Election talks under shadow of legal threat from Pheu Thai

[kikoman]

Bluenosed Codger (Quote)

On what grounds would you invalidate them? The CC already rejected the Dems attempt to invalidate the election.

GGold(Quote)

Because the voting was not held in a single day as per the constitution! I realise the dems failed in their attempt to invalidate the elections, But if the same thing happens again when they announce the other polling dates, and people can't vote, then what happens!

PTP may have to request the election be declared invalid, to hold new national elections. Truth is no one knows how it will end!

(kikoman's response)

Wrong again, the 2011 election was held on 3 different days, and met the constitutional requirement to be held on a single day. Again historically Thai elections are held on three different days as was the 2011 election, (1) day 1, advanced voting (2) Day 2, General election (3) day 3, By Election, re-vote as necessary!

The Democrats all ready petitioned the court to invalidate the election, and the court rejected that petition!

Then the Day (3) Third day election, by election and re-scheduled vote, that the EC new election date has already violated the constitutional requirements, PTP takes EC to court for failing to hold the election as dictated by the constitution!

Cheers

Edited February 17, 2014 by kikoman

[BlueNoseCodger]

There's more numbers in the details released from the EC that Matichon has.

The bottom 3 percentage votes are:

Thammarat 1,302 people, representing 8.78% of the vote were below the 20% level (Suthep stronghold in south).

Prachuap Khiri Khan 20.05 percent voted, that was a democrat stronghold, and now it has a new leader because the vote is above 20%.

Samut Songkhram 24.42 percent of voters went to the polls, was another Democrat seat, now its someone elses because the vote was above 20%.

Suthep's call to not vote at the polls, failed even in Prachuap Khiri Khan which was one of the Democrats strongholds. He got precisely one seat to reject elections. Because enough people voted in these Democrat strongholds, they've lost all those seats to one of the other parties.

Wow, no wonder the EC isn't keen to release the result.

Wow, the EC is not allowed to official announce a result untill all of the election has been done. If they announced an official result now, those results and the Feb 2nd election would be anulled!

So, pray tell again, who isn't keen on announcing the results?

That's not true, point me to the claim in the Constitution that would annull the result if they announced the results from elected seats just because some seats have'n't yet run the elections. Under what clause would you seek to cancel the election?! Look at 2011, the EC announced the result 27th July, Re-election of member of the House of Representatives in Sukhothai Province 3rd constituency was ordered. also the same day and happened later.

Did it matter that this and some other seats were done after the result was announced? No, of course not, why would it? The idea that people change their vote based on influence of previous voting, is not barred by the Constitution. After all the March Senate votes should be done with knowledge of the House vote, yet now won't be because EC won't finish the election and withholds the result.

The constitution actually forces EC to release the results!

Section 236. The Election Commission shall have the following powers and duties:

(7) to announce the result of an election and the voting in a referendum;

So you have to have a reason within the Constitution to withhold the result. Having a regulation in organic law or EC regulations isn't good enough to trump the Constitution.

Edited February 17, 2014 by BlueNoseCodger

[kikoman]

There's more numbers in the details released from the EC that Matichon has.

The bottom 3 percentage votes are:

Thammarat 1,302 people, representing 8.78% of the vote were below the 20% level (Suthep stronghold in south).

Prachuap Khiri Khan 20.05 percent voted, that was a democrat stronghold, and now it has a new leader because the vote is above 20%.

Samut Songkhram 24.42 percent of voters went to the polls, was another Democrat seat, now its someone elses because the vote was above 20%.

Suthep's call to not vote at the polls, failed even in Prachuap Khiri Khan which was one of the Democrats strongholds. He got precisely one seat to reject elections. Because enough people voted in these Democrat strongholds, they've lost all those seats to one of the other parties.

Wow, no wonder the EC isn't keen to release the result.

Wow, the EC is not allowed to official announce a result untill all of the election has been done. If they announced an official result now, those results and the Feb 2nd election would be anulled!

So, pray tell again, who isn't keen on announcing the results?

Wrong again!

[BlueNoseCodger]

The last time the Democrats did not run in elections was 2006, and the turnout was 65%. This time, with the polling station blocks and intimidation, and ballots hijacked and 'do not vote' campaign, it was 48%. So at best your Suthep blocked 17% of the voters, not 70%.

Constitutional Court already ruled the results workable on Feb 12th, they rejected Dems attempt to annul the election. (e.g. see yahoo news)

Bangkok, Feb 12 (IANS) Thailand's Constitution Court Wednesday rejected a petition filed by an opposition leader seeking the court's ruling on whether the Feb 2 general elections were constitutional. The petition, filed by Wirat Kanlayasiri, a former Democrat MP from Songkhla, appealed to the court to declare as void the elections citing Section 68 of the constitution... Section 68 of the Thai constitution penalises the exercise of rights and liberties to acquire ruling power through unconstitutional means....According to Wirat, the elections did not take place across the nation Feb 2 and hence should be declared unconstitutional.

He said the caretaker government's invocation of the emergency decree in Bangkok and nearby areas was an act that enabled Prime Minister Yinluck Shinawatra's Pheu Thai Party to use administrative power to take advantage over its political rivals in the election.

But the court said there was no evidence of the elections violating Section 68 and dismissed the petition.

So only 17% of people voted for dictatorship, or were scared or unable to vote.

My dear BNC, I only said that if Pheu Thai gets less than 30% of the electorate actively behind them through voting AND their attitude hasn't changed, 70% of the electorate will be disenfrancised.

As for the CC dismissing the Democrats petition, that no problem. That's according to Section 68. What I mentioned was a failed election.

My dear Rubl,

If 'actively behind them' is how you would like the election to be judged, please realize that 11 million people are actively behind them and at the peak of your protests your side had 300k at most.

Even that 300k number quickly fell away when people realized what Suthep was up to.

His protests get only hundreds of people these days actively behind him now.

As to how many voters were disenfranchised by Suthep? 100%, because he didn't want their votes and didn't want to permit them to vote.

Edited February 17, 2014 by BlueNoseCodger

[kikoman]

What seems clear is the constitution has not been so expertly drafted, leaving a lot of holes everywhere as to what to do when certain things happen - hence no one is really sure and all sides claim their own interpretation is the right one.

Bit of a problem that. Got to get to the spirit of it.

The military Junta passed a law that made illegal to publicly criticize the draft constitution, prior to the vote to accept or reject it.

The military threatened not to step down if the constitution is not accepted!

Source Wikipedia!

Yes, that was the source of the problems with the constitution!

Cheers.

[JAG]

It would seem that the Pheu Thai party is really anxious to declare 'winning the election', choosing their PM again and govern by a 'clear mandate'.

If Pheu Thai gets 12 or 13 million votes out of a 49++ million electorate with a total of 24m or so votes cast will we get a government which doesn't represent 75% of the population? Democracy Thaksin style?

Remind me again, who boycotted the election, who forced the polls to close and intimidated a large swathe of the electorate, significantly reducing the turnout?

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

[BlueNoseCodger]

Still don't have decent Bhumjaithai numbers, but estimating them by simple scaling up removing the Dems seats gives:

Pheu Thai would have 388 seats.

BJT would have 50 seats.

On the other hand if BJT got the Democrat defectors who aren't in that 'no vote',

Then BJT share would rise to 86 seats.

[Baerboxer]

It would seem that the Pheu Thai party is really anxious to declare 'winning the election', choosing their PM again and govern by a 'clear mandate'.

If Pheu Thai gets 12 or 13 million votes out of a 49++ million electorate with a total of 24m or so votes cast will we get a government which doesn't represent 75% of the population? Democracy Thaksin style?

A couple of days ago in a UK by-election for the constituency of Sale, the voter turnout was 28%. The winner achieved about 17% of the total electorate. Is this democracy, Thaksin style, too?

Ah! But Yingluck said that voters can make their decision at the polls.

They did.

She lost her mandate

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

47.72% of the voters voted, and Pheu Thai got 74.82% of the vote.....

I don't get your point?

http://asiancorrespondent.com/119339/ec-figures-show-turn-out-at-47-72/

Thank you for the link. You missed the word 'estimated' out. Not official just someones' estimate.

An honest mistake guv as they say

[timewilltell]

I don't get why people are so polarized about this even if accepted a passion for democracy, and ignoring the January joiners who are only here for propaganda purposes and blatantly so.

Isn't it pretty clear Pheu Thai are neither democratic nor transparent? Forcing through amnesty bills (been a common thread since Thaksin's criminal verdict through Samak and Yingluck for years), is not concomitant with democracy or parliamentary procedure?

Thaksin has clearly stated Yingluck is his proxy and Samak also said he was a proxy for Thaksin. Does anyone consider this democratic in any way?

Isn't it pretty clear Suthep is not behaving democratically either in preventing polling?

Isn't it pretty clear the constitution does not prescribe what to do in every situation and can be construed in more than one way (the job of the CC to construe)?

Isn't it pretty clear that PT have intentionally muddied the waters by refusing to listen to the EC about the date of the election in the first place and the fact that free and fair elections could not be held with so many people protesting and the emergency decree in place with threats of violence?

Isn't it pretty clear that with so many constituencies with no MP, announcing the election which is supposed to happen on one day, would be contrary to a fair vote in those constituencies, given knowing the results elsewhere would motivate people against the winner to turn out to vote?

Isn't it clear that the PT have tried to pass the buck onto the EC in order to sidestep any criticism of its own actions?

Where would the EC get its power to order the police and military to force elections to be able to be held? Isn't that the responsibility of the government, caretaker or otherwise? Consider the previous point as a possible reason the government did not do that.

How can a free and fair election be held when the people know, or at least are doubtful, that the election would be considered valid when it is common knowledge that a quorum could not be reached and the election would likely be considered void like last time?

It is pretty clear to me that neither side involved here are behaving in a democratic or responsible way or should I say none of the three sides are Suthep, Democrats or Pheu Thai. They all have their agendas but none are truly democratic, although it does rather depend on how you define the word. Personally democracy is an ideal far more than just allowing a person to vote. Many countries allow voting and intimidation of the voters is extreme. They have had a vote though - does that make the country democratic per Se?

Oh and by the way the CC has ruled on only one article of the constitution as to the validity of the poll - it does not mean that there are not other clauses that may come into play. A court considers only the matters put before it and that is all so beware assuming that the CC has ruled the poll constitutional rather than constitutional so far as section 68 is concerned - a wholly different thing.

What's clear is that nothing is clear. Each side are clouding each and every issue and failing to take responsibility for their actions. I do not see how irresponsible people can make a government for the people. Maybe it is just that responsibility is a scarce resource in this society?

Edited February 17, 2014 by timewilltell

[SICHONSTEVE]

There's more numbers in the details released from the EC that Matichon has.

The bottom 3 percentage votes are:

Thammarat 1,302 people, representing 8.78% of the vote were below the 20% level (Suthep stronghold in south).

Prachuap Khiri Khan 20.05 percent voted, that was a democrat stronghold, and now it has a new leader because the vote is above 20%.

Samut Songkhram 24.42 percent of voters went to the polls, was another Democrat seat, now its someone elses because the vote was above 20%.

Suthep's call to not vote at the polls, failed even in Prachuap Khiri Khan which was one of the Democrats strongholds. He got precisely one seat to reject elections. Because enough people voted in these Democrat strongholds, they've lost all those seats to one of the other parties.

Wow, no wonder the EC isn't keen to release the result.

Wow, the EC is not allowed to official announce a result untill all of the election has been done. If they announced an official result now, those results and the Feb 2nd election would be anulled!

So, pray tell again, who isn't keen on announcing the results?

That's not true, point me to the claim in the Constitution that would annull the result if they announced the results from elected seats just because some seats have'n't yet run the elections. Under what clause would you seek to cancel the election?! Look at 2011, the EC announced the result 27th July, Re-election of member of the House of Representatives in Sukhothai Province 3rd constituency was ordered. also the same day and happened later.

Did it matter that this and some other seats were done after the result was announced? No, of course not, why would it? The idea that people change their vote based on influence of previous voting, is not barred by the Constitution. After all the March Senate votes should be done with knowledge of the House vote, yet now won't be because EC won't finish the election and withholds the result.

The constitution actually forces EC to release the results!

Section 236. The Election Commission shall have the following powers and duties:

(7) to announce the result of an election and the voting in a referendum;

So you have to have a reason within the Constitution to withhold the result. Having a regulation in organic law or EC regulations isn't good enough to trump the Constitution.

Section 236. The Election Commission shall have the following powers and duties:

(7) to announce the result of an election and the voting in a referendum;

The EC will do this at the relevant time - doesn't state when it has to be done, simply that it is to be done!!!

[Gweiloman]

Can any anti-election / pro-election-to-be-annulled supporters give any clear and logical reason for rescheduling the elections in April? We are now only in the middle of Feb. Upon dissolution of the parliament, the constitution states clearly that elections must take place within 60 days. That's for the whole country!! Why is the EC trying to arrange for elections that is only 1/10th the scale of a national election in more time than it would take to run a national election?

With regards to the royal decree, PT has stated that they think this might be a trap. Has the EC come out to reassure PT that a second royal decree will not invalidate the 02 Feb election?

I think it is pretty obvious to everyone that the EC is stalling and that they have an ulterior motive that is not in line with their duties and responsibilities.

You ask some interesting points and let them all down with your last paragraph.

Imagine that this is a democracy and that regions A and B get between 45 and 60 days to register candidates but region B gets waylaid and needs to rerun. Should the parties get the same time to prepare as Region A?

Imagine that a royal decree allows for an election to be completed on one date and it isn't. And that a new bielection needs a new royal decree. And that the constitution doesn't really cater for such extraordinary circumstances and therefore a legal compromise must be agreed to either complete the mangled election or start a new one.

But you've already made your mind up

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Imagine that this is a democracy and that regions A and B get between 45 and 60 days to register candidates but region B gets waylaid and needs to rerun. Should the parties get the same time to prepare as Region A?

If anything, the parties in region B needs less time than in the original elections.

However, this has nothing to do with the parties needing time to prepare but the EC saying THEY need the time