Thaksin: Ready to do anything, but not ready to resign?
Tuesday, February 28th, 2006 | 6:01 pm @ SK
By now, Thailand Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra must have learned his lesson well, first thing first, not to underestimate your opponents in the future and it’s doing more harm than good to be an arrogant one.
The People’s Alliance for Democracy, a coalition of anti-Thaksin groups, have demanded that he resigned by next Sunday (March 5), else, he could be forced from office by mass protests.
"We give Thaksin until [Sunday] 5 March to resign or face the biggest show of opposition ever," Sondhi Limthongkul, a media tycoon who began the anti-Thaksin campaign, told supporters in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
Earlier, the opposition parties had decided on a boycott as they believed a fair election is impossible without political reform as Thaksin controlled political institutions designed to be independent.
Thaksin, in a desperate attempt to woo the leaders of three leading opposition parties, has offered to postpone the snap election he has set for April 2. His famous last words:
"I am ready to do anything, just tell me what you want."
Ready to do anything, but not ready to resign? Oh, c’mon on.
February 28th, 2006 at 9:09 pm
I am in Bangkok now and it will be interesting to see what the Election Commission will do if the opposition boycott the election. Yesterday, the commission already warned of action against those who boycott the election as it is against the law.
March 3rd, 2006 at 10:13 am
An update: Today’s papers showed pictures of Thaksin’s supports rallying in support of Thaksin. Oppositions said that it was staged. Couple of pages more, there is nothing but the call for resignation from various people.
The army have said hands-off on this political turmoil. The King is silent about this issue venthough some people are calling for the King to dismiss Thaksin.
SET and BOT (Bank of Thailand) reported that the expect more foreign investment to be heading to Thailand despite of the turmoil. The share market index was up. Ya, it sounded like what we see in Malaysia - everything is seems ok despite of problems. It’s seems ok because we have Petronas & EPF pumping money in the background.
March 5th, 2006 at 4:53 am
[…] "The Thai Rak Thai Party (the ruling party) has a new motto to promote democracy and keep the country’s rules and laws. This means that for the past five years, the Thaksin administration did not (upkeep) these principles." Earlier, the opposition parties had decided on a boycott as they believed a fair election is impossible without political reform as Thaksin controlled political institutions designed to be independent. […]