US embassy cable - 05BANGKOK1278

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 BANGKOK 001278 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR EAP/BCLTV; HQ USPACOM FOR FPA HUSO 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV, PHUM, TH, Elections - Thai, Thai Prime Minister 
SUBJECT: THAKSIN'S VICTORY -- CREDIT THE MAN, INNOVATIVE 
POLICIES, AND THE THAI RAK THAI POLITICAL MACHINE 
 
REF: BANGKOK 1039 AND PREVIOUS 
 
1. (SBU)  SUMMARY:  The landslide victory of Thaksin 
Shinawatra's Thai Rak Thai (TRT) party in the February 6 
parliamentary election victory reconfirmed the Prime 
Minister's domination of the Thai political landscape. 
Thaksin's personality, sophisticated media presentation, 
focused populist message, and traditional get-out-the-vote 
organizing combined to allow TRT to leave the Democratic 
Party, its closest rival, in the political dust.  The 
February 6 election is regarded as generally free and fair. 
END SUMMARY. 
 
THAILAND'S GREAT COMMUNICATOR 
 
2. (SBU) As the February 25 date for announcement of the 
official election results approaches, it is clear that Thai 
Rak Thai (TRT) candidates won over 375 (of 500 seats) in the 
Lower House of Parliament.  This huge majority will allow PM 
Thaksin to form an unprecedented single-party Thai 
government.  The key to TRT's overwhelming win was the 
enormous personal prestige of PM Thaksin with the Thai 
electorate, an appeal he bolstered by delivering on promised 
populist programs and slick political marketing tactics 
throughout his first term.  While the Thaksin image is 
underpinned by Thailand's spurt in economic growth and full 
recovery from the 1997 Asian financial crisis, it has also 
been skillfully built up. 
 
3. (SBU)  In the Thai context, Thaksin's confident 
personality lent itself to image magnification.  As a largely 
self-made billionaire, he has benefited from Buddhist 
beliefs, still strong in the rural electorate, that success 
in this life reflects having lived a good life in the 
previous incarnation.  The decisive "CEO" image that he 
cultivated may annoy members of the Thai elite and 
sophisticated urbanites, but it appeals to other voters who 
believe Thailand needs a tough leader to address social 
problems and walk proudly on the international stage.  His 
combative statements, harsh strategies of wars on drugs, 
corruption and, over the last year, on Muslim separatists in 
the South attracted many Thais even as they appalled 
international observers. 
 
POPULIST IMAGES AND POLICIES, AND STAYING ON MESSAGE 
 
4. (SBU) Examples abound too of how PM Thaksin, working 
closely with media savvy TRT aides, transformed many of his 
day-to-day duties of his office into opportunities to 
highlight his decisive leadership and populist policies.  PM 
Thaksin regularly holds "mobile" cabinet meetings -- at least 
one a month -- in different provinces outside of Bangkok. 
These traveling roadshows always projected the Prime Minister 
sleeping on a mat at a local Buddhist temple, or walking with 
farmers in the fields promising them debt relief, or fixing 
some thorny local dispute with the Governor or local 
officials.  These populist images helped keep Thaksin's 
personal approval rates consistently above 60 percent.  They 
are reinforced by Thaksin's use of weekly radio talks 
(suspended during the official election campaign) to explain 
his actions to "the people." 
 
5. (SBU)  In November 2004, a few months before the 
elections, Thaksin and TRT -- mobilizing  every Royal Thai 
Government (RTG) agency to sponsor a booth -- staged a 
week-long government fair at an exhibition mall in Bangkok. 
This fair highlighted Thaksin's policies:  the popular 
30-baht health scheme, the revolving village fund, low income 
housing, educational scholarships abroad, the 
One-Tambon-One-Product (OTOP) program, and others.  It was a 
reminder that he has continued to implement the populist 
programs he promised before the 2001 election, which critics 
had predicted would be impossible to sustain.  The central 
theme of this fair was an ingenious portrayal of the PM as 
the &CEO8 of Thailand, a leader doing all he could to help 
the nation through "grassroots" efforts to become prosperous 
and more developed. 
 
6. (SBU) Thaksin, who has no equal in Thailand on how to 
attract political attention, even used the media to great 
effect when, just before the election, an accident in 
Bangkok's newly opened subway system forced a two-week 
closure.  At the grand re-opening designed to restore 
confidence in riders, the PM showed up with young TRT 
candidates and several well-dressed TV personalities in tow. 
In contrast, Apirak Kosayodhin, the Democrat Party (DP) 
Governor of Bangkok, just elected in August of last year, 
failed to make an appearance.  Thaksin also dominated media 
coverage after the December 26 tsunami, immediately visiting 
the devastated provinces, mixing in with the survivors, and 
promising that the RTG would tide over victims with immediate 
relief and foot all the big infrastructure repair costs. 
After the election, Bangkok Governor Apirak commented to the 
Ambassador on the PM,s ability to "turn crisis into 
opportunity8 as one major factor in TRT's strong showing. 
 
TRT STRENGTHS:  DISCIPLINE, COMBINING "MODERN" AND 
TRADITIONAL POLITICS 
 
7. (SBU) Aside from the personal draw of Thaksin and the 
popularity of his populist policies with poor urban and rural 
voters, the TRT party showed itself to be better organized 
and innovative than the opposition parties.  As illustrated, 
TRT insiders proved throughout Thaksin's first term their 
mastery of modern marketing techniques to boost the Prime 
Minister's image and sell his programs.  TRT demonstrated it 
could appeal over the heads of local power brokers directly 
to voters, but at its core it remains a party combining 
factions of tough "traditional" politicians, whose political 
styles remain common.  In January, Deputy Agriculture 
Minister Newin Chidchob, a key and controversial veteran TRT 
party operative, was reportedly caught red-handed offering to 
buy votes at a vote canvassers' meeting in southern Thailand. 
 The scandal began to grow but, in a matter of days, Newin 
was relocated from his assignment to &reign in the South8 
from DP control to his Northeast stronghold.  The controversy 
over Newin's actions raged in the media for a few days, but 
he was unavailable for the opposition to exploit it 
politically.  While Newin's problems may have influenced the 
outcome that the TRT lost across the South (and even the MP 
constituency seats it had held in the far southern 
provinces), the party was able to deflect a nasty campaign 
image that might have tarred candidates in other regions. 
Accusations against Newin are pending in the EC. 
 
WAS THE ELECTION FREE AND FAIR? 
 
8. (U) The Election Commission (EC) has estimated nationwide 
voter turnout on February 6, 2005 at just under 73 percent, 
or nearly 3 percent more than the last general election in 
2001.  While the independent EC ran the nuts and bolts of the 
polling process, the sitting RTG had the budget and control 
of state agencies to give itself advantages.  Many complaints 
about individual races have been lodged.  However, by most 
accounts, the RTG did not unduly press its "state influence" 
advantages, and the running of this election was remarkably 
smooth and fair, even though all parties engaged in vote 
buying and other traditional political tactics to some 
degree.  Even in tsunami-affected areas, the vote went on 
with few problems.  Most importantly, security officials were 
able to maintain a nearly incident-free election day in the 
nation's troubled far southern region. 
 
9. (U)  The Asian Network for Free Elections (ANFREL), a 
Bangkok-based network of Asian election observation and human 
rights organizations, described the election in these terms: 
"The process was generally free and fair, and the results, by 
and large, represented the will of the people.8  ANFREL, 
which dispatched over 40 international election observers 
nationwide, took note of the prevalence of vote buying and 
claim of misuse of RTG funds to sway voters, such as use of 
tsunami relief efforts in Phangnga province.  However, ANFREL 
 
SIPDIS 
was also impressed that by the 3 pm polls closing on election 
day, an organized, carefully watched vote count had been 
conducted, and some 34 million Thais had voted.  ANFREL did 
not fundamentally dispute the process that allowed TRT and 
Thaksin to roll up an unprecedented landslide victory. 
 
THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY:  CAPABLE OF RENEWAL? 
 
10. (SBU)  Comment:  Thaksin demonstrated his strong personal 
appeal, and he and TRT received  credit from most voters for 
Thailand's vigorous economic growth and increased regional 
stature.  Even in the fourteen provinces of the South, where 
TRT lost all individual constituency contests, it received 
more than three times the number of "party list" votes than 
in 2001.  Nothing in the Thai Constitution prevents Thaksin 
from running for a third (or more) four-year term and the 
future looks bleak to the opposition.  Thaksin critics are 
grumbling fiercely and many make dire predictions about the 
dangers of weakened checks and balances.  Uniformly, however, 
they agree that the overall election results reflected the 
electorate's choice. 
 
11. (SBU)  The DP and other opposition parties were soundly 
beaten in this election.  On the national level, the DP was 
unable to pose a strong alternative to Thaksin, could only 
offer promises that mimicked his popular policies in health 
and education reform, and virtually conceded defeat more than 
a year before the election.  Some newspapers have claimed 
that the DP party symbol, a statue of the Goddess of the 
Earth, cried tears of sorrow on the night of February 6, and 
some superstitious Thais interpret this as a permanent 
inability of the DP to compete with TRT.  However, in the 
aftermath, the fact that the DP won decisively in the South 
and will lead the opposition with (probably) 96 MPs is 
beginning to sink in.  Abhisit Vejjajiva is likely to replace 
the stolid Banyat Bantadhan as DP leader, and he has already 
tried to publicly discuss alternatives to Thaksin's 
provocative security approach to the South, where increasing 
separatist violence may prove to be the Administration's 
Achilles Heel.  There are signs that other DP leaders are 
serious about restructuring the DP to be more pro-active in 
criticizing the incoming TRT administration, and to better 
adjust to the new style of politics that Thaksin has 
introduced.  They talk openly of the need to steal some pages 
from the TRT electioneering playbook to ensure that the party 
regains a truly national constituency.  End Comment. 
BOYCE