Monday 29 December 2008

Loyalists or Traitors?

The two men who shaped Thai politics in 2008

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Guanyu said...

Loyalists or Traitors?

The two men who shaped Thai politics in 2008

In a year where Thai politics has dominated headlines, two people stand out for one thing held in common.

Mr Newin Chidchob and army chief Anupong Paochinda kept Thailand on edge throughout the year as to where their loyalties lay.

Whether they have remained loyal to their cause or traitors to others, the two men took decisions that have drastically altered the course of Thai politics, for better or worse.

After Thaksin, these two men have come to the fore to represent the multiple faces of Thai politics, its good and evil and its relentless internal struggle. And for these reasons, Thai paper The Nation have named them its Persons of the Year.

Anupong Paochinda

He speaks with his tanks without having to roll them out in the old-fashioned style of a military coup.

The reality of Thai politics is such that whenever there is political instability, the role of the men in green uniform is prominent.

Gen Anupong has played his game shrewdly. It is with his manoeuvring that Mr Abhisit Vejjajiva has become prime minister.

Is he an opportunist or a royalist? Did he betray Thaksin Shinawatra and his friends, or was he standing by the people and democracy? Controversy swirls around this figure.

No matter how he is judged, Gen Anupong has been most influential in Thai politics this year. His actions, or rather, inaction for the most part, has turned the face of Thai politics to its current situation.

Gen Anupong has repeatedly said it is easy to stage a military coup but it is another matter to govern after that. The Surayud government proved this.

There were at least four occasions this year when the military would have liked to stage a coup to end the political crisis. But each time, it never happened, much to the dismay of Gen Anupong’s military colleagues.

The military body thought that the country could no longer move forward because the wounds of the political division were too deep to heal.

The People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) revived its street demonstrations, hoping that the military would step in to clean up the mess again. The military staged a coup in 2006 only for the Surayud government to mess everything up.

PAD protesters demanded the end of any Thaksin influence. At the same time, the Red Shirt supporters of Thaksin used violence on the PAD. As authorities turned a blind eye, the conflict turned into a mini civil war.

The coup failed to materialise largely due to lack of cooperation from Gen Anupong. PAD leaders were so mad at the Army chief that they attacked him almost every day in their rallies.

In public, Gen Anupong has sent out a signal that he prefers the political crisis to be resolved through political means. In private, it is pure power play.

In October 2007, Gen Anupong was appointed Army chief by then Prime Minister General Surayud Chulnanont. General Sonthi Boonyaratglin, the coup leader, could not block Gen Anupong’s rise. Although he staged a coup against Thaksin, Gen Sonthi later cut a deal with Thaksin to try to destroy Gen Anupong.

Thaksin and Gen Anupong went to the same class 10 at the pre-cadet military school. Gen Anupong was looked upon as a black sheep in this class 10 because he broke ranks to join the military coup against Thaksin. Most of his classmates were later on moved to inactive posts.

Gen Sonthi preferred General Montri Sangkasap for the Army chief post. In the end, Mr Surayud called the shots by supporting Gen Anupong instead.

Mr Surayud’s hasty call for the general election handed the power back to the remnants of Thaksin. Samak Sundaravej became prime minister in early 2008 and went on to chart out his own turf without listening to Thaksin. Samak gave Gen Anupong almost a free hand in the military reshuffle, hoping to get his backing in return. Wherever Samak went, he preferred to have Gen Anupong accompany him.

The critical moment came on Sept 2 when Samak declared a state of emergency against the PAD’s protesters occupying the Government House.

The PAD regrouped in August when the Samak government tried to amend the Constitution to offer amnesty to the former executive members of the defunct Thai Rak Thai Party.

With the state of emergency, Samak handed absolute power to Gen Anupong to quash the protesters. But the Army chief simply didn’t want the hot potato, knowing he would lose out if he were to use military force against the protesters.

At the same time, he called for the Samak government to resolve the crisis through political means, one way of which was to set up a national unity government. With Gen Anupong taking a firm stand, the Samak government lost further credibility to govern.

The tense situation turned into a stalemate. The PAD continued to celebrate inside Government House. In the end, Samak had to go when the Constitution Court wielded the axe.

Somchai Wongsawat inherited a weak government. His relationship with the military deterioriated fast. Somchai only had the police as his ally. On Oct 7, the day when Somchai delivered his policy address to Parliament, the government took drastic action against the protesters by shooting tear gas at them. Several protesters lost their arms and legs. The military stood idle, while the police did the dirty job.

Like the Samak government, Somchai would find himself without any power to govern. Nobody was listening to him.

When Somchai went abroad to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Peru in late November, the situation in Bangkok was very tense. The PAD protesters went for a blockade of Don Mueang and Suvarnabhumi airports, hoping the military would have no choice but to stage a coup.

Somchai did not dare disembark in Bangkok. As soon as his plane landed at the Air Force airport adjacent to Don Mueang, it immediately flew off again to Chiang Mai, where Somchai could keep his distance from the military and the PAD protesters.

All the time, the government threatened to sack Gen Anupong if he did not cooperate by taking on the protesters at the airports. Somchai declared a state of emergency around the two airports and assigned the police to handle the security.

Again, Gen Anupong would not have anything to do with the state of emergency. He would exert no action.

Gen Anupong rebuffed Somchai by sending back a signal that the military would stage a coup if Somchai were to remove him from the Army post.

With two prime ministers from the Thaksin camp losing power in a hurry, Somchai ousted through a party dissolution court order, it was impossible to have the third nominee prime minister from this camp.

Gen Anupong backed a switch in the core of the coalition government. The Democrats got a political windfall. With the defection by Mr Newin Chidchob and his allies, who sought shelter under the military wing, Mr Abhisit succeeded in mustering enough majority in Parliament to become prime minister.

Gen Anupong has promised to back the Democrats for at least two years. But between now and then anything could happen.

Newin Chidchob

If Thaksin Shinawatra is the name associated with the modern ills of democracy, Mr Newin Chidchob must be the one representing the old-school shortcomings of the system. After a four-year reign of the former, it looked as if Newinesque politicians’ time was up. You may have been kings, Thaksin told them, but I am the emperor.

But the likes of Mr Newin are the seeds of grass that can wait forever underground as long as the conditions are not right. As Thaksin replaced rural patronage with endless offerings directly from the central government and took the terms political networking and financing far beyond the levels known to the old guards, Mr Newin went humbly with the flow. When he tearfully hugged Thaksin at the beginning of the latter’s downfall in 2006, it must now be a goodbye the ousted leader wants to forget.

And if that farewell signalled the beginning of the end of a political style that was simply too fast to live, this month’s photo of Mr Newin and Democrat leader Abhisit Vejjajiva embracing was an eerie reminder of the resilience of old-style political demons. They can’t be taken out by a coup, or street protests. They are adaptors of the most flexible kind.

Only this time they cause ambivalence rather than the usual absolute dismay. Mr Newin’s revolt, somehow, gave Thailand a much-needed break no matter what the future holds. ‘It’s over, boss,’ he reportedly told Thaksin on the phone. Without his switch of allegiance to the Democrats, it would not have been.

Is it a fitting end brought onto the emperor by one of the kings? The defection changed the whole complexion of Thailand’s power play, depriving Thaksin of indirect control of state power and making him a real ‘freedom fighter’ who will now have to fight without the means he enjoyed most of 2008.

There has been much speculation over why.

Gossip portrayed a highly ambitious politician seeing his master’s absence as a perfect opportunity to make his own luck, thus ending up being pitted against Thaksin’s relatives and inner circles and everything deteriorating ever since.

More positive hearsays had Mr. Newin very upset with the way former prime minister Samak Sundaravej was treated by Thaksin and Co, and with the ‘disastrous’ decision to add fuel to the fire by installing Somchai Wongsawat as Samak’s successor.

What we know for sure is that Mr. Newin is back. Latest speculation has him planning to consolidate all coalition partners, with the exception of the MPs from the dissolved Chart Thai camp, and form a major political party. After all he has managed, that does not even sound too ambitious. With the rain coming and other conditions conducive, the long-dormant seeds of grass are ready to prevail in the Thai political landscape once again.