In Thailand's high politics where governments survive or succumb, context is everything. After two decades of a political merry-go-round, marked by a series of elections, street protests, military coups, and judicial interventions only to end up with a problematic post-election rule under military domination, no deep expertise is needed to understand what has been happening in this land.
There have been two sides in Thailand's divide. Being on the wrong side -- the fault line being the established political order from the latter half of the last century that revolves around the military, monarchy, bureaucracy and judiciary -- means being knocked down time and again. At issue is whether this circular charade of Thai politics has reached a critical threshold where it may no longer be allowed to repeat itself.
Even casual observers of Thai politics would have noticed something strange recently when a brand new political party that had just been elected last March was dissolved in short order. This party, called Future Forward, might have been one of a kind in the world because none of its 81 members of the 500-strong lower house of parliament had been an elected representative before. It had never happened in Thailand that a new party with no veteran MPs had won so big.
The FFP won on a forward-looking agenda that appealed to younger voters against the military-led establishment, including the abolition of the draft, transparency and accountability of the military and its bloated budget and number of generals, decentralisation, inclusive development, education reforms, good governance, democracy and human rights, and so on. It was a plan for Thailand's future towards democratic development away from military-authoritarianism.
For its anti-establishment stand and reform proposals for a progressive future, the FFP was immediately slapped with more than two dozen charges after the election, from alleged electoral fraud to sedition and violations of this and that organic law and constitutional clauses. Its party symbol of an upside down triangle was likened to an ancient subversive cult known as the Illuminati. Not allowed to raise sufficient funds from e-commerce activities, FFP leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit provided a disclosed start-up loan of 191.3 million baht to the party, a move that led to the party's dissolution.
This is how contemporary Thai politics works. Charges are levelled by loyalists from both sides against key political players and parties. These charges then become kind of judicial buttons which can be exercised. If players in question behave and fall in line, no immediate prosecutorial harm is likely. But if they defy and challenge the establishment side, then all kinds of bad things can happen from party disbandment, a long-term ban from electoral politics, and criminal charges leading to jail time.
Although FFP was not the only party that needed start-up money, somehow it received all the scrutiny from state agencies. The other parties were financially lubricated in ways that have escaped due spotlight. The pro-military Palang Pracharath Party, for instance, organised a banquet and raised more than 600 million baht from private sector individuals, state enterprises and firms. Three companies under King Power group that own duty-free government concessions at major Thai airports altogether donated nearly 30 million baht.
But the Election Commission only saw wrongdoings with the FFP, never as yet with Palang Pracharath. It so happened that the EC members were appointed during the junta period in 2014-19. So were the occupants of the National Anti-Corruption Commission. A number of Constitutional Court judges harked back to the same military era. Unsurprisingly, the Constitutional Court did not allow the FFP to make a fuller defence of its case, seeing fit to rule on the party's dissolution just three days before the much-anticipated censure debate where the new party's leaders were on course to make a big impact in taking the government to task.
While the Illuminati case was dismissed on a lack of evidence in favour of the court's ostensible impartiality, the loan case struck down the party. But casual observers did not need to know that Section 66 of the Political Parties Act was invoked to rule that Mr Thanathorn's transparent start-up loan was equivalent to "other benefits", even though law experts elsewhere subsequently opined that a payable loan should not be considered as income. The 10-year ban on the party's leaders on its executive committee adds salt to the wound.
All of this has happened before. Earlier and more electorally successful political parties -- Thai Rak Thai and Palang Prachachon -- were similarly dismantled in 2007 and 2008. Their platform was not entirely similar to FFP to the extent that they catered to neglected rural segments of the electorate. The FFP was not about a pro-poor rural-focused agenda to address grievances from the latter half of the 20th century but a pro-youth platform to get rid of prolonged military-authoritarian rule and take Thailand forward into the 2020s and beyond.
Observers thus need not be confused by Thailand's convoluted politics. All they need to see is the forest, not so much its individual trees. Context matters so much that it is decisive. The names of parties and party leaders matter less than where they stand on the Thai fault line. If they are on the wrong side, they will lose. If they run, they may be able to stay away. If they stay, they may end up in jail.
The difference with Mr Thanathorn and his fellow leaders, unlike earlier precursors of the dissolved Thai Rak Thai and Palang Prachachon, is that these newcomers have shown no sign of fleeing. As criminal charges are in the offing, the prospect of them going to jail will likely heighten political temperatures.
Already their supporters among the younger generation have risen up in broad-based flash-mob protests across campuses and schools nationwide, a phenomenon not seen since 2005-06 when demonstrations erupted against the abuse of power and conflicts of interest under the Thaksin Shinawatra government. Surely the establishment side from the incumbent government, military and judiciary must think they can ride out yet another storm. But forestalling changes and reforms that are overdue in the 2020s will come at greater expense to Thailand and may no longer be put up with by the newer and younger voices that are being seen and heard.