Yellow shirts opposed to negotiations

The Nation (30 March 2010) reports on a press conference held Monday by the yellow-shirted People’s Alliance For Democracy (PAD) which “opposed political talks about a parliamentary dissolution. It said the solution proposed by the red-shirt protesters had a hidden agenda to help fugitive former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra.”

Making the claim that the “red shirts were not qualified to negotiate with the government as they were not representatives of a majority, but just Thaksin’s proxy,” PAD coordinator and secretary-general of the New Politics Party Suriyasai Katasila said must have forgotten the time that PAD demonstrated against three governments or has somehow convinced himself that PAD represents “the majority.”

Suriyasai added that by talking to the red shirts, the government was recognizing the hated “Thaksin regime.”

Speaking for PAD, Suriyasai took the same line as the government, parroting Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva’s claim that parliamentary dissolutions are “a normal practice in the parliamentary system” but only so long as they are setting the agenda. Suriyasai claimed that the “red-shirt proposal aimed only to help Thaksin get amnesty…”.

Suriyasai engaged in double standards when he said that the red shirts “should not use street protests, violence and innocent people as bargaining chips to achieve their goals…”. Leaving aside allegations of violence, PPT has no doubt that every red shirt supporter who hears this will simply ask why PAD could demonstrate for months on end and occupy Government House and the airports with impunity, but refuse to allow other groups a constitutional right to demonstrate.

PAD actually goes further down the double-standards road in calling for the government to ditch the talks with the red shirts and, instead, throw them in jail: “enforce the laws to punish wrongdoers and end the illegal protest as well as bring peace to the country…”.

As usual, PAD also opposed “any move to rewrite the military-sponsored Constitution” that was not for a “public benefit.”That’s actually the government’s bargaining point with the red shirts, and shows how any process of rewriting would be stalled. PAD promised to “call a meeting of its network to seek a solution to lead the country out of crisis…”.

The Bangkok Post (www.bangkokpost.com/news/local/35256/pad-warns-govt-to-reject-red-demands) has a similar report. There Suriyasai is reported as claiming the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) are “nominees of Thaksin Shinawatra.”

The notion of PAD somehow becoming bellicose yet again will suit the government. PAD adds the political shove that the government finds helpful when dealing with opponents that claim popular mandates. PAD also allows a stage for the more right-wing and extreme elements of the ruling forces to be expressed. Scared by the size of red shirt rallying and by some of the class conflict rhetoric, PAD provide a potentially convenient point of counter-attack by the government’s middle class and elite supporters.

Advertisement