4 days ago
Thai court suspends prime minister as political crisis spirals
Advertisement
In a petition to the Constitutional Court, a group of senators sought the removal of Paetongtarn, accusing her of violating ethics standards in her talks with Hun Sun. On Tuesday, the court agreed to consider the complaint and suspended her with immediate effect.
Paetongtarn said she accepted the court's decision and would soon present her case.
'I will try to prove that my intention and effort was more than 100 percent for the country,' she told reporters. She also apologized again, saying the conversation with Hun Sen was not for her personal gain.
Paetongtarn has few options on how to proceed, said Isra Sunthornvut, who heads the Thailand office of Vriens & Partners, a government affairs consultancy. One path is to resign, he said, while the second is to dissolve parliament and call for new elections.
Advertisement
'Or No. 3, which is the most terrible, is military intervention,' he said. 'But with the Constitutional Court coming in, I wouldn't see a reason for the military to intervene.'
It is the latest upheaval in Thailand, which has suffered from long stretches of political uncertainty in recent years.
Thailand has been mired in a cycle of coups and protests for decades, with the royalist-military establishment exerting its will against threats to the status quo. Since the early 2000s, the military has twice overthrown democratically elected governments linked to Thaksin Shinawatra, Paetongtarn's father.
In the 2023 election, voters emphatically rejected military rule. But the party that won the most ballots, Move Forward, was blocked from forming a government and was eventually disbanded.
Months after the election, Thaksin's Pheu Thai Party took power. An ally, Srettha Thavisin, became prime minister, but, less than a year later, was removed by the Constitutional Court over an ethics complaint. He was succeeded by Paetongtarn.
Since taking office, she has been viewed as a puppet of Thaksin's. But the roots of the current crisis lie in tensions with Cambodia that have flared occasionally over the decades. In a brief skirmish in May, a Cambodian soldier was killed, and the relations between the two neighbors quickly deteriorated to the lowest point in years.
Paetongtarn and Hun Sen spoke to each other on June 15, aided by translators. Paetongtarn called him 'uncle' and offered to 'arrange' anything that he wants. She also urged him to ignore 'the opposite side,' a reference to the Thai military.
Her comments drew condemnation from lawmakers, both those in her coalition and in the opposition, who all called on Paetongtarn to resign. The second-largest member of her governing coalition, the Bhumjaithai Party, quit her alliance last month. Quickly, the legal challenges against Paetongtarn piled up.
Advertisement
It remains unclear how long the court will take to reach a verdict on Paetongtarn's fate. But she has been given 15 days to defend herself against the charge, the court said in a statement.
In the interim, Suriya Jungrungruangkit, the deputy prime minister, is set to be appointed the acting prime minister, according to the Secretariat of the Cabinet.
For now, Paetongtarn is trying to hold on to at least one other title: On Tuesday, she appointed herself culture minister, though she has not been sworn into the role.
There is precedent in Thailand for suspended prime ministers to be returned to the role. In 2022, the court suspended Prayuth Chan-ocha, the general who staged the most recent coup, while it considered a petition to remove him from office for overstaying his term. He was restored to the job in five weeks.
But even if she returns to office, Paetongtarn has precious little political capital. A poll conducted last month showed that her approval rating had plummeted to 9.2 percent from 30.9 percent a few months earlier.
Thaksin, 75, is also facing legal challenges. On Tuesday, he went on trial on a criminal charge of insulting the monarchy, a case that could send him to prison for up to 15 years.
This article originally appeared in
