This Sunday, August 19th, 2007, the Thai people had the opportunity to vote in the first referendum in their history. The referendum concerned the approval, or otherwise, of a new constitution which had been written by nominees of the military junta which seized control in September of 2006. The military coup was swiftly followed by an announcement that the current 1997 Constitution had been cancelled – this was necessary for the junta and its collaborators because of course it outlawed such an action. The 1997 Constitution was known as the People’s Constitution because it involved an unprecedented amount of consultation with the common people of Thailand.
The junta’s new constitution is a document of quite a different sort. Its intention is not just to exonerate the coup leaders and their quislings from legal action but also to make it much more difficult for any political party in future gaining control of the country. Prior to the coup, super-rich media tycoon Sonthi Limthongkul organised demonstrations against the democratically-elected Thai Rak Thai government that were regularly estimated in the media as numbering 50,000 which, not presumably by coincidence, is equal to the number of people necessary to sign a petition to bring an act of impeachment against a prime minister. That number is to be reduced to 20,000. The Senate will go from being an elected body to one which is largely appointed, paving the way for its stuffing with scores of conservative old men antithetical to the interests of the working people. Constituencies are to be redefined as large geographical areas with multiple members, hence weakening further the link between members of parliament and their constituents. It is widely expected that the result of the new constitution will be to weaken the political process and to return Thailand to the past when weak coalition of personality-based political parties ostensibly led the country which was, in reality, controlled by certain powerful interests and elites behind the scenes.
Only some 57% of the Thai electorate turned out to vote, which was significantly below the turnout for the three elections which so overwhelmingly voted for Thai Rak Thai. Of those, 58% voted for the constitution and 41% against (with 1% of spoiled ballots). Fewer than one third of Thai voters have endorsed the new constitution, therefore, and this is a message that coup leaders and their cronies are starting to take on board. It may be that one victim of this narrow acceptance, which was assisted by a massive use of the media and the military forces to persuade people to vote in favour, will be the postponing of the sinister Internal Security Act, which is set to give the military even more powers and on a permanent basis.
