'Maybe". That was the most up-to-date hint Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha gave to the press corps yesterday when asked whether he will enter the political fray.
In fact, this probability moved closer to reality with the launch of his Facebook, Instagram and Twitter accounts this week. One no longer really needs to second-guess whether he will enter the race in the upcoming general election tentatively planned for Feb 24.
Surasak Glahan is Deputy Editorial Pages Editor, Bangkok Post.
However, while Gen Prayut's political future becomes ever clearer, the odds of the election descending into a sham are rising. Definitely maybe, so to speak.
Unless Gen Prayut has a last-minute change of heart, anyone looking forward to a "free and fair" election, after more than four years of military rule under the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO), may need to look beyond the Feb 24 poll.
In the four months leading up to the poll, nothing about it seems like it will even be close to being free and fair given the current list of dos and don'ts -- the rules set by the NCPO, followed by the Election Commission (EC) and applied under different standards to different political parties.
In a tweet late on Tuesday, the premier declared that he opened social media accounts including Twitter "so everyone can have a chance to see what I can do".
Gen Prayut's quest for a second term could involve being put on the prime ministerial candidate list of the newly established pro-NCPO party, Palang Pracharath, ahead of the poll. For now, it is not a matter of "if" but "when" he will publicly confirm his decision to join the party.
Alternatively, he could wait to be nominated as an outsider PM if parliament fails to pick one from the party lists, following the election.
Both options have been made possible by the constitution, thanks to charter drafters handpicked by the NCPO.
While the NCPO is still barring parties from campaigning, including any activities conducted via social media, Gen Prayut and his four ministers, who are executives of Palang Pracharath, have been on a series of road trips meeting the electorate and promoting the government's Pracharat (people-state) policy.
Even for novice political observers, such activities on the ground have obvious political implications. They benefit Palang Pracharath, whether or not Gen Prayut is nominated as its prime ministerial candidate.
And as politicians cry foul and whine about the "unfair" game this election is becoming, Gen Prayut's launch of his social media accounts just gives them more reason to be resentful.
As for the EC, which has five of its seven members selected by the NCPO-appointed National Legislative Assembly, it gave Gen Prayut's social media blitz its blessing.
EC chairman Itthiporn Boonprakong insisted yesterday it is not political campaigning. That means the poll agency does not consider that Gen Prayut's actions violate his own political ban which is still largely applicable to other political parties.
And while the EC has given an immediate green light to the premier, it has taken actions which appear to wilfully jeopardise the future of certain anti-regime political parties, such as Pheu Thai and Future Forward.
It is now probing an allegation that Pheu Thai broke the law governing political parties by allowing an outsider, Thaksin Shinawatra, to control the party from abroad. The allegation stems from a video call that some of its core members had with the ousted premier earlier this year. If found guilty, the party risks being dissolved.
Of course, the law was invented by the regime-appointed lawmakers in an effort to drive out Thaksin's influence in the party and Thai politics. Even though the EC lacks hard evidence to prove the case, Pheu Thai's future is in limbo given that the party, under different names, has been disbanded twice in recent history.
In 2006, Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai Party was dissolved by the Constitutional Court for illegally bankrolling smaller parties in order to make the April 2006 elections appear legitimate. Following the dissolution, the party's members moved to the People Power Party (PPP). But the PPP was dissolved in December 2008 for election fraud allegedly committed by its deputy leader Yongyuth Tiyapairat. Pheu Thai was the reincarnation of the PPP.
At the same time, the EC does not seem too keen to probe whether Palang Pracharath could have benefited from the influence of an outsider, the Sam Mitr political group which has been actively poaching former MPs of other parties into the fold of the pro-regime party.
For the party, whose name is pronounced the same as the government's populist policy, nothing appears to stand in its way. For anti-regime parties, it is a different story.
The road to the election is also thorny for Future Forward, led by former business tycoon and political activist Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit. Last week, the party received a call from the EC warning it to not sell merchandise such as caps and T-shirts to raise funds. The reason? It breaks the NCPO's political ban. Later on, it backtracked saying donations are okay but each party needs prior approval from the NCPO.
As a new party, Future Forward needs this legitimate fundraising, a type of activity which will also be forbidden once the royal decree on the election is effective, likely in January. If the regime says "no" to its fundraising, the party will not have the money to campaign.
Like Pheu Thai's leaders, Future Forward's executives are facing potential criminal lawsuits following complaints brought against them by the NCPO's legal team for their criticism of the regime. With these threats along with the restrictions on campaigning, both parties will be fighting an election contest on a far from level playing field against Palang Pracharath and its potential prime ministerial candidate, Gen Prayut.
In the worst-case scenario, should they end up being dissolved or facing a dissolution case ahead of the election, the 2019 poll will be a sham. Even If they survive, it will still be far from a free and fair contest unless Gen Prayut leaves politics for good.