Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-Ocha said he will dissolve parliament in March, a move that paves the way for the next election.
(Bloomberg) — Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-Ocha said he will dissolve parliament in March, a move that paves the way for the next election.
Prayuth told reporters he informed the cabinet in a meeting on Tuesday of his intention to dissolve the House of Representatives — the clearest sign he has given yet on the timeline for the vote, though he didn’t give a specific date.
Prayuth’s move could be an attempt to buy time for his new party to campaign and recruit members to run for office. If he dissolves the house as late as March 22 — just one day before its term ends — the election can be held around May 21 at the latest.
That could give him an extra two weeks given the election is now tentatively scheduled for May 7. When asked Tuesday if the dissolution move would come in early March, Prayuth answered vaguely: “Something like that.”
The former army chief is bidding to extend his eight-year rein in charge — first as a coup leader in 2014 and then as the head of an elected coalition since 2019. He’s the top candidate of a new conservative party after splitting with the military-backed ruling Palang Pracharath Party that helped him stay in power since the last vote.
Read: Thai Election Jockeying Heats Up as PM Prayuth Joins New Party
Prayuth is hoping a recovery in Southeast Asia’s second-largest economy, which is being powered by the return of millions of foreign tourists and billions of dollars in state stimulus, will boost his candidacy. He faces an uphill task addressing voter discontent stemming from the high cost of living and an uneven recovery in Thailand following the Covid pandemic.
He’ll face tough competition for the top job. In recent opinion polls, Prayuth has significantly trailed opposition Pheu Thai Party’s Paetongtarn Shinawatra, daughter of former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who was toppled in a coup in 2006. Parties affiliated with Thaksin have won the most seats in every Thai election over the last two decades.
Pheu Thai also won the most seats in 2019, only to be thwarted by Palang Pracharath in forming a government, as election rules were heavily stacked in favor of the ruling generals.
Also: Thailand Sets Fee for Foreign Visitors as Tourism Booms
Earlier on Tuesday, the military-appointed Senate thwarted a key proposal by the lower house to hold a national referendum on rewriting the junta-era charter on the same day as the election, dealing another blow at attempts to curb the generals’ power.
The Senate has delayed the vote on the referendum proposal since November, saying its members needed to study it more carefully. The bloc has generally prevented any moves to amend the constitution in ways that would curb its influence.
If approved, the proposal would have paved the way for Thai citizens to vote on whether they wanted a completely new constitution to be written by an elected drafting committee. Several efforts by lawmakers and civil society organizations to amend the 2017 constitution have failed over the years.
(Updates throughout.)
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