The Constitutional Court on Wednesday granted the opposition Move Forward Party (MFP) a 15-day extension to submit a written defence in the party dissolution case against it. The new deadline falls on May 18.
The original deadline was April 18 but the party requested a 30-day extension. The court initially approved only 15 days — until May 3 — which Move Forward said was insufficient to gather all the evidence it needs to defending itself against the petition filed by the Election Commission (EC).
The court on April 3 accepted a petition from the poll body seeking the dissolution of Move Forward because of its stated policy to amend the contentious royal defamation law, or Section 112 of the Criminal Code.
Under Section 92 of the Political Parties Act, the EC is empowered to propose dissolution of a party if it has evidence of an act deemed hostile to the democratic regime with the King as head of state.
The EC was acting in response to a Jan 31 Constitutional Court ruling that found the Move Forward policy constituted an attempt to undermine the constitutional monarchy. It ordered the party to cease all pubic advocacy for changes to the lese-majeste law.
The judges pointed to the past actions of Pita Limjaroenrat, the party’s former leader, as well as those of other members, including applications to grant bail for suspects in lese-majeste cases.
Wednesday’s court decision came as good news to the party, after leader Chaithawat Tulathon told a meeting on Tuesday that he believed the court would probably approve the extension.
Move Forward won the May 14, 2023, election with 151 House seats but was unable to form a coalition with the runner-up Pheu Thai Party. The latter said it would be impossible to obtain the support of the unelected Senate as long as amending Section 112 remained a core policy of Move Forward.
However, Move Forward refused to budge and Pheu Thai went ahead to form a new coalition. Move Forward now leads the opposition.
Move Forward’s predecessor, the Future Forward Party, was dissolved in 2020 by the charter court following an EC complaint about a campaign finance violation.