Sunday, December 7, 2008

'Coup for the Rich' must be opposed

Dec 7, 2008

By Giles Ji Ungpakorn 

Last Tuesday, the Constitutional Court dissolved the democratically elected governing party in Thailand for the second time, forcing the government to resign. 

This followed the refusal of the armed forces and the police to follow government instructions to clear the two international airports, blocked by armed People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) fascists. The royalist alliance against the government is made up of the fascist PAD, the military, the police, the judiciary, the mainstream media, the Democrat Party, most middle-class academics and the Queen. 

They are all behind this judicial coup. A leading Democrat Party MP was one of the leaders of the illegal blockade of the two airports. The yellow-shirted PAD had 'armed guards' who repeatedly shot at opponents. They constantly used violence and demanded 'joint patrols' with the police. 

The PAD has constantly broken the law, and yet is 'untouchable'. On the rare occasion that PAD leaders are forced to attend court, they are given bail and allowed to go back to commit the same crimes over and over again. 

The majority of the Thai population, who are poor, face a double whammy. First, the elite royalists are doing everything possible to take away their basic democratic rights. Second, mass job losses have occurred in the tourist industry as a result of the airport blockade. Jobs in agriculture and electronics were also affected, and of course we are faced with the serious world economic crisis. 

The elite do not care if the Thai economy is trashed and Thailand returns to being a poor Third World nation. In such nations, the elite continue to live the same lives as the rich in the developed world. The PAD protesters are middle-class extremists who do not have to go to work, hence their prolonged protests. 

We are constantly told by the conservatives that the poor are 'too stupid to deserve the right to vote'. The army staged a coup in 2006 and rewrote the Constitution in order to reduce the democratic space and also to absolve itself of any wrong-doing. The electorate has repeatedly voted in overwhelming numbers for the government party, whether it be Thai Rak Thai or People Power Party. Now People Power politicians are moving to the new Puea Thai party. Will a fair election be held? Or will the elite engineer a 'fix' to make sure their people win? 

What is the root cause of this crisis? 

The root cause of this crisis is not the corruption of the Thaksin government in the past. It isn't about vote-buying, good governance, civil rights or the rule of law. Politicians of all parties, including the Democrats, are known to buy votes. The elite, whether politicians, civil servants or military, have a history of gross corruption. Even when they don't break the law, they become rich on the backs of Thai workers and small farmers. The Democrat Party is stuffed with such millionaires. 

Ironically, the Thai Rak Thai party was helping to reduce the importance of vote-buying because it was the first party in decades to have real policies which were beneficial to the poor. It introduced a universal health-care scheme and Keynesian village funds. People voted on the basis of such policies. 

The Democrats and the conservative elite hate the alliance between Thaksin Shinawatra's business party and the poor. They hate the idea that a government was using public funds to improve the lives of the poor. This is why the anti-government alliance is against demo-cracy. The PAD has suggested reducing the number of elected MPs and a recipe to do away with the principle of 'one person, one vote'. 

So the root cause of the problem is the conservative elite's contempt for the poor and contempt for democracy. Its members are prepared to break the law when it suits them. 

What is the solution? 

Business leaders and the royalist elite are demanding an unelected national government. The Democrat Party leader has 'volunteered' to be the prime minister. Such a national government would complete the judicial coup for the rich. It would be a victory for the PAD and a defeat for the electorate. 

The Red Shirts, who are organised by government politicians, are the only hope for Thai democracy. They have now become a genuine pro-democracy mass movement of the poor. This is what is meant by 'civil society', not the PAD fascists. Thai academia fails to grasp this basic fact. But the Red Shirts are not a 'pure' force. Many believe in the illusion of former prime minister Thaksin. They overlook his gross abuse of human rights in the South and the war on drugs. But these human rights issues are also totally ignored by the PAD and its friends. 

Throughout this three-year crisis, the majority of the Thai non-governmental organisation (NGO) movement (especially the NGO-Coordinating Committee) has failed to support democracy. Many welcomed the 2006 military coup. Many supported the military Constitution. Now they are either silent or echoing the demands of the army chief, who said in the previous week that the government should resign. 

At no point have they attempted to build a pro-democracy social movement. Many believe that the poor are 'uneducated and lack enough information to vote'. The honourable examples are the Midnight University in Chiang Mai, some sections of the labour movement, groups of new generation NGO activists and Turn Left. 

The economic crisis 

Millions of jobs are being destroyed as a result of the world economic crisis and the unrest in Thai society. People are being driven back into poverty. Yet the Democrat Party, the military, the conservative elite and the mainstream NGO movement do not have a clue or do not care one jot about the necessary policies to defend the living standards of the poor. They make chants about the King's sufficiency economy and the need for fiscal discipline. In other words, the poor must trim their spending and learn to live with their poverty while the rich continue to live in luxury. 

We desperately need massive government spending on infrastructure, job protection and a serious expansion of welfare. Value-added tax should be reduced or abolished, and higher direct taxes should be levied on the rich elite without any exception. The bloated military budget should be cut. Wages should be raised among workers. Poor farmers should be protected. This will happen only in a climate of genuine democracy. This is why we must oppose this second 'Coup for the Rich'. 

The writer is a professor at the Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University.

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