrutiny. There will be political games initiated to attack her weakest points.

Much of what will happen may be beyond her control. We can only hope her rivals will be fair, democratic and respect the rules of the game. She is Thaksin Shinawatra's sister, but that must not be used against a woman who has led a political party to a major election victory.

Yet parts of the future will be within her control. If Yingluck wisely exercises the mandate that the Thai public have given her, we shall know whether Thai democracy is as bad as it has been portrayed by some internationally. Maybe "wisely" is not the correct word. Yingluck must exercise the mandate properly, even if that requires that she forget the "sister" hat as long as she's leader of Thailand.

This is a warning that she has received ever since she was placed at the top of the Pheu Thai party list. Even some supporters of her own party have agreed that it's time to begin a new chapter in which Thaksin is taken out of the equation. To keep him in it wouldn't be fair to Yingluck. It wouldn't be fair to Thai democracy.

So, the man who will determine the new prime minister's future is her brother. If he thinks too much of himself, of what has allegedly been taken away from him, of the "injustice", he will only risk giving his beloved sister the injustice she and our democracy don't deserve.

-- The Nation 2011-08-06