Thai Prime Minister threatens snap election

By Nopporn Wong-Anan

BANGKOK (Reuters) – Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra
may dissolve parliament and call a snap election if his
opponents and critics increase pressure on him to resign, his
spokesman said on Monday.

Government spokesman Surapong Suebwonglee told Channel 3
television Thaksin would not yield to mounting calls to quit
and had told a Sunday cabinet meeting that dissolving
parliament could be the way out of the political crisis.

“The prime minister said he would certainly not resign. But
if he was put into a situation that he had to make any
decision, he would dissolve parliament,” Surapong said.

The baht slipped almost 0.25 percent and the stock market
fell 1.5 percent on his comments. But stocks recovered some
ground by mid-afternoon, and were down 0.79 percent, after
Surapong told reporters Thaksin had not yet reached the “dead
end” that would force him to the polls three years early.

“House dissolution only comes when the prime minister can
no longer run the country or there is a major conflict between
the government and parliament,” he said.

Thaksin won a second successive landslide election victory
last year, but has seen his popularity slide in the middle
class since his relatives sold off their $1.9 billion stake in
Shin Corp, the telecoms empire he founded, to Singapore.

Although he or his family do not appear to have broken any
laws in disposing of their Shin stake last month, Thaksin’s
critics have seized on the fact that they went to considerable
lengths to avoid paying tax.

Thaksin, who held an emergency cabinet meeting at his home
on Sunday night after a former political mentor joined the
chorus of critics calling on him to step down, criticized
several Thai media reports suggesting a snap election would
fall in May.

“It is all your thoughts and sayings. I haven’t said a
word,” he said.

ELECTION MAKES SENSE

Despite the denials, the opposition Democrats have seen a
snap poll as likely as Thaksin uses his strong political
support in the countryside to neutralize voter discontent in
Bangkok — which has just hosted two major anti-government
protests.

“My view is that regardless of his power base, he does need
to reduce tension in Bangkok,” said Korn Chatikavanij, a
Democrat MP and former president of JP Morgan in Thailand who
has been leading the push for a full probe into the Shin Corp
sale.

“I don’t see him resigning unless something bad comes out
of the investigation,” Korn told foreign journalists recently.
“I do see him dissolving parliament. He might need to do
something like that. If I were him, I would do it.”

Polls suggest that even though its popularity has waned one
year into its second term, Thaksin’s pro-business Thai Rak Thai
(Thais Love Thais) party would still emerge from an election as
comfortable winners.

Despite this, there has been little let up from critics
ranging from a former business partner to the
anti-privatization lobby and unions.

His one-time political mentor, Chamlong Srimuang, a
teetotal general who led a 1992 “people power” revolt against
the then military government, joined their ranks on Sunday,
increasing the chances of another mass rally in a week’s time.

“Chamlong is still seen as a symbol of democracy who
opposes greedy capitalism and globalization and I believe a lot
of his followers will join him at the rally,” said Prapart
Pintobtang of Bangkok’s Chulalongkorn University.

(Additional reporting by Trirat Puttajanyawong and Darren
Schuettler)