Nopporn Wong-Anan
Reuters
BANGKOK—Exiled former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said Wednesday that a military crackdown on protesters backing him could spawn mass discontent and lead to guerrilla warfare.
Thaksin, ousted in a bloodless 2006 military coup, is denounced by adversaries as Thailand’s most corrupt politician. To his anti-government supporters, who set Bangkok ablaze on Wednesday, he is a saviour.
Speaking from an undisclosed location, Thaksin said the deadly crackdown on “Red Shirt” protesters could degenerate into widespread violence.
“There is a theory saying a military crackdown can spread resentment and these resentful people will become guerrillas,” Thaksin said in an interview as troops fought protesters in Bangkok, sparking violence in outer provinces.
“There are lots and lots of people across the country who are upset because they were prevented from joining the Bangkok rally.”
His critics say Thaksin is a crony capitalist who plundered the economy and perverted democracy for the benefit of his family and friends while in power from 2001 until the 2006 coup.
But to many rural voters, he was the first leader to consider the needs of millions living beyond Bangkok’s bright lights.
Thaksin, who scored two landslide poll wins, has been living abroad in self-exile since being removed.
But a two-month campaign by his supporters to oust the government of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, hoping to gain Thaksin a political amnesty and justice, culminated on Wednesday in the country’s worst political violence in 18 years.
Rioting and fires swept Bangkok after troops stormed the protesters’ encampment, forcing their leaders to surrender.
Protesters set ablaze at least 27 buildings, including the Thai stock exchange and Central World, Southeast Asia’s second-biggest department store complex.
A night curfew was declared in Bangkok and 21 provinces.
Thaksin, 60, has hovered over Thai politics since fleeing the country in 2008, accused of undermining the powerful monarchy and breaching conflict-of-interest laws. He was sentenced in absentia to two years in prison.
Government officials say the multimillionaire former telecommunications tycoon was funding the protests to the tune of about $1.5 million a day. Both Red Shirt leaders and Thaksin deny he funded the anti-government movement.
In his comments, Thaksin rejected any notion he was the stumbling block in failed talks between the government and protesters.
“I only gave them advice that they should make a collective decision as a group, not letting any individual leaders to make a decision by their own . . . I never discussed about my personal interests with them,” Thaksin said.
Thaksin, a former police officer, is accused by critics of abusing his electoral mandate to systematically dismantle constitutional checks and balances while consolidating his own rule.
In 2005, he looked unassailable with a record majority in parliament based on the platform of cheap health care and handouts for rural voters that swept him to power four years earlier.
He formed the first elected government to serve a full term, after which it was re-elected. He was also the first leader in Thai history to form a one-party government.
But corruption scandals and alleged abuses of power eroded his popularity among Bangkok’s middle classes. Simmering anger exploded in 2006 when his relatives sold off, tax-free, their $1.9 billion stake in Shin Corp, the telecoms empire he founded, to a Singapore state company.
Thaksin responded by calling an election three years early, which he duly won.
Born into a family of ethnic Chinese silk merchants in 1949 in the northern city of Chiang Mai, Thaksin became a police officer in 1973 before gaining a masters degree in criminal justice at Eastern Kentucky University.
He is still popular among rank-and-file policemen, accused by government backers of doing too little to stop the protests.
In 1987, he established a computer dealership with his wife that started selling hardware to the police. The company evolved into Shin Corp, a telecoms conglomerate with interests ranging from mobile phones to satellites, the Internet and the media.
But a corruption probe dogged him in power until he convinced investigators he made an “honest mistake” in failing to declare millions of dollars of shares transferred to his domestic staff.
A 2003 war on drugs in which 2,500 people were killed boosted his image as a crime-buster, but sparked outrage from rights groups, who said he was riding roughshod over civil liberties.
In February, Thailand’s top court seized $1.4 billion of his assets, saying it was acquired through abuse of power.
Thaksin, ousted in a bloodless 2006 military coup, is denounced by adversaries as Thailand’s most corrupt politician. To his anti-government supporters, who set Bangkok ablaze on Wednesday, he is a saviour.
Speaking from an undisclosed location, Thaksin said the deadly crackdown on “Red Shirt” protesters could degenerate into widespread violence.
“There is a theory saying a military crackdown can spread resentment and these resentful people will become guerrillas,” Thaksin said in an interview as troops fought protesters in Bangkok, sparking violence in outer provinces.
“There are lots and lots of people across the country who are upset because they were prevented from joining the Bangkok rally.”
His critics say Thaksin is a crony capitalist who plundered the economy and perverted democracy for the benefit of his family and friends while in power from 2001 until the 2006 coup.
But to many rural voters, he was the first leader to consider the needs of millions living beyond Bangkok’s bright lights.
Thaksin, who scored two landslide poll wins, has been living abroad in self-exile since being removed.
But a two-month campaign by his supporters to oust the government of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, hoping to gain Thaksin a political amnesty and justice, culminated on Wednesday in the country’s worst political violence in 18 years.
Rioting and fires swept Bangkok after troops stormed the protesters’ encampment, forcing their leaders to surrender.
Protesters set ablaze at least 27 buildings, including the Thai stock exchange and Central World, Southeast Asia’s second-biggest department store complex.
A night curfew was declared in Bangkok and 21 provinces.
Thaksin, 60, has hovered over Thai politics since fleeing the country in 2008, accused of undermining the powerful monarchy and breaching conflict-of-interest laws. He was sentenced in absentia to two years in prison.
Government officials say the multimillionaire former telecommunications tycoon was funding the protests to the tune of about $1.5 million a day. Both Red Shirt leaders and Thaksin deny he funded the anti-government movement.
In his comments, Thaksin rejected any notion he was the stumbling block in failed talks between the government and protesters.
“I only gave them advice that they should make a collective decision as a group, not letting any individual leaders to make a decision by their own . . . I never discussed about my personal interests with them,” Thaksin said.
Thaksin, a former police officer, is accused by critics of abusing his electoral mandate to systematically dismantle constitutional checks and balances while consolidating his own rule.
In 2005, he looked unassailable with a record majority in parliament based on the platform of cheap health care and handouts for rural voters that swept him to power four years earlier.
He formed the first elected government to serve a full term, after which it was re-elected. He was also the first leader in Thai history to form a one-party government.
But corruption scandals and alleged abuses of power eroded his popularity among Bangkok’s middle classes. Simmering anger exploded in 2006 when his relatives sold off, tax-free, their $1.9 billion stake in Shin Corp, the telecoms empire he founded, to a Singapore state company.
Thaksin responded by calling an election three years early, which he duly won.
Born into a family of ethnic Chinese silk merchants in 1949 in the northern city of Chiang Mai, Thaksin became a police officer in 1973 before gaining a masters degree in criminal justice at Eastern Kentucky University.
He is still popular among rank-and-file policemen, accused by government backers of doing too little to stop the protests.
In 1987, he established a computer dealership with his wife that started selling hardware to the police. The company evolved into Shin Corp, a telecoms conglomerate with interests ranging from mobile phones to satellites, the Internet and the media.
But a corruption probe dogged him in power until he convinced investigators he made an “honest mistake” in failing to declare millions of dollars of shares transferred to his domestic staff.
A 2003 war on drugs in which 2,500 people were killed boosted his image as a crime-buster, but sparked outrage from rights groups, who said he was riding roughshod over civil liberties.
In February, Thailand’s top court seized $1.4 billion of his assets, saying it was acquired through abuse of power.
16 comments:
Thaksin will be re-elected as Syam Prathes' next president!
Abbhishit, PAD the invader of Preah Vihear, and the Thai ruling classes never learned a lesson, that military suppression will cause more resentments by the ordinary Thai. If the election were held today these bastards will loose again.
If Thaksin is re-elected, Thailand will never having a chance to be a real democratic country just like in the west.
I urges all the Khmer Surin people that living in Siames.Can you guys rises againt the Siames to gain your own dependent from ah Siames. Right now it the good chance for you, what are you waiting for?
M. Thasink if you want to be respected by the yellow shirts, the Thai King and Thai military
and regain power in Bangkok you have to create a personal army and finance a private military force to harass the military junta.
You're rich enough to do it, otherwise you must get help from China and other communist countries in the region to create bases of back folds .
You have then to become allied with the thais Muslims of the South for to expand the battlefront.
You have to combine the political action and the military action.
Look Abhisit is ready to recognize a certain autonomy to the thais Muslims of the South after years of armed struggles.
Your dream of regaining power in Bangkok against the military with democratic elections is utopia.
Abhisit and his supporters also rely on force and the military to stay in power Bangkok.
Yous need to do the same thing.
Otherwise, you must give up your political ambitions.
For now it is the force against force.
Take Ah Thong Wadi to be with your guerrilla fighters.
Ah Thong Wadi is a dickhead, let him piss himself, shit himself in the jungle like monkey.
Dumb Thai Thong Wadi my ass!!!!
4:35 PM man, take care your own country. Are you not still under Vietname? you are happy to be under controlled by foreigner. how cruel khmer people like you.
Wadi
Cambodia and laos border countries should help the reds and their families and all Thai refugees fleeing the ruthless repression of the military and police Abhisit which will worsen in coming days because the international community can not do anything much for them apart from the usual diplomatic protests and without any practical effectivenessby giving them refugee camps along its borders
May be also a way for cambodia to settle the border dispute with Abhisit.
The King is for the repression and walk with Abhisit and Thai military dictatorship.
The red and all his supporters should not underestimate the violence, the brutality of the military and police repression will go against them in the days to come : arrest, torture, assassination, murder, .....
The military and the police of Abhisit consider already red as terrorists.
Do not go to military l like some red leaders when there is no guarantee that your life is not threatened. Do not be stutpides.
You have toflee to the border of cambodia and laos where the refugee camps will soon be created for you.
The red you must now flee abroad to Cambodia or Laos to rearrange your movement and your political and military struggle to regain power in Bangkok against the military and police Abhisit.
Again, is Thaksin using Cambodia as a political base or launchpad for his political gains with the blessing of the notorious one-eyed leader?
Also, I wonder how much of Thaksin's money had been bankrolled into Mr. Hun Sen's account for his political base (Cambodia)?
War is peace
When the another war erecting please not to let Abhi-Shit and his boss flee just arrest them on the spot then send back to school of democracy not a democrazy it's now.
Good prediction Mr T.S
I said, kill thaksin and lefty leaders of Thai. And Thai will be peaceful.
I said, kill Thai King...instead!
To 2.58 Please be careful of your bad words saying like that! If I say like this to YOUR KING, how do you feel? However I forgive you because of your INNOCENT KNOWLESSNESS. In my opinion, whoever King is the BEST PERSON in that country due to H.M.'s goodness and kindness to the nation and its people. I do hope you may be more kind and optimistic to other people in creative way in order to make some positive changes in your mind and behavior, including your COUNTRY in the future. Best wishes,
Sorry to make a mistake on the comment of 2.58 AM. In fact that I really want to make a direct comment to 8.37 AM. As I mentioned before that....Please be careful of your bad words saying like that! If I say like this to YOUR KING, how do you feel? However I forgive you because of your INNOCENT KNOWLESSNESS. In my opinion, whoever King is the BEST PERSON in that country due to H.M.'s goodness and kindness to the nation and its people. I do hope you may be more kind and optimistic to other people in creative way in order to make some positive changes in your mind and behavior, including your COUNTRY in the future. Best wishes,
Thong Wadi is a Thai dickhead. Back to Nanchoa would you. You are a devel nation Siam shithead.
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