\n<\/p>\n
Bangkok, Thailand <\/strong>\u2013 A court is poised to decide whether Thailand\u2019s most consequential and controversial political figure of the past 25 years, Thaksin Shinawatra, insulted the country\u2019s revered monarchy, a crime that can land a culprit in jail for up to 15 years.<\/p>\n The charge, under Thailand\u2019s strict \u201clese-majeste\u201d royal defamation law, stems from an interview the 76-year-old business tycoon and former prime minister gave to a South Korean newspaper in 2015 regarding a military coup that toppled his sister and then-Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra in 2014.<\/p>\n Though holding no official role in government, Thaksin remains a towering figure bearing over Thailand\u2019s stormy politics, and the verdict on Friday will test the state of his long-fraught relationship with the country\u2019s powerful royalist establishment.<\/p>\n \u201cThe prosecution is of great political significance,\u201d said Verapat Pariyawong, a Thai law and politics scholar at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) University of London.<\/p>\n \u201cIf found innocent, Mr Thaksin would rely on the verdict as proof that he has always been a loyalist, contrary to the accusations by his political opponents which inflamed conflicts over the past two decades,\u201d Verapat told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n A guilty verdict, on the other hand, could \u201ctrigger a new round of political conflicts\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cSome would see it as a breakdown of the so-called grand compromise that paved the way for Mr Thaksin\u2019s return to Thailand, and undoubtedly many will link the guilty verdict to other pending major court decisions not just against Mr Thaksin but also his daughter and suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n After 15 years in self-imposed exile, Thaksin returned to Thailand in 2023.<\/p>\n That lengthy absence from Thailand helped him to avoid a prison sentence on a prior corruption charge, though he was still forced to complete a commuted term in custody on his return home.<\/p>\n His latest tribulations stem from a royal defamation charge in June 2024, and he is also on trial for allegedly faking ill health in order to serve his sentence for corruption outside of jail.<\/p>\n Thaksin\u2019s daughter and currently the country\u2019s suspended prime minister, Paetongtarn, is being prosecuted for an alleged breach of ethics over a leaked phone call with Cambodia\u2019s former prime minister and strongman Hun Sen.<\/p>\n A court suspended Paetongtarn from her duties as premier on ethical grounds last month after Hun Sen leaked their phone conversation, in which the Thai prime minister spoke reverentially to the Cambodian leader.<\/p>\n During the call, Paetongtarn referred to Hun Sen as \u201cuncle\u201d and criticised a Thai army commander.<\/p>\n Her political adversaries and other people said it was unbecoming of a Thai premier to have addressed a foreign leader so deferentially, and criticising the military is also a red line in a country where the politically powerful armed forces are held in high esteem.<\/p>\n A court is due to rule in Paetongtarn\u2019s case on August 29, a verdict which could see her removed from office permanently.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Thaksin\u2019s path to the pinnacle of Thai politics started modestly, with a stretch in the national police force beginning in the early 1970s.<\/p>\n With the help of a government scholarship, he earned a master\u2019s degree and then a doctorate in criminal justice in the United States before returning to public service in Thailand and resigning from the police force as a lieutenant colonel in 1987.<\/p>\n Leveraging his professional contacts, Thaksin tried his hand at a number of business ventures before striking gold in telecommunications, founding and, in time, building his Shin Corp into an industry leader.<\/p>\n It also launched Thaksin onto Thailand\u2019s richest list.<\/p>\n Last month, Forbes ranked Thaksin 11th among the country\u2019s wealthiest families or people, with a personal net worth of $2.1bn.<\/p>\n In the 1990s, Thaksin started parlaying his business success into a political career, founding his first of many parties by the end of the decade.<\/p>\n On the back of a populist platform that promised affordable healthcare and debt relief, he landed in the prime minister\u2019s office with a resounding general election win in 2001 and another in 2005.<\/p>\n But mounting scandals cut his second four-year term short.<\/p>\n Amid accusations of corruption over the $1.9bn sale of Shin Corp and an unrelated land deal that prompted mass protests, the Thai military removed Thaksin and his government in a 2006 coup.<\/p>\n A Thai court convicted him over the land deal the next year. To avoid jail, he fled into self-imposed exile in 2008.<\/p>\n Wanwichit Boonprong, a Rangsit University lecturer, says Thaksin had made powerful enemies within the country\u2019s military \u2013 a force that has grown accustomed to managing its internal affairs largely independent of the government \u2013 by trying to steer the appointment and transfer of high-ranking officers.<\/p>\n By seeming to meddle in the military\u2019s work, Wanwichit told Al Jazeera, Thaksin raised fears that he was bent on both \u201cundermining the military and weakening the monarchy\u201d.<\/p>\n The military has long prided itself as the ultimate protector of the Thai monarchy, a touchstone of the country\u2019s influential conservative movement.<\/p>\n Thaksin also pulled off the rare feat in 2005 of winning enough seats in the House of Representatives to form a government without the need for any coalition partners, making him uncommonly potent as a political force.<\/p>\n That popularity scared his critics, says Khemthong Tonsakulrungruang, an assistant professor at Chulalongkorn University.<\/p>\n \u201cThat popularity, combined with his quick and outspoken manner, raised a lot of people\u2019s suspicion that he might want to or he might try to compete with King Bhumibol [Adulyadej],\u201d he said.<\/p>\n While there was little, if any, proof to back that up, Khemthong said, \u201cit became a very convenient tool to mobilise people\u201d against Thaksin.<\/p>\n Army officials take pictures in front of Thailand\u2019s then-King Bhumibol Adulyadej\u2019s portrait as people gather to mark his 88th birthday, in Bangkok in 2015 [File: Jorge Silva\/Reuters]<\/p>\n But even in exile overseas, Thaksin continued to dominate Thai politics.<\/p>\n Parties tied to the Shinawatra family kept winning elections and forming governments, only to be thwarted by the military or the courts each time.<\/p>\n With a prison sentence hanging over him, the tech mogul stayed abroad for 15 years, until returning to Bangkok to cheering crowds on August 22, 2023.<\/p>\n Before leaving the airport, Thaksin ostentatiously prostrated himself before a portrait of the country\u2019s new king, Maha Vajiralongkorn, son of the late King Bhumibol.<\/p>\n The very same day, the Shinawatras\u2019s latest party, Pheu Thai, secured the premiership for its candidate, Srettha Thavisin, by backing out of a planned coalition with the more progressive Move Forward party, which had won that year\u2019s general election.<\/p>\n Pheu Thai rejected speculation that it had struck a \u201cgrand bargain\u201d with the conservative establishment by pulling away from Move Forward, which had campaigned on reining in the military and the monarchy\u2019s powers, in exchange for Thaksin\u2019s safe return.<\/p>\n However, only nine days later, King Vajiralongkorn commuted Thaksin\u2019s prison sentence from eight years to one, and he was out on parole within months. He had also spent his entire six months in custody in a private room in the luxury wing of a state hospital.<\/p>\n Now, with Thaksin on the brink of another conviction that could again send him to jail, the \u201cgrand bargain\u201d is seen to be fraying.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of people understand that when Thaksin came back he would lay low, that he was allowed to come back but he wasn\u2019t allowed to be politically active, he should stay at home, be quiet. But instead of that he was super active,\u201d said Chulalongkorn University\u2019s Khemthong.<\/p>\n Despite having no official role in the Pheu Thai party or the government it now leads, Thaksin has spent little time out of the spotlight since returning home less than two years ago \u2013 proposing grand policy prescriptions at public fora, touring constituencies with reporters in tow, conferring with domestic and international leaders alike.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, a lot of people speculate that the [defamation] charge was to put more control over him, to control his behaviour, his political activism,\u201d Khemthong said.<\/p>\n Thaksin\u2019s continued high-profile lifestyle has also led to the popular belief that he, not his daughter, is still the real power behind the party, and by extension the government.<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone knows that Thaksin is the spiritual leader and the real owner of the Pheu Thai Party,\u201d said Rangsit University\u2019s Wanwichit.<\/p>\n \u201cUsing this [defamation] case is akin to trying to keep Thaksin in check in the conservative power play,\u201d and amounts to insisting that \u201che must obey the conservatives\u2019 established guidelines,\u201d Wanwichit added.<\/p>\n Critics of Thailand\u2019s royal defamation law, or of how the courts use it, say it has long been swung like a cudgel against threats \u2013 real or imagined \u2013 to the conservative establishment\u2019s political power and privilege.<\/p>\n The law, under Section 112 of the Criminal Code, prescribes up to 15 years in jail for anyone who \u201cdefames, insults or threatens\u201d the king, queen, heir apparent or regent.<\/p>\n But Verapat, of SOAS, says many have \u201cfallen victim\u201d to the courts\u2019 \u201cexpansive interpretation\u201d of the law.<\/p>\n In January 2024, the country\u2019s Constitutional Court ruled that the Move Forward party had breached the law by promoting a bill that proposed limits on how it could be used.<\/p>\n The panel of judges accused the party of harbouring a hidden agenda to undermine the country\u2019s constitutional monarchy and ordered Move Forward to disband as a political movement.<\/p>\n When thousands of protesters took to the streets of Bangkok through much of 2020, calling on the military-aligned government at the time to step down, their list of demands grew to include reforms meant to rein in the monarchy\u2019s alleged influence over politics in the military\u2019s favour.<\/p>\n Since then, more than 280 people have been charged under Section 112, according to Thai Lawyers for Human Rights, a local advocacy group.<\/p>\n Among the most prominent of the 2020 protesters was lawyer Arnon Nampa, who has been sentenced to a cumulative 27 years and eight months following his 10th conviction on a royal defamation charge in July.<\/p>\n Thai Lawyers for Human Rights has called the use of the law \u201ca form of violence against those who exercise their right to freedom of expression\u201d.<\/p>\n The defamation case against Thaksin, which is based on a 10-year-old interview in which he criticised no one strictly covered by Section 112, fits into that same, expansive \u201cmodus operandi\u201d, Chulalongkorn University\u2019s Khemthong said.<\/p>\n Whichever way the verdict goes on Friday, analysts say the fallout for Thaksin and the Shinawatra family is unlikely to be immediately known, as either side can and probably will appeal.<\/p>\n Khemthong said the case against Thaksin could continue to drag out for months, if not a year or more.<\/p>\n Rangsit University\u2019s Wanwichit concurred.<\/p>\n \u201cThe appeals court battle will likely continue regardless of the verdict,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Bangkok, Thailand \u2013 A court is poised to decide whether Thailand\u2019s most consequential and controversial political figure of the past 25 years, Thaksin Shinawatra, insulted the country\u2019s revered monarchy, a crime that can land a culprit in jail for up to 15 years. The charge, under Thailand\u2019s strict \u201clese-majeste\u201d royal defamation law, stems from an<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17116,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[1844,1316,10280,8588,150,124,125,10282,6334,10281,6130],"class_list":{"0":"post-17115","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics","8":"tag-case","9":"tag-due","10":"tag-expm","11":"tag-insult","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-politics","14":"tag-royal","15":"tag-shinawatra","16":"tag-thailands","17":"tag-thaksin","18":"tag-verdict"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Power player<\/h2>\n
\u2018Super active\u2019<\/h2>\n
\u2018Court battle\u2019<\/h2>\n