Thailand (Lonely Planet, 13th Edition) - China Williams [0]
Destination Thailand
Getting Started
Events Calendar
Itineraries
History
Thailand & You
The Culture
Arts
Food & Drink
Environment
Bangkok
Central Thailand
Southeastern Thailand
Chiang Mai Province
Northern Thailand
Northeastern Thailand
Upper Southern Gulf
Lower Southern Gulf
Andaman Coast
Deep South
Directory
Transport
Health
Language
Glossary
The Authors
Behind the Scenes
Map Legend
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Destination Thailand
Technically, elephants are not allowed on the streets of Bangkok, but during the right time of year (typically after rice farmers have finished harvesting their crops), you can’t help but come across the giant beasts, wandering the congested sois with their owners, largely ignored by just about everybody except foreign tourists. To most visitors it’s inconceivable that a creature so large can be so casually disregarded. But this is Thailand, a country where the people have become experts at ignoring the metaphorical elephants in their rooms.
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‘this is Thailand, a country where the people have become experts at ignoring the metaphorical elephants in their rooms’
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Since the abolition of the absolute monarchy in 1932, political instability has essentially been the norm in Thailand. The most recent period of unrest began in 2006 with the coup d’état (the 18th in 70 years) that saw then Prime Minister, Thaksin Shinawatra, forcibly removed from office, sent into exile and replaced by military rule. Unlike elsewhere where such an event might have had people protesting on the streets, the ‘smooth as silk’ coup hardly disrupted Bangkok traffic, and Thais, depending on their political allegiances, appeared to accept the changes with restrained joy or quiet resignation.
The following 15 months of caretaker rule were largely seen as ineffectual, and spanned lowlights ranging from limits on press freedom to significant economic slowdown, but public displays of discontent were rare if not non-existent. Long-awaited elections in late 2007 led to the People’s Power Party (PPP) of Samak Sundaravej, an alleged Thaksin proxy, gaining a majority in parliament. This sparked a series of street protests led by the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), the same anti-Thaksin group whose protests preceded the 2006 coup.
In less than six months, the largely middle-class Bangkok-based PAD had boldly taken over Government House and was demanding Samak’s resignation. In response, pro-Thaksin supporters, many of whom are relatively poor farmers, labourers and taxi drivers from Thailand’s north and northeast, formed their own pro-government alliance called the United Front of Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD). Even moderate Thais began taking sides, with PAD supporters wearing yellow (a colour associated with the monarchy), and government supporters sporting red. For the first time in recent Thai history, it appeared that at least one elephant – the vast divide between the urban, educated elite and the rural poor – could no longer be ignored.
In June 2008, after several weeks of PAD occupation of Government House, the country’s Constitutional Court found Samak guilty of accepting money to host a cooking program, and he was forced to stand down. Although his dismissal due to this technicality was tantamount to the coup the PAD demanded, they were anything but placated when Sundaravej was subsequently replaced by Somchai Wongsawat, Thaksin’s brother-in-law.
Meanwhile, Thaksin and his wife Potjaman remained largely in exile in the UK, with only sporadic visits to Thailand. However in late 2008, the Supreme Court found Thaksin guilty of a corruption charge, sentencing him to two years’ imprisonment. Potjaman was subsequently sentenced to three years in jail for tax fraud. The couple’s UK visas were later revoked, and any plans to return to the UK or Thailand were inevitably shelved.
In October and November of 2008 confrontations between the PAD and police and pro-government supporters became increasingly violent, leading to the death of two PAD members.