Something stinks?

[PeteC]

How can a higher majority in the provinces than in Bangkok voice their opinion that they agreed with, and welcomed the coup? Something like 80% in BKK and 82 % in the provinces.

This is when Thaksin won the last two elections by 15-19 million votes with the majority of votes for him from those provinces?

Something is not right. Was the election commission so sly and corrupt that they were able to forge results without anyone having a clue? There were no international monitors here that I know of, and they haven't attended Thai elections for a long time.

Wouldn't it be something if it eventually comes out that his election victories were all a fraud. I think that could be interpreted as treason. Pete

[Handsome Buddha]

There are lies, damned lies & statistics.

[Hublet]

Your both on the money. The polls do not agree with the so called mandate.

Good sleuthing

[johnnyk]

Thais figure out quickly what people want to hear and then they tell them.
eg. "You hansum man..." etc etc

[Guess]

There is also the time scale factor.

People generally in Thailand are less interested in political issues than other countries in the world and only protest when something is serious wrong or the current regime has such a strong oponnent that he is able to rally the masses to support him and his peoposed regime changes. Once people had mass access to media such as TV it soon become apparent that political news information was of little interest, even though it was mainly govenment controlled anyway, and Thai Soaps and music programs became the staple diet of viewing for Thai families in the poor areas. Politics was boring and the King would look after things anyway. The one hundred plus baht (depending upon your status) gift to take people to the polling stations and ensure that their cross was put in the right place was hardly noticed the first time round and was probably not known about publicly elsewhere in Thailand. In addition to his Thaksin at that time hard a good PR machine and managed to get a slim majority with which he then merged with two other parties to gain overall control over the Democrats who retained their strongholds.

This was in 2001. (The term coallition has been used in Thai history not as I would use it). There is something awry with those statistics aswell.

In the period from the 2001 election early this year most of Thailand could only see the economic growth in terms of more motorcycles more trucks more cash to spend. This enormous group of about half the population at least had no complaints about the Thaksiun regime and talk of mass profits from the telcomms business would have meant little to them. (The activities of the large corporates in their relationship with politics is laregly not understood by the majority of voting layman in the West even when they are overwhelmed with media from many biased sources).

In the next election this year Thaksin stepped up his pay for vote campaign using a small fraction of the billions of baht made within the rapidly expanding telecomms market in Thailand. This along with sheer refusal of many Democrats to take part in what they considered to be a corrupt election enabled Thaksin to get a landslide victory. So to the outside world he was Mr. Clean and in charge of a country with one of the largest growth economies of the world and dragging his country from post war anti communist success followed by military turmoil into an ex British colonial type economy. So to the outside world and many inside Thailand everything was hunky dory and they had one of the best PMs in the world and they still had the King.

Sonti who had been associated with Thaksin in the early days of the formation of TRT knew different. He has been campaigning publicly since at least the last election to the people that all is not what it seems. He even managed to get his own TV station distributed through cable networks however this was not available in in many areas. I think it may have been just a case of the political leanings of the local cable operators that decide but I am not sure. It was available in Petchaburi but not Hua Hin in Prachuap.

This campaign has been building up steam steadily since the election with enormous crowds from all over Thailand but I think mainly from the South and local Bangkok residents. This along the the sell off of govenmet assets for personal gain was what I believe was the cause of the resignation. During this whole period there were many converts which may go someway to answering Pete's original question.

My belief that prior to the last election Thaksin would have had about a 35 to 40% genuine support with Bangkok being slightly more than the rest of Thailand. The anti Thaksin stance also was strengthened in the south where 2001 promises regarding the Muslim/Buddhist/Goverment conflict were not undertaken and Tsunami donations from around the world were not properly accounted for.

So as for Pete's comment about the Election Commision forging results, that is a possibility and I have heard cases of "You don't need to go anywhere just lend us you ID card and we will bring it back later and give you 200 baht." So on a localised basis the Election Commision was certainly corrupted or probab;y already corrupt by the lure of cash. If the indivuduals were gettin a minimum of 200 baht with the poy yai gettin thousands how much to you expect that the officials could cream off.

So in answer to your last statement Pete. Yes corruption took pace on a large scale but I have no evidence without the publicised statsitics at hand for both elections and current polls as to what level thay took place and to what degree. What I am sure about though is that Thaksin has never ever had a legitimate majority and I cannot believe that the UN have not picked up themselves the level of vote rigging in both elections. If this country had been located in Sub Saharan Africa it would have been crawling with blue helmeted troops and UN officals at every point. Either the UN are not aware (in which case it should be easy to rectify that one) or they are aware but are being silenced by their Western masters and fund raisers for some reason. I suspect the latter.

All of this information comes from independent sources, my own personal experiences and those of my wife and from people that we know who come from the poorer areas of Thailand.

[Jaime]

Of course, this all assumes that the polls have been taken from a meaningful sample of the population. And who conducted them? Would they have a vested interest (i.e not being incarcerated) in demonstrating that the coup enjoyed widespread support? Polls can be spurious at the best of times. In my opinion they are just as likely to be corrupted as the election results.

[PeteC]

Of course, this all assumes that the polls have been taken from a meaningful sample of the population. And who conducted them? Would they have a vested interest (i.e not being incarcerated) in demonstrating that the coup enjoyed widespread support? Polls can be spurious at the best of times. In my opinion they are just as likely to be corrupted as the election results.

A possibility Jaime, but remote I think. What I see on the ground here is genuine relief, and I could say happiness with what has happened. Everyone seems relaxed and hopeful. I hope it keeps up. Pete

[STEVE G]

Guess wrote:
Yes corruption took pace on a large scale but I have no evidence without the publicised statsitics at hand for both elections and current polls as to what level thay took place and to what degree.

I will second that, I have been up in the village in Issan during elections, and the whole thing is a big party due to the money being thrown about. You see elderly rice farmers, who have absolutely no interest in politics, going straight from the polling station to the noodle stand to buy whisky, laughing their heads off.

[Guess]

Of course, this all assumes that the polls have been taken from a meaningful sample of the population. And who conducted them? Would they have a vested interest (i.e not being incarcerated) in demonstrating that the coup enjoyed widespread support? Polls can be spurious at the best of times. In my opinion they are just as likely to be corrupted as the election results.

From afar and even relatively close by that may appear to be a distinct possibilty. I agree totally on the motivations of statistics.

To digress in order make a point: The Scottish Licensing Laws about 30 years ago were even more stringent than those of England. The Scottish Parliament reviewd the laws and extended the hours so that they exceded the English hours. A research company was later tasked by the British (UK) National Goverment to see what the effect had had on alcoholism, health, crime and all other alcohol related issues. In nearly all cases the findings were that by extending hours alcohol related problesm actually decreased. Soon after one of the leading newspapers in the UK who probably had the taste of sour grapes for not having been chosen to do the survet revealed that the company used to do the research was actually a subsiduary of the Distillers Corporation and Allied Breweries (later Diageo).

Of course the whole survey had to be discarded as there was an obvious motivation to rig the results.

In this case here in Thailand the stakes are much higher and the retribution potentially more lethal so it makes good sense that statistics would be rigged to suit the researchers own interests.

The difference here in my case, and I guess that of many of us here on this forum is that we either live here or like Jaime and many others, have direct links with Thailand. This way tou can see and her what people say for yourself even though I agree that the sample of the population may not be ideal. On the other hand though we are probably getting information from a sample that the research companies may well miss altogether and also many Bangkok middle class voters do not encounter. This section of the voting population also had a significant impact on the election results.

Anyway after all that speculative waffle, I believe both the fact thats votes for cash happened in both elections on a major scale and that statistics relating to the support for the "coup" could be falsified. However, as STEVE G has posted after my post and from many other people, I have heard convincing stories of vote rigging I have not met one single person who has been approached and asked what their opinion is of the "coup" either by person, email, internet or cellphone.

[Digger]

[quote="Guess"][
To digress in order make a point: The Scottish Licensing Laws about 30 years ago were even more stringent than those of England. The Scottish Parliament reviewd the laws and extended the hours so that they exceded the English hours. ]
Hi Guess: hate to go off at a tangent but know you would do the same to me as you have done in the past but do not think there was a Scottish Parliament 30 years ago but a united kingdom paliament full of Scots.rather like today.

[Guess]

T The Scottish Parliament reviewd the laws and extended the hours so that they exceded the English hours. ]
Hi Guess: hate to go off at a tangent but know you would do the same to me as you have done in the past but do not think there was a Scottish Parliament 30 years ago but a united kingdom paliament full of Scots.rather like today.

Sorry people Digger is right I should have said the Scottish department of State. The Scottish Parliament was not formed until 1999.

[Edd Case]

Come, come lads -

Scottish department of State -

- The Scottish Office surely!
That extra hour - killed off all the "lock-ins" - we got an extra hour and that was it - home to bed. At least now we have HHAD to while away the wee sma hours !!

[sargeant]

My girl cracked me up when the coup was happening seeing i was a bit worried she said

dont worry all stop stay same start again

i had to stop worrying as my sides hurt so much for larfing