As many readers will already know, the Criminal Court on Thursday revoked the bail of United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) leaders Jatuporn Promphan and Nisit Sinthuprai, sending them to jail. The two were among the nine UDD leaders charged with “terrorism” following the April and May 2010 uprising.
The Abhisit Vejjajiva government has been trying to jail Jatuporn since last year, but have been thwarted by his status as a parliamentarian. This is the first opportunity that the regime has had to silence the outspoken critic as his MP status lapsed when the election was called.
One of the claims by state prosecutors is that the speeches they made on a UDD’s stage on 10 April constituted lese majeste. The Court appears to have ruled that parts of the speeches made by Jatuporn and Nisit “could lead to chaos in the country and were in breach of the bail conditions. As a result, the court handed down a verdict to withdraw bails for both of them but dropped petition of bail revocation against the seven others.”
The Bangkok Post states that lese majeste was recognized by the Court in this decision, stating that their speeches “were dangerous and a threat to national security.”
Jatuporn and Nisit were promptly taken to the Bangkok Remand Prison which will not receive visitors until 17 May, adding two more political prisoners to the list of those locked up for political “crimes” in Abhisit’s royalist Thailand.
Jatuporn is a popular MP and a candidate for the Puea Thai Party and the arrest can be seen as yet a further attempt to manipulate the outcome of the polls so that they favor the royalist Democrat Party. Some prefer to see the detention as “an attempt to provoke red shirt supporters with the aim of preventing the election from taking place.”
Others in the Puea Thai Party remain concerned about the propaganda value to the government by this linking of Jatuporn to the anti-monarchy movement.
PPT tends to think that the abhorrence of Jatuporn amongst the elite backers of the Democrat Party is only a tad below the hatred they have for Thaksin Shinawatra. At the same time, Jatuporn is admired and popular amongst grassroots red shirts, and his jailing may increase Puea Thai votes. The Democrat Party are probably calculating that this spike in support will be in areas where red shirts will already dominate. PPT thinks that they may well be mistaken.
One area where the impact of this arrest will be especially important will be in driving more into the anti-monarchy movement. Jatuporn’s popularity and arrest will be yet another “eye-opening” moment for many at the grassroots. The already declining status of the monarchy is likely to be accelerated by this move. The royalist elite simply cannot understand the nature of this change.
