After more than a year of prolonged political crisis and confrontation that was capped by the military coup of 19 September 2006, Thailand's murky political environment appears headed towards even greater uncertainty and instability.
The coup restored the holy trinity of the military, the bureaucracy and the monarchy to the apex of Thailand's socio-political hierarchy, and put down, for the time being at least, the upstart new order represented by deposed Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and his crew. However, the putsch did not put away Thaksin politically despite the litany of corruption accusations and alleged abuses of power that hounded his five-year rule.
By New Year's Eve, when multiple and coordinated bomb blasts convulsed central Bangkok, it became clear that what had transpired since 19 September amounted to a coup gone awry. Insinuating that remnants of Thaksin's ousted regime were culpable for the lethal bomb attacks, the military junta, the self-styled Council for National Security (CNS), appeared inept and dysfunctional as it sought to maintain security in the capital.
Separately, the interim govern is reeling from a series of setbacks ranging from the failed liberalisation of the underground lottery, slow progress in prosecuting the Shinawatra family's shady land purchases and tax evasion accusations, to policy flip-flops on capital controls. The government of caretaker Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont, an erstwhile Privy Councillor and former army commander-in-chief, consequently became more reliant on the CNS, as security priorities surged to the forefront of its policy agenda against the backdrop of its apparent technocratic incompetence.
As both the CNS and the Surayud government have lost their way in the aftermath of the coup, what is likely to take place from here onwards is the continuation of a titanic struggle between the forces of the establishment and those of Thaksin. At stake will be no less than Thailand's very heart and soul. Three concurrent trends portend why and how this grand battle will run its course.
First, Thaksin still represents a potent and unrivalled political phenomenon previously unseen in Thailand. He commands deep pockets, thanks to a telecommunications and media empire built on state concessions and government connections. The sale of his family's flagship company, Shin Corp, to Temasek Holdings early last year netted Thaksin a THB73.3 billion windfall. Moreover, Thaksin is a unique, consummate personality, who can count on a vast network of contacts, informants, sympathisers, and loyalists in many echelons of the police, the military, the bureaucracy, the private sector, not to mention the rural masses and urban poor who voted his Thai Rak Thai party into office in January 2001 with two successful re-elections in February 2005 and April 2006, the latter result subsequently nullified. Most important, Thaksin believes in the righteousness of his cause. Although his opponents have justifiably deplored him for corruption and abuses of power, he sees his pro-poor populist platform as a clutch of innovative ideas to remake Thailand into a more egalitarian society, thereby uprooting its neo-feudal underpinnings.
Thaksin's background and experience reveal a man on a mission, a fighter who has spectacularly monopolised the Thai telecoms industry and Thai politics. His nature is not to accept defeat unless it is forced on him. Thus the Thaksin phenomenon, his denials in media outlets such as CNN notwithstanding, is unstoppable because of the sheer force of his resources, conviction, and personality.
Second, the CNS generals have unwittingly facilitated Thaksin's political longevity. After failing to take Thaksin to task aggressively in the fortnight after the coup, the CNS set up a lacklustre cabinet full of elderly and mostly retired hands from the bureaucracy, and followed up with an appointment of a national assembly with substantial military representation.
The ruling generals also failed to press their coup justifications, namely, Thaksin's corruption, constitutional usurpation, societal polarisation and disrespect directed, by the nature of Thaksin's rule, to the king. Their post-coup management had been so dismal that the New Year's Eve bomb blasts led to rumours of another coup to tighten the military's grip and get rid of Thaksin's agent provocateurs and other agitators for good.
Indeed, if its security management slips further and Thaksin continues to gain ground on the generals, a harsher, incumbency coup may be in the offing. It would be a coup staged in the same direction with similar objectives, but with a new leadership and tougher methods and means. Another coup in 2007 would almost certainly delay the already contentious and problematic constitution-drafting and election timetables, and could become a source of street protests, with enabling conditions for Thaksin to make his political comeback.
Thirdly, the September 19 coup is unlike previous putsches in contemporary Thailand for its critical timing. Its tumultuous aftermath is panning out as Thais enter the twilight of their monarch's glorious 60-year-old reign in a 21st century kingdom that is characterised by unresolved polarisation and ongoing tussle for the country's future after the royal succession. Thailand as it is known today has modernised from a village backwater to a middle-income nation with a gleaming metropolitan capital, weighed down by social and income disparities between the rich and middle classes on the one hand, and the poor on the other, or as Thaksin's reign highlighted, between Bangkok and the countryside.
Unless the establishment makes greater efforts to bridge this yawning gap, Thaksin may well get another turn. Whichever side comes out on top in this grand struggle, Thailand as we know it is coming to an end. A new Thailand will emerge in an arduous and contested process during which its denizens and foreign friends from near and far should lend their support for as smooth a transition as possible.