So the circus-like referendum came and went. And the vote came down decidedly on the side of the junta government.The constitution drafters and supporters are understandably ecstatic. Their work in drafting the country's supreme law will not go to waste, and, with the public mandate on its side, the junta can now carry on with its national reform agenda and returning the country to a democratic path.
But while the results of the vote are clear, their meaning is murky at best. Analysts are poring over the results, trying to decipher what the voters mean or want from the ballot. Is it their belief that the charter would be an effective antidote to government corruption? Are they simply fed up with the colour-coded political conflict and happy with the military-imposed peace and order? Do they admire Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha as a strong leader and trust he will steer the ship of state to a more prosperous future?
Are they really happy with the draft constitution as it is? Have they read the document and understand what it says? Or do they just want to have an election soon and return the country to normalcy at all costs?
Western observers and journalists find it incomprehensible that the majority would accept a document that would impose restrictions on their basic rights.
Wasant Techawongtham is former News Editor, Bangkok Post.
But such incomprehension stems largely from a Western perspective based on respect for basic human rights that they have internalised since childhood.
That's just not so for Thais. Thai society has been under a patriarchal and patronage system for much of its history. As a result, most Thais grew up under values quite different from those in Western societies.
We are a culture of macho men. To live under a strong and tough leader and to obey his authority is as natural as eating rice so long as we can expect favours in return. This could be promises of peace and order, stability, personal safety or social welfare.
Freedom of speech, political franchise, human rights and public participation are abstract ideas that have little relevance when the people have to struggle daily to subsist or compete in the marketplace. You may recall that not long ago polls found that large numbers of Thais don't mind corruption so long as they, too, could benefit from it. That must also be baffling to the Western audience.
Call it lack of principles, if you will. But Thais are pragmatic people, not unlike those in most other developing countries. China's late statesman Deng Xiaoping's saying is often quoted to justify this pragmatism: "It doesn't matter whether a cat is black or white as long as it catches mice."
Because of this pragmatism, Thais can be quite contradictory as well and it's maddening. A lot of people accepted the draft constitution because they believed the moniker given it by the drafters as the "corruption-bashing constitution".
It does not matter that the draft supreme law only targets tainted politicians to prevent them from entering the political arena while tackling bureaucratic corruption is conspicuously absent. Everybody knows, of course, that politicians could not do their corrupt deeds without the cooperation of their bureaucratic minions. People don't seem to be bothered either that alleged corruption cases by the military have never been investigated in full by corruption watchdogs.
However, for people whose livelihoods are threatened by development projects such as mining operations, petroleum concessions, and coal-fired power plants, the concept of rights suddenly takes a firmer shape. These people were just as nonchalant whether they had rights in the past. But they became educated quickly after being subjected to the cruelty of development, which is largely the fruits of collaboration between industry and the state apparatus.
Under the junta-sponsored constitution, citizens cannot be certain what rights they have and will have little leverage in protecting them. The power to define citizens' rights and to defend them is vested in the government. The drafters call that progress. So it's at the government's discretion on how broad to define citizens' rights and how forcefully to protect them. That does not bode well for the grassroots, especially now that the draft constitution has gained public approval and more intense development under the junta's stewardship is likely to come online.
The short history of the current military regime is not on the side of the grassroots. When it launched numerous projects that required massive investment and threatened villagers' livelihoods as well as the environment, it did not see fit to seek public consultation and participation. Consequently, more confrontations are likely to ensue.
Meanwhile, the goal of achieving reconciliation between colour-coded parties, which was the supposed reason of the military intervention in the first place, seems more remote than ever.
As state power is being consolidated in its hands, the military becomes a potential party in the conflict with not just the red shirts but also with a large segment of civil society and socially-minded academics.
More troubling still is the rise of the student movement from the ashes which has so far eluded the attention of analysts. Small groups of student activists have been playing a visible yet insignificant role opposing military rule so far. But if the military and the government after the next election are unable or seen to be negligent in achieving national reform as promised, we may see increasing activism that harks back to the Oct 14, 1973 student movement.