Don Muang's a tough lesson for Pheu Thai

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BURNING ISSUE
Don Muang's a tough lesson for Pheu Thai
Attayuth Bootsripoom



BANGKOK: -- Democrat Party candidate Tankhun Jitt-itsara surprisingly won the Don Muang by-election, beating the candidate of the Pheu Thai Party, which was seen as the all-time champ of the constituency. The outcome has taught a new political lesson for both Pheu Thai and the Democrats.

The Don Muang by-election became a clear model for study because Pheu Thai has dominated the constituency for years. With deeper consideration, it could be seen that Pheu Thai's political support was based on supporters of former MP Karun Hosakul. Karun, a native Don Muang politician, became the all-time hero of the constituency for years before he was disqualified by the Supreme Court, leading to the by-election. His strong base helped the Chart Thai Party win its first Bangkok House seat when Karun supported Janista Liewchalermwong in the election. Karun later joined Thai Rak Thai, forerunner to Pheu Thai.

Although Don Muang is part of Bangkok, it is still like a provincial constituency because it has many communities with grassroots people living there. For these grassroots people, the party does not matter as much as the individual politician they support.

It was a blunder for Pheu Thai when the party thought its logo was more important than an individual candidate. So Pheu Thai treated the by-election with the same old attitude that "it could win even by fielding an electricity pole in the election".

Actually, this was not the first time Pheu Thai has been taught this lesson. It had already suffered from this attitude when contesting the Bangkok governor's election.

Tankhun became popular among Don Muang people because he continued to work for them even after he was beaten in the 2011 general election.

In addition, he proved it again with his efforts during the great Bangkok flooding late in 2011. He helped Don Muang people regardless of whether they were red-shirts or not.

But Karun was rarely seen helping Don Muang people during the flood crisis because he was busy at the government's flood relief centre - trying to please the red shirts, rather than helping Don Muang people.

Worse still, Karun was seen as a hooligan and was engaged in a series of scandals. In the latest, a canvasser for Tankhun was shot dead and police could not trace the mastermind. This apparently prompted Don Muang people to have sympathy for Tankhun.

In the meantime, leading Pheu Thai members did not bother to find out whom Don Muang people preferred to represent them as an MP. So, the party made its own decision to choose Yuranant Phamornmontree as its candidate, thus tacitly telling its own members in Don Muang that none of them was qualified to contest the poll.

It was a top-down order that Yuranant, who is backed by Khunying Sudarat Keyuraphan, had to contest against Tankhun. Yuranant was ordered to resign as a party-list MP to contest the by-election, causing public confusion as to why an MP had to resign to contest to be an MP again.

Yuranant himself admitted he had only 18 days to campaign. It was as if he had entered the race out of the blue, hoping to ride along with Karun and the Pheu Thai's popularity. The reason for choosing him as the candidate was purely political and had nothing to do with local people.

Eventually, these same local people taught a lesson to Pheu Thai: that politics was not a simple issue that could depend on the decisions of a few. They could not simply throw anything to the people for their support.

So, it is now about time for Pheu Thai and even the Democrats to seriously think about a primary voting system, which would allow voters to propose their choice of candidates for the party to endorse. This system would prove that the parties care about local people and would lay a strong base for democracy, allowing local people to vote for candidates really suitable for them.

Had the leaders of the party always been right, the outcome of the by-election would have been different. The Democrats should use this chance to implement the primary voting system more, and Pheu Thai should start implementing it now.


-- The Nation 2013-06-20

[bigbamboo]

Maybe Pheu Thai should actually go for that pole as their candidate at the next election.

Can't do any worse.

[jambodave]

Maybe Pheu Thai should actually go for that pole as their candidate at the next election.

Can't do any worse.

Why choose someone from POLAND as their candidate,weird.

[moe666]

When you have a top down party like the PTP these things will continue to happen, as the PM said the loss was no big deal tells you how much they really care about people.

[Wavefloater]

"Actually, this was not the first time Pheu Thai has been taught this lesson. It had already suffered from this attitude when contesting the Bangkok governor's election."

I sort of laughed when I read the headline and it referred to a "Tough Lesson". I guess this is just more evidence of how ineffective the Thai education system really is. They don't really learn anything worthwhile in school, so it stands to reason that they can't learn from any lessons when they leave school and face the real world.

[chainarong]

Maybe Pheu Thai should actually go for that pole as their candidate at the next election.

Can't do any worse.

Why choose someone from POLAND as their candidate,weird.

Why not , PTP have got a few ministers that are from another planet.

[chainarong]

One shouldn't get to carried away , the democrats have a lot of sole searching to do and to aim their policies towards the working man , drop the we were born to rule attitude and get on with it, the PTP supporters have to get burned big time before reality kicks in, to rid the country of the PTP , may take some time , but burned they will get , unfortunately so will the rest of Thailand.

[Wavefloater]

One shouldn't get to carried away , the democrats have a lot of sole searching to do and to aim their policies towards the working man , drop the we were born to rule attitude and get on with it, the PTP supporters have to get burned big time before reality kicks in, to rid the country of the PTP , may take some time , but burned they will get , unfortunately so will the rest of Thailand.

Now, what the heck are they going to find looking at the underside of their feet ? Or how can finding some flat fish be helpful?

They would be better served doing some SOUL searching. (Sorry - not trying to be the the vocabulary police -- just thought it was kind of funny. I hope you do too.)

[rubl]

Maybe Pheu Thai should actually go for that pole as their candidate at the next election.

Can't do any worse.

Why choose someone from POLAND as their candidate,weird.

Actually I think our bamboo chap was referring to this likeble fellow

[rubl]

A top-down order with the candidate for constituency MP having to resign as party list MP first.

Did PM Yingluck really say "after nearly a decade Thai regained democracy" ?