Thailand: back to the military

Press, 12 October 1976, Page 20

Thailand: back to the military

Thailand’s brief experiment in parliamentary democracy has ended in a reversion to military rule. Student rioting in 1973 was mainly responsible for breaking what appeared at that time to be a permanent military’ dictatorship. Now the pendulum has swung back again. The Government over which Admiral Sangad Chaloryoo will preside is entirely military in composition, and will rule without any reference or relation to political parties. In this Government of the Right there is no place in the Administration Reform group for Communists, or even Leftists of a milder political colour.

It is Admiral Chaloryoo’s view that democracy in Thailand is in great need of improvement. That is probably an understatement. The truth is that the form of democracy introduced in 1973 had very unstable foundations. In the General Election that brought Mr Kukrit Pramoj to power, 42 parties participated: but only eight parties won representation running into double figures. Few of the parties had any substance, in terms of political belief or grouping, with the result that the governing coalition which emerged had no unified policy. Nevertheless Mr Pramoj contrived a workable relationship with China as well as with neighbouring countries already in an advanced stage of conversion to communism.

The next Government, led by Mr Pramoj’s elder brother, Seni Pramoj, looked more stable, to the extent that it contained four parties holding between them about four-fifths of the parliamentary seats. But, with Communist insurgency all around Thailand’s borders, and active in its own northern region, a return sooner or later to military rule was an obvious possibility. Mr Seni’s Government was

acutely aware of that fact: but not even a last-minute readjustment of his Cabinet was able to save him. Factional strife in his own Democrat Party, and fresh outbreaks of trade union and student violence in Bangkok, protesting against the return from exile of two former military strongmen-politicians, one of whom. Marshal Thanom Kittikachorn, had taken refuge in a Buddhist monastery, gave the military leaders the excuse they needed—if there was need at all —to topple the Government and take office themselves. They were forced to act, they said, to save Thailand from a Communist take-over.

The threat of such a .take-over may have been real, or it may have been no more than an expedient invention. Yet the planners of the coup could point to Vietnam, now unified under Communist control, and still accusing Thailand of cherishing the old imperialism. They could point to Laos, professing independence but nevertheless still strongly influenced by Hanoi. And they could point to Cambodia, under a harsh and disciplined regime from which many have fled to refuge elsewhere. Bangkok can expect no more than reluctant recognition from these neighbours. The Government at home will face problems that have so far seemed insoluble: a flight of capital on a devastating scale, notably to Hong Kong; a desperate need to reduce unemployment and to mend a collapsing transport system: and an equally urgent need to increase farm production while giving farmers a fairer share of the fruits of their labour. Admiral Chaloryoo’s aim, he insists, will be to return Thailand to a truly democratic form of government as soon as possible. The short-term prospects for that can hardly be regarded as hopeful after the repressive measures taken in the last few day’s.