Yesterday saw the Thai elections held with a defining win for the Opposition. This means the end of the Abhisit government. To say this is too simply describing what happened and what may seem to be happening.
The Pheua Thai Party with Yingluck Shinawatra as its leader is the winner but this statement does not tell the story.
You see many parties standing for election but in the end they all go behind one or the other of the two major parties. This means that you have two blocks in the Parliament and no real Independents.
Then there is another interesting fact that I just learnt. Ministers of the government are not allowed to vote in the Parliament. So you might have the majority but with the loss of ones who are ministers you still need the support of minor parties.
Both these factors allow for ongoing division along the two side model and for instability as minor parties hold much sway.
Of course, the factor we don't know about is just how much dirty play is involved. The Democrats played the card of reminding the people of the demonstrations and destruction of last year in Bangkok due to the Red Shirt demonstration but there was no mention of 91 Thais killed at the end of the same demonstrations. I live in a country where 91 citizens were murdered and nothing substantial has been done over a year later to see justice done.
We really don't know the whole story nor is the whole story being told.
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