Even before its peddlers in parliament made a panicky retreat, the expansive amnesty bill to absolve all those involved in Thailand's political conflict going back to 2004 already yielded longer-term ramifications.
Anti-government protesters shout slogans during their rally at Democracy Monument yesterday, despite calls from Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra to end the demonstration. EPA/RUNGROJ YONGRIT
Its handiwork seen widely as an exoneration of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra by way of letting others off the hook, the bill has been voted down in the Senate after being hastily passed in the Lower House. Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra with the support of government MPs has pledged not to revive it after the statutory 180-day pause expires. The demise and debacle of the government's gross amnesty misstep are instructive on several grounds.
First, the government's limited policy momentum has been deflated. Profligate and ill-conceived policies on rice pledging and car rebates for first-time buyers were already problematic and faced stiff resistance from the opposition Democrat Party and wide segments of the public. The signature plan to invest some 2 trillion baht via off-budget expenditures in massive national rail and road modernisation over seven years will now be tougher to see through, even with the popular Transport Minister Chadchart Sittipunt as chief engineer and salesman.
If Thailand's railways are revolutionised alongside some expansion and improvement of existing highways, the Thai economy could bank on the consequent multiplier effects from reduced transaction costs and efficiency gains for at least a decade. The downside of this grand plan to make Thailand the centre of gravity in mainland Southeast Asia centres on shoddy implementation and likely corruption and graft. Yet it is a promising policy that is worth a try in view of other options. But now it will be hindered by the political maelstrom generated by the anti-amnesty fury. The same can be said of the 350-billion-baht flood management plan, which has seen charges accepted by the Constitution Court for bidding irregularities.
Even though it came in with a clear electoral mandate, the Yingluck government has had a limited policy thrust because of Thailand's polarised political environment. Opposition forces have been formidable even if they cannot muster an electoral mandate of their own. In the wake of the amnesty controversy, the Yingluck government will now be hard-pressed to push through its major policy schemes.
Second, the principle of promulgating an acceptable amnesty under agreeable terms for all major political players is now stigmatised. The amnesty idea is unlikely to be revisited in parliament for at least the mandatory 180 days but its desirability and attractiveness as a way to resolve conflict and start anew from a relatively clean slate have now been tainted.
That the notion of amnesty has been discredited along with the aborted amnesty bill poses longer-term problems when myriad politicians, activists, security officers and members of the public from all sides across the political divide are tagged with criminal charges large and small relating to the political conflict over the past decade. At some point in the future, an amnesty that satisfies all sides will be needed for Thailand to regain its footing. It is now more difficult to get there because of the short-lived amnesty bill.
Moreover, the bit activists and minor players now in prison or on the run from criminal charges for taking part in political activities from Sept 19 2006 to May 10 2011 _ the proposed period in Worachai Hema's original amnesty draft before it was twisted by Thaksin's Pheu Thai Party loyalists, led by Prayuth Siripanich _ may now languish in jail indefinitely. In the Worachai draft, these peripheral participants from all sides, excluding the organisers and ringleaders, would be let go. But this is no longer the case. Some of them may feel more radicalised, not moving towards the centre of the political spectrum but farther to the fringes.
The third implication involves political parties and politicians. Thaksin's amnesty move surprised and baffled many who could have foreseen the backlash against it. It was not Thaksin's first major miscalculation. When he sold his Shin Corp business empire in late January 2006, Thaksin somehow did not figure that it was going to galvanise and embolden demonstrators to lay conditions that saw the back of him. Now the Thaksin-Yingluck working relationship will come into focus. Whether the brother's hubris and folly that nearly upended the sister's government will enable Yingluck to gain and come into her own more as a politician and whether Thaksin would allow it are key outcomes that should be watched. While the sibling dynamics are likely to have been impacted by Thaksin's amnesty manoeuvre, it is not yet clear whether Thaksin will keep at it with disregard for the Yingluck government's stability or whether she will be more assertive going forward.
The amnesty failure has also caused dissension in the Pheu Thai Party, whose constituency bases rest on the support of the red shirts under the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship. The red shirts were alienated and angry with Thaksin's amnesty bid but they quickly realigned with Pheu Thai and the Yingluck government when they sensed the anti-amnesty movement escalating into an outright government ouster bid. The red shirts as a social movement and Pheu Thai as Thaksin's party machine are still symbiotic but the red shirts and Thaksin are less cohesive and answerable to each other than before.
On the other side, the Democrat Party has had to do its own heavy lifting in the streets this time. The last time brinkmanship and confrontation on this scale transpired was in 2008 when the yellow shirts under the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) did the tough work in street demonstrations while the Democrats stood to gain in parliament once the pro-Thaksin party, prime ministers and politicians were sidelined by the Constitution Court.
But now the Democrats are an opposition party and a street mob at the same time, although its leading demonstrators such as Suthep Thaugsuban resigned from parliament to fully partake in street-based activism. Unlike the PAD's persistence in the streets over several months, the Democrats went for broke in several days in the hope of benefiting from the ICJ's decision on the Preah Vihear temple. Without a dire ICJ verdict and in view of the aborted amnesty bill, Democrat Party activists have lost some traction, although they may hope for a favourable Constitution Court decision next week on the constitutionality of charter amendments. The Democrats' aim is clearly to change the status quo but such an effort may not bode well for their election prospects. They also must be mindful and prepared for a snap poll in case their anti-government manoeuvres succeed in compelling Ms Yingluck to dissolve the Lower House.
Having lost policy momentum and credibility from the amnesty fallout, Prime Minister Yingluck can show responsibility and consider an earlier rather than later election if she survives this round of political turbulence into 2014. A new mandate can be sought after August next year, which would bring her premiership beyond three years in a four-year term, a sensible time to see how Thais would decide again in light of all that has happened since Ms Yingluck assumed office.
Thitinan Pongsudhirak is associate professor of International Political Economy and director of the Institute of Security and International Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University.