Thai Opposition Leader Wants Election Delayed to Allow Reforms
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - Thai opposition leader Abhisit Vejjajiva on Saturday urged that a general election planned for July be delayed by up to six months to allow time for reforms aimed at ending a protracted political crisis that threatens to explode.
Protesters have been trying to oust Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra since November, part of a long-running crisis that broadly pits Bangkok's middle class and royalist establishment against the mainly poor, rural supporters of Yingluck and her brother, ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra.
Thaksin was ousted by the military in 2006 and now lives in exile to avoid a jail term handed down in 2008 for abuse of power. His opponents accuse him of corruption and nepotism, Reuters reported.
Thailand's Election Commission and Yingluck agreed on Wednesday to hold a general election on July 20, but anti-government protesters who disrupted a vote in February said they still wanted electoral reforms before a new poll.
Former Prime Minister Abhisit, who launched a mediation effort on April 24, told a news conference the vote should be delayed by five or six months while a committee thrashed out reforms that would be put to a referendum.
While that was being done, he wanted the country to be run by a neutral interim government with limited powers.
The panel should include representatives of the People's Democratic Reform Committee (PDRC), the protest group led by Suthep Thaugsuban, who was a deputy prime minister under Abhisit until 2011.
"I have said from the start that no side will get what they want 100 percent from what I am proposing. But ... the government will see an election, people will get to vote in the next five to six months. The PDRC protesters will get their neutral government," Abhisit said.
He said he would not be part of the reform committee and that no politician should sit on it, but he gave few details on its likely composition. He also said he would not take up a political position in future if his plan was accepted, although his medium-term intentions are unclear.
