It is now apparent who was more expendable between the Palang Pracharath Party (PPRP) and the United Thai Nation (UTN) Party in the eyes of Pheu Thai.
Thamanat: Broke ties with Prawit
Although the two parties were looked upon as two tributaries of the same river, their origins were starkly different, which ultimately explained how dispensable they were.
The new cabinet has seen itself take the unusual step of incorporating just half a party in the government. The party in question is the beleaguered and fractured PPRP.
Once the most powerful party in the Prayut Chan-o-cha administrations, the PPRP shrank to become a medium-sized party with 40 MPs to its name in the general election last year.
During the course of the Paetongtarn cabinet formation, the PPRP experienced its worst internal rift yet which culminated in the breakaway of a 20-MP faction led by former party secretary-general Capt Thamanat Prompow.
Capt Thamanat declared he had severed ties with a figure he profoundly respected, a reference to PPRP leader Gen Prawit Wongsuwon. It is widely believed the split came when Gen Prawit's faction reportedly sent its choice of PPRP's ministerial candidates to Pheu Thai without consulting Capt Thamanat first .
The Thamanat-led group was offered three seats in the cabinet. However, oddly enough, the quota also covered the agriculture portfolio now with Narumon Pinyosinwat, leader of the Kla Dharma Party and a former PPRP politician, according to an observer.
Capt Thamanat, with a questionable background on account of his criminal conviction in Australia for a drug offence in the 1990s, passed the agriculture post to Ms Narumon who has been closely linked to him since the early days of the PPRP.
At the same time, the Prawit faction has been driven out of the government. The party leader has reportedly said he and the Thamanat faction will remain together in the PPRP for a long time despite their differences. The Thamanat camp will not be free to defect to another party with their MP status intact unless they are expelled from the party.
Capt Thamanat and his faction have quite a few parties they could defect to if they are booted out of the PPRP. One could be Kla Dharma, and the other is Pheu Thai, a party to which Capt Thamanat was formerly affiliated.
"So, it would be a warm homecoming for Capt Thamanat and his bloc if he eventually made up his mind to rejoin Pheu Thai after years with the PPRP," the observer said.
Meanwhile, the position Prawit's faction, which has reluctantly ended up in the opposition, is in stark contrast to another party, the UTN which has remained in the coalition.
The observer said some people are curious to know how the UTN has managed to remain in two consecutive Pheu Thai-led governments -- the Srettha Thavisin and Paetongtarn administrations.
This is despite the two conservative parties tracing their roots back to the Prayut Chan-o-cha governments which Pheu Thai is fiercely critical of.
The UTN, founded by Gen Prayut in the latter half of his last four-year tenure as premier in 2021, broke away from PPRP following a foiled plot, allegedly engineered by Capt Thamanat, to overthrow Gen Prayut as prime minister in a no-confidence debate in 2021.
Some PPRP members were also displeased with Gen Prayut, accusing him of being aloof and not making an effort to draw closer to those in the then ruling party.
The PPRP and Gen Prayut drifted so far apart that it was impossible for them to reconcile their differences. Gen Prayut proceeded to register the UTN which attracted a number of members from within the PPRP.
Although critics generally branded the two parties as fruit from the same "poisonous tree" -- a reference to the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) headed by Gen Prayut, which toppled the Pheu Thai-led government in 2014 -- former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, dubbed Pheu Thai's de facto leader, is known have animosity towards Gen Prawit and his faction.
Thaksin's negative feelings have to do with Gen Prawit's refusal to keep his ambition to become prime minister in check. His perceived desire to assume the top post at an opportune time was construed as a constant, lurking threat to Pheu Thai. The observer said Thaksin must have thought the Prawit faction had gone too far with what he believed was a clandestine move by Gen Prawit to oust Mr Srettha as premier.
The accusation was that Gen Prawit worked behind the scenes to have 40 former senators petition the Constitutional Court to demand Mr Srettha's removal on the grounds he appointed ex-convict Pichit Chuenban to the cabinet. The court found Mr Srettha guilty of breaching ethics and dismissed him.
Gen Prawit's supporters, however, rejected the accusation, maintaining the former senators, although handpicked by the NCPO, had no links with Gen Prawit.
He, along with Gen Prayut and former interior minister Gen Anupong Paojinda, were the "Three Por" generals who were instrumental in the 2014 coup.
The observer said the rumour going around while a replacement for Mr Srettha was being mulled by Pheu Thai was that Gen Prawit was manoeuvring to enlist support from some coalition parties and the main opposition Move Forward Party to become premier.
The alleged plan did not succeed. However, it might have made Thaksin even more suspicious of Gen Prawit.
On the other hand, UTN leader Pirapan Salirathavibhaga has not exhibited, at least overtly, a desire to be prime minister. The UTN's ties with Gen Prayut are also no cause for concern for Pheu Thai now that he has been named a privy councillor, a position that demands absolute independence from politics.
A party fighting for survival
Prawit: Crucial to PPRP's survival
A deep internal rift is casting doubts over the Palang Pracharath Party's (PPRP) future, but some observers believe the party will survive as long as its leader, Gen Prawit Wongsuwon, stays involved in politics -- at least until the next general election.
The party is currently split into two factions: one loyal to Gen Prawit, who was excluded from the latest Pheu Thai-led government, and the other supporting former secretary-general Capt Thamanat Prompow, who declared its split from the PPRP but remains with the party so its members retain their MP status.
Capt Thamanat's 20-MP group joined the government, and two of them, Itthi Sirilathayakorn and Akara Prompao, were appointed to the cabinet as deputy agriculture and cooperatives ministers. The group is also believed to be closely allied to the Kla Dharma Party led by Narumon Pinyosinwat who was named Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister.
The Pheu Thai Party brought in some 20 MPs from its former arch-rival the Democrat Party to fill the gap left by Gen Prawit's group.
The exclusion of Gen Prawit from the Paetongtarn Shinawatra administration is suspected to be linked to a move by a group of former senators to petition the Constitutional Court to dismiss Mr Srettha for appointing former convict Pichit Chuenban as Prime Minister's Office minister.
The PPRP rift has intensified speculation about its survival. Moreover, Gen Prawit also faces public scrutiny concerning audio recordings recently released to the media, which could jeopardise his political career.
According to Suvicha Pouaree, director of the Nida Poll Centre, what will happen to the PPRP depends on Gen Prawit as he is crucial to the party's survival, at least until the next general election.
"Gen Prawit, who turns 80 next year, may contest the next election depending on his health. From the looks of it, he's still fully committed," he said.
Mr Suvicha said the frosty relationship between Gen Prawit and former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra had not reached the point of no return, and they may reconcile if a favourable deal is reached.
Gen Prawit is known to have many connections with politicians and members of independent organisations and this may make Thaksin, thought to be the de facto leader of the ruling party, feel uncomfortable burning bridges.
The more Thaksin is involved in politics, the more precarious a position the Paetongtarn administration will find itself in compared to the relatively more stable Srettha Thavisin government, he noted.
Pheu Thai may be targeted for allowing Thaksin, a non-party member, to have undue influence over the party -- an offence that could lead to the dissolution of the ruling party and cut short the political career of Ms Paetongtarn, Thaksin's youngest daughter, according to Mr Suvicha.
However, if the PPRP exits politics, the Bhumjaithai Party is likely to reap the most benefits as political families in the PPRP are more likely to defect to Bhumjaithai, he pointed out.
Bhumjaithai is eager to welcome them since it has heavily relied on the political clout of such families to win elections, according to the analyst.
Some PPRP members may also switch to Pheu Thai if it manages to maintain or shore up its popularity. But if Pheu Thai's popularity declines, the party will no longer be an attractive option at the next election.
Additionally, several observers believe Pheu Thai has a price to pay for bringing the Democrats into the coalition. Some hard-core supporters are believed to harbour resentment against the Democrats for the crackdown on red-shirt protesters in 2010 during the Democrat-led administration.
The PPRP's new secretary-general Paiboon Nititawan told the Bangkok Post that the party will not disintegrate as some anticipate and will still be around at the next polls.
He insisted that the PPRP is resilient with the MPs loyal to Gen Prawit driving the party's agenda forward.
"I can assure you that the party will definitely stick around and Gen Prawit isn't being discouraged in anyway," he said.
Despite the PPRP split, the Prawit camp is unlikely to expel Thamanat's faction which has about 20 MPs. This is out of fear the move will play into the hands of the Thamanat faction that has openly admitted looking at ways of exiting the PPRP without its MPs losing their House seats.
However, PPRP is keeping up the pressure on the Thamanat faction by setting up a committee to investigate him over his ethical conduct. The investigation is believed to focus on Capt Thamanat's alleged connections with Thaksin.
Capt Thamanat would be in hot water if it could be proved he had let Thaksin influence him while he was directing PPRP affairs as party secretary-general.
