Anfrel: Thaksin got most news coverage

Thai radio and television was biased in favour of the ruling party during the election and the government must come up with guidelines to ensure equal time, an election observer group said yesterday.

``All you saw was the face of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra,'' said Damaso Magbual, team leader of the Asian Network for Free Elections (Anfrel).

``Eighty-two per cent of the population get their information from television and radio alone, which means they do not read any print media. The access to electronic media must be better distributed.''

Mr Damaso said a timesharing method of distributing air-time was effectively used in Europe, and even in countries such as Cambodia and Sri Lanka.

Anfrel is a Bangkok-based regional network of election monitoring and human rights organisations.

The group deployed six long-term observers and 39 short-term observers in 20 Thai provinces before and during the Feb 6 election, and visited more than 350 polling stations and 30 counting centres. Observers in the Anfrel team came from 17 countries.

Mr Damaso also said the heavy military presence in the troubled deep South prevented political parties from getting their message across.

However, Mr Damaso said, the election-day turnout in the South was high, voters seemed confident and the polling process was generally acceptable.

Anfrel coordinator Somsri Hananuntasuk said observers in the far South reported many voters did not know who candidates were and cast votes out of anger.

``There was basically no campaigning, and because of the 6pm curfew there were no campaign rallies,'' said Ms Somsri.

Warin Thiamcharas, of the People's Network for the Election, said with or without adequate discussion of party policies, southerners would still vote for the Democrats since the Thai Rak Thai had created a bad image for itself.

``People from the South also want to see a balanced parliament. That is why the majority came out to support the opposition party,'' he said.