People’s Party leader Natthaphong Ruengpanyawut speaks during a press conference, announcing a new political party, in Bangkok, Thailand, on August 9, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Thailand’s disbanded Opposition Move Forward Party unveiled a new leadership and political vehicle on Friday (August 9, 2024) that will become the biggest party in Parliament, naming it People’s Party and promising to advance its predecessor’s progressive platform.

The anti-establishment Move Forward, which won most seats in the last election but was blocked from forming a government, was dissolved by the Constitutional Court on August 7, 2024, which ruled its plan to amend a law that shields the royal family from criticism risked undermining democracy and the constitutional monarchy.

Thailand’s turbulent politics over two decades: A timeline

All 143 surviving Move Forward lawmakers have joined the new party to be led by 37-year-old Natthaphong Ruengpanyawut, a former executive of a cloud software company who joined Move Forward in 2019.

“We will carry on Move Forward’s ideology. The mission for me and the party is to create a government for change in 2027,” Mr. Natthaphong told a press conference.

The dissolution, which was criticised by the United States, Britain and European Union, was the latest salvo in a two-decade battle for power in Thailand that broadly pits its conservative establishment and royalist military against popularly elected parties.

Move Forward’s liberal agenda has won massive support from young and urban voters, but earned it some powerful enemies, with plans that include reforming the military and dismantling business monopolies worth billions of dollars each year.

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Its bid to amend a law on royal insults was its undoing, riling influential generals and royalists with far-reaching connections, who see the monarchy as sacrosanct.

Though the court in a January ruling ordered Move Forward to drop its campaign, Mr. Natthaphong said the new party would continue the push to change the law, known as article 112, though with caution.

Thailand’s lese-majeste law one of the world’s strictest of its kind, with punishments of up to 15 years for each perceived insult of the crown. The palace typically does not comment on the law.

“We have said we propose to amend article 112 to ensure that this law is not a political tool used to abuse others, but we won’t be careless,” Mr. Natthaphong said. “I think we will continue to push for the improvement and fixing of this law, which is still problematic.”

Mr. Natthaphong is a graduate in computer engineering and was Move Forward’s deputy secretary-general, working on the party’s digital policies, which were key to its election win.

The People’s Party is the third incarnation of the Future Forward, which was dissolved for a campaign financing violation in 2020, triggering nationwide anti-government protests.

Former leader of Move Forward Party, Pita Limjaroenrat, center, shakes hands with his supporters at Move Forward Party headquarters in Bangkok.
| Photo Credit: AP

Thailand’s most popular politician, Pita Limjaroenrat, was banned from politics for 10 years and his party dissolved on Wednesday over his attempt to reform the kingdom’s archaic royal defamation laws. The country has been mired in cyclical political crises since a military coup in 2006.

The Constitutional Court said it voted unanimously to dissolve the party because its campaign proposal to amend the law amounted to an attempt to overthrow the nation’s constitutional monarchy.

The Move Forward Party was unable to form a government after topping the polls because members of the Senate, at that time a conservative military-appointed body, refused to endorse its candidate for prime minister.

Here is a look at the turbulent two decades that led to the pivotal decision by the Constitutional Court.

A general view of Thailand Senate. (File photo used for representational purpose only.)
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Forty caretaker senators on May 17 petitioned Thailand’s Constitutional Court to dismiss Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin over a Cabinet appointment which they say breaches the constitution.

The senators object to the appointment of Pichit Chuenban, a former lawyer, as Minister to Mr. Srettha’s office last month during a Cabinet reshuffle.

Mr. Pichit was jailed for six months in 2008 for contempt of court after an alleged attempt to bribe court officials with two million baht ($55,218) [($1 = 36.2200 baht)] hidden in a paper grocery bag. His law licence was suspended for five years by the Lawyers Council of Thailand after the incident.

The senators said they were seeking a court ruling on whether Mr. Pichit has the integrity and ethical standards required by the constitution to hold a Ministerial position and whether Mr. Srettha had breached the law by making the appointment.

“Pichit is not qualified to be a Minister but the Prime Minister still nominated him for the position,” Senator Derekrid Janekrongtham told Reuters. “The Prime Minister’s action may therefore breach ethical standards as well,” he said.

Government critics say Mr. Pichit was appointed to the Cabinet due to his close relationship with a client, ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who returned to Thailand last year after 15 years in exile. Mr. Thaksin still wields considerable political influence over the government.

Government spokesman Chai Wacharonke dismissed the senators’ accusation, and said the government had carefully vetted Mr. Pichit’s qualification. “Our legal team insists that the appointment is lawful and there is no problem with his qualification,” Mr. Chai told Reuters.

The 40 senators, whose term ended earlier this month but who remain as caretakers until a new selection process is completed in July, are part of an appointed Upper House of Parliament introduced by the military when it changed Thailand’s constitution after a 2014 coup.

Last year, the same senators closed ranks with military-backed parties to block the anti-establishment Move Forward party from forming a government.