Stress is mounting on Thailand’s Electoral Fee (EC) to undertake a full or partial recount of Sunday’s common election, as allegations of vote-buying and different irregularities proceed to mount.
Late Tuesday, Thailand’s opposition Individuals’s Celebration, which got here second within the election, mentioned that it had filed requests for recounts in 18 constituencies in Chonburi, Maha Sarakham, Khon Kaen, Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, Nakhon Ratchasima and Suphan Buri. It mentioned that in these constituencies there was “clear proof of irregularities through the tallying course of,” together with vote-buying and tampering, and predicted that it might file extra requests for recounts within the coming days.
“Whereas the celebration can settle for a loss, they can’t settle for an election that’s not free and truthful,” it mentioned. The PP has additionally arrange an online portal the place voters can submit proof of voter irregularities or fraud.
Yesterday morning, a gaggle of scholar protesters gathered exterior the EC headquarters in Bangkok, calling for a right away nationwide recount.
“At the moment we’re right here to face in solidarity with members of the general public who’ve been monitoring polling stations the place there are suspicious indicators within the vote rely – whether or not in Chonburi, Suphan Buri, or Samut Prakan,” mentioned Thirapop Tengraprawat, a frontrunner of the protests, The Nation reported.
The complaints have solid a level of doubt on the election, which Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul’s conservative Bhumjaithai celebration shocked most observers by profitable by a decisive margin. Preliminary outcomes from the Election Fee recommend that Bhumjaithai is on observe to win 193 of 500 seats within the Home of Representatives, nicely forward of the PP on 118 seats and the once-dominant Pheu Thai celebration on 74. However the aftermath has been marked by a rising clamor about vote-buying, uncounted ballots, and different alleged fraud.
Issues had been first raised at Constituency 1 in Chonburi, a coastal province to the south of Bangkok, which was received by Bhumjaithai’s Suchart Chomklin, a divisive former deputy prime minister allied with an area political clan.
Voters rapidly cited a number of alleged irregularities at a badminton stadium the place poll bins had been saved. They claimed that some bins had been lacking safety seals, whereas others weren’t sealed with normal numbered cable ties or appeared to have been opened with out official signatures. Protesters later claimed to have found official election paperwork, together with signed tally lists with the Individuals’s Celebration marked because the winner, which had been discovered discarded in trash cans on the badminton stadium the place poll bins had been saved.
Lots of of voters have camped out on the stadium in Chonburi, refusing to permit the EC to take poll bins away till it supplies a convincing clarification for these irregularities.
In the meantime, a variety of different irregularities have come to mild. Questions have additionally been raised over the excessive variety of spoiled ballots filed through the election, which the EC put at round 2.8 million, or 8 p.c of the entire votes solid, in response to the South China Morning Publish.
In his evaluation of preliminary voting information, political scientist Napon Jatusripitak of the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute additionally recognized 20 constituencies the place there was a yawning hole between the variety of party-list and constituency ballots solid. In Thailand’s political system, 400 of the five hundred Home seats are instantly elected from constituencies, whereas the remaining 100 are apportioned in response to voters’ most popular celebration – and voters are requested to fill out separate ballots for every. Napon’s evaluation of the electoral information means that an implausibly excessive variety of Thai voters crammed out one of many ballots or spoiled/discarded the opposite.
The EC mentioned on Tuesday that no less than 113 complaints of alleged election irregularities had been lodged thus far, most of which concern alleged vote-buying, and that each one could be examined in response to the right authorized processes. The identical day, the EC mentioned that it had ordered a two-day fact-finding probe in Chonburi, however mentioned that the dispute was doubtless a results of a “misunderstanding.”
For his personal celebration, Anutin mentioned yesterday that he would maintain off selecting junior coalition companions, “till on the very least the EC says the rely is one hundred pc full.” He added, “I need to see the clear variety of seats first.” He has additionally said that he doesn’t have an issue if the EC decides to undertake a nationwide recount, so long as it’s finished in accordance with the regulation.
It’s unlikely that these numerous irregularities alter the results of the election, no less than at this stage, however they’ve affixed a big asterisk to predictions that Bhumjaithai’s decisive electoral mandate would stabilize Thai politics for the following few years. If the conduct and final result of the election grow to be some extent of political mobilization, Thailand’s lengthy season of political tumult may nicely drag into the following authorities mandate.
