EC to approve 95% of MPs Tuesday and Wednesday

EC to approve 95% of MPs Tuesday and Wednesday

The Election Commission will endorses at least 95% of constituency MPs on Tuesday. (Bangkok Post file photo)
The Election Commission will endorses at least 95% of constituency MPs on Tuesday. (Bangkok Post file photo)

The Election Commission (EC) met on Monday to review the last batch of election-related complaints and will likely endorse more than 95% of all MPs on Tuesday and Wednesday, according to an informed source.

The constitution requires at least 95%, or 475 of all 500 MPs, be endorsed on Thursday so Parliament can convene 15 days later, or by May 23. Senators, meanwhile, will be announced three days after the MPs are endorsed.

But since the EC still has to wait for the Constitutional Court's ruling on Wednesday morning on whether the party-list MP calculation formula it intends to use is constitutional, the 150 party-list MPs cannot be endorsed on Tuesday but rather late on Wednesday.

In any case, a source said if the EC endorsed 97% of the constituency MPs on Tuesday, it will use the same proportion in endorsing the list MPs the next day.  

In the meantime, political parties were watching closely to see if the EC would disqualify any winning MP candidates or revoke the status of any election candidates as the move affects the total votes won by each party and the calculation of its party-list seats.

So far, Surapol Kietchaiyakorn, a Pheu Thai candidate in Chiang Mai's Constituency 8, is the only winning candidate to have been disqualified by the EC for breaking the election campaign regulations.

A total of 17 election candidates have seen their status revoked. The votes they received were not used to calculate the party-list seats. 

The results are expected to announced on Wednesday.

The EC is required by law to endorse the MPs' names by Thursday. However, winning candidates can be disqualified any time over the period of a year if the EC finds any were guilty of violating the law. 

The source revealed that the EC did not discuss the case against Future Forward Party (FFP) leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit during yesterday's meeting. 

Mr Thanathorn was accused of having shares in a media company while applying to run in the general election, a prohibition for MP candidates. This could constitute a breach of Section 98 (3) of the constitution, which bars owners or shareholders of media and/or publishing companies from applying to be MPs.

Pundits expect the EC to endorse Mr Thanathorn's status as a party-list MP. If he is found to have violated the regulation, the EC will forward its decision to the Constitutional Court to revoke his status.

In a related development, Ruangkrai Leekitwattana, a former member of the already-dissolved Thai Raksa Chart Party, urged the EC on Monday not to announce the poll outcome until the court rules on the constitutionality of the EC's formula for calculating and distributing party-list seats. 

He said the EC still has more complaints involving the qualifications of election candidates to consider, so the agency should check everything carefully before endorsing the winners.

Mr Ruangkrai said he would petition the EC on Tuesday to look into the shareholdings of 10 other election candidates, and ask it to delay announcing the election results accordingly.

He said the EC should not rush to announce the result because the votes received by constituency candidates are tied to party-list seats.

"If the EC endorses the winners while doubts remain it may face lawsuits from various stake-holders," he said.

Meanwhile, the National Legislative Assembly (NLA) is expected to hold its final meeting on Tuesday, ahead of the announcement of the poll result, even though it is allowed to continue working until the new parliament convenes.

NLA member Somchai Sawaengkarn said the meeting would involve a bill on a national university.

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