Monday 4 May 2009

Why Thai PM Abhisit needs the ASEAN summit to go smoothly

Prime Minister Abhisit has stuck his neck out and told the media there will no be a repeat of the ASEAN summit protests (in Pattaya) last month when the reschedule meeting takes place in Phuket.

Whilst he is under pressure as the shambles in Pattaya (why oh why was it held there, a place hardly renowned for its security) which hugely dented Thailand's already wounded reputation, comments to the media simply draw emphasis to the event, almost challenging protests to take place.

Abhisit may well be right, I hope for his sake he is, I sound like a stuck record when I continually endorse him as a politician (which I do, by the way) but his ice is thinning and another disaster would be...well...disasterous for his tenure.

The pressure is mounting with the PAD (Yellows) disagreeing on government policy, they are also unhappy with the Abhisit's handling of the UDD (Reds) and the recent shooting of Sondhi, a senior PAD member. Indeed, the PAD is so disgruntled it is considering forming a political party of its own.

Then there is the Red corner, the UDD are unlikely to ever take to Abhisit as his rise to PM was helped in no small way by last year's airport protests and chaos caused by the PAD, the arch-nemesis. Just to prove it, at last month's Bangkok protests the UDD repeatedly called for Abhisit to go.

It's got to the stage where I'm struggling to see who actually supports the PM - he really needs the ASEAN summit to go well.

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