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Security stepped up ahead of Thai by-elections
Polls will be test of political strength for ruling coalition of Prime Minister Vejjajiva
- AP
- Published: 23:35 January 10, 2009
Bangkok: Authorities in Thailand stepped up security on Saturday, a day before the country's first by-elections since a new government took power after sustained political unrest.
Sunday's polls will be a test of political strength for the ruling coalition of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, head of the Democrat Party. Voters in 22 provinces will fill 29 parliamentary seats made vacant mostly by politicians disqualified from office.
A total of 83 candidates from 13 political parties are on the ballots, said Election Commissioner Praphan Naikowit. Abhisit was voted prime minister last month by a thin majority in Parliament after a court finding of electoral fraud led to the dissolution of three parties in the previous government coalition, which was packed with allies of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
Thaksin was ousted by a military coup in 2006. Yet he remains the country's most influential politician. Of the 29 seats at stake in today's polls, 13 belonged to allies of Thaksin in the disbanded People's Power Party that led the previous government, and 16 seats were held by the now disbanded Chart Thai party. Chart Thai had supported the pro-Thaksin alliance, but its lawmakers have now switched their allegiance to the Democrats.
Pundits in the local press expect the majority of the seats formerly held by Thaksin's allies to go to small parties and factions that now support Abhisit's government.
"The coalition is likely to retain its majority but the Democrat Party will have to rely more on small parties and factions whose allegiances are fickle," said Sukhum Nuansakul, a political scientist at Bangkok's Ramkhamhaeng University.
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