Thai protests raise concerns over economy
Print Edition
Thousands of demonstrators massed outside four Thai government ministries, a major state office complex and 24 provincial halls yesterday in a widening effort to cripple the administration and oust Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra.
By evening, more than 13,000 protesters surrounded Thailand’s top crime-fighting agency and an adjacent government complex. They already occupy the finance ministry and have forced the evacuation of four other ministries in two days.
“We will stay overnight here. I urge all police to leave this compound,” protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban told reporters outside the Department of Special Investigation.
The protests threaten to destablize Thailand at a delicate time, just as its US$366 billion economy, southeast Asia’s second biggest, is losing momentum.
Latest figures show that exports fell 0.7 percent in October from a year before, compared to the 0.7 percent rise most economists had expected.
Responding to the crisis, Thailand’s central bank unexpectedly cut interest rates by a quarter point when it held its policy-setting meeting.
The demonstrators, a motley collection aligned with Bangkok’s royalist civilian and military elite, accuse Yingluck of being an illegitimate proxy for her billionaire brother, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a populist hero of the rural poor who was ousted in a 2006 military coup.
Most of the 24 provinces where demonstrators had massed are in the south, a traditional stronghold of the opposition Democrat Party, although four were in the north and northeast, where the Shinawatra family is hugely popular.
The aim of yesterday’s rallies was to wipe out the “political machine of Thaksin,” said Suthep, a former deputy prime minister under the military-backed government that was routed by Yingluck in a 2011 election.
The DSI recently indicted Suthep, and former prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, for murder for their alleged role in the deaths of more than 90 people in 2010 when troops crushed protests by Thaksin’s supporters.
“This department is supposed to be an independent organization, but it has not acted neutrally,” said Chattavorn Sangsuwan, 38, a demonstrator and employee at a car firm.
“We will finish off what the coup-makers started in 2006. Their job was not complete, Thaksin’s influence is still everywhere. We are here to finish the job.”
Fearing clashes could erupt and further weaken her government, Yingluck said police would keep the peace.
“My government will not use force. This is not the ‘Thaksin regime,’ this is a democratically elected government,” Yingluck told reporters outside parliament.
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