If you ever feel as though the politics in your country are a bit corrupt just take a look at Thailand. They had a new party that won the popular vote and honestly, should have had the candidate that the people actually voted for be put into the highest office in the land. Instead, Thailand quietly negated the election results, dissolved the new, popular party, and installed a different Prime Minister instead.
While similar things have happened in other countries such as in France where one party won enough votes to install their candidate in the top position but instead of allowing that, the other parties got together and joined forces to make sure that the other party didn't get the top job after all. It seems a bit unfair because they have a certain set of rules that can be circumnavigated after an "undesirable to the status quo" result occurs. Thailand did something similar but instead of just stealing the victory from the new party, they eliminated the new party's right to exist through some shady court dealings. I'm no Thailand political scholar, but this seems illegal.
The new Prime Minister is the woman on the right and her name is Paetongtarn Shinawatra. Even if you don't know anything about Thailand there is a good chance you might recognize the guy on the left.. That is her father, Thaksin Shinawatra and he was once the Prime Minister of Thailand as well. He was eliminated from his position by a coup where the military simply took over the country because I guess someone didn't like how things were going. This resulted in riots and occupation of various places throughout the country because the people who voted for him actually DID like how things were going and he was for the most part, fulfilling his campaign promises. Once he was ousted from his position he fled the country and remained in exile for a very long time. During that time he purchased a football club that you may have heard of called Manchester City.
The Shinawatra family is extremely wealthy and you might have been able to figure that out by the fact that they purchased one of the world's most famous sport franchises while in exile and on the run from his country's government. In his absence from the country new elections were held and Thaksin's sister, Yingluck, was elected Prime Minister. She got to serve a bit of her term before she too was removed from office by another coup.
I don't recall how long ago that was but it wasn't that long ago. So now we have a new Prime Minister who is of the same bloodline of a family whose members have been removed from the Prime Minister seat, twice. What the actual hell are we doing over here in this country? I suppose that the Shinawatra family is a lot like the Bush or Kennedy family in the USA, but unlike those two, this family has always been removed from their positions by the military.
You may recall that Thailand was ruled by a controversial military rule for quite some time and they only recently released their grasp on the control of the country. Are the political elite poking the tiger in the hopes that they will once again stage a coup? It does seem to be the tradition here.
Paetongtarn's Aunt, Yingluck, is still a political refugee and is in exile in an unknown location somewhere. If she were to return to Thailand, she would be arrested just like Paetongtarn's father was earlier this year. Will this change because the daughter/niece is now in power? It will be interesting to see what happens.
This kind of goes to show that the Shinawatra family always has held power, even when they were ousted from power. Their political maneuverings have ensured that they were in a way, running things in Thailand even though they were not technically allowed to be in it without being arrested.
There she is with her auntie Yingluck, who was removed from office in a bloodless coup.
The new Prime Minister wasn't supposed to win, the Move Forward Party, which was dissolved in what looks like a completely illegal move, won that right but was denied it. So I wonder how disenfranchised the Thai people are feeling right now. They voted for who they wanted and when the political elites didn't like the results, they used the system to get the result that the elites wanted anyway. It has to be very frustrating for the average voter as well as the politicians in the Move Forward Party because apparently the system truly is rigged. If this is any sign about how things are actually run in this country I don't understand why they bother with elections at all.
I will say this about the Shinawatra's: They know how to captivate and perhaps manipulate the people, especially the poor. They promise and for the most part deliver on helping out the poor and this is evident in what the new PM is already saying she will do such as double minimum wage, expand free health care, and make legislation that lowers the cost of public transport in Bangkok. The question I have for these decisions is the same I would ask of any country's leaders: "How are you going to pay for it?"