Thai Vote Goes Smoothly as Protesters Regroup near Bangkok Lakes
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - Thailand was holding re-run elections on Sunday in five provinces where voting was disrupted in last month's poll by anti-government protesters trying to unseat Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and officials said all was going smoothly.
Dozens of gunshots and at least two explosions raised tension on the eve of the February 2 general election, which was seen as incapable of restoring stability in deeply polarized Thailand whatever the result.
Protesters were gathering in central Lumpini Park in Bangkok on Sunday, where many already sleep in tents alongside boating lakes, after protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban said they would abandon other sites in the city.
Some of the other protest sites were being dismantled but the elevated highway along the south side of Lumpini Park on the edge of Bangkok's financial district was still blocked, Reuters reported.
Election re-runs planned for April in other provinces have been suspended pending a court decision on procedures.
Voting was disrupted on February 2 in 18 percent of constituencies, 69 out of 375, nationwide, the Election Commission said, affecting 18 of 77 provinces.
Commission secretary-general Puchong Nutrawong said voting had gone ahead peacefully on Sunday.
The demonstrators, who have blocked intersections in the capital for weeks, say Yingluck must resign and make way for an appointed "people's council" to overhaul a political system they say has been taken hostage by her billionaire brother and former premier, Thaksin Shinawatra.
The election is almost certain to return Yingluck to power, thanks to her support base in the largely rural north and northeast, a result the opposition will never accept.
The result cannot change the dysfunctional status quo in a country popular among tourists and investors yet blighted by eight years of turmoil, pitting the Bangkok-based middle class and royalist establishment against the mostly poor, rural supporters of the Shinawatra family.
