BANGKOK: Thailand’s junta chief yesterday ruled out elections for at least a year to have time for political “reforms”, defending the coup in the face of rising international alarm.
“The (ruling military regime) have a time frame of one year and three months to move towards elections,” said Prayut Chan-O-Cha in a televised national address over a week after the army takeover. He said all sides had to cooperate and stop protesting for the plan to succeed. “Enough time has been wasted on conflict.”
He said the military will set up “reconciliation centres” across the country to heal a decade of political division that has often spilled into violence.
Chan-ocha took power on May 22 saying he had to end the latest violent spasm of a struggle between the royalist establishment and an upstart power network headed by billionaire former premier Thaksin Shinawatra.
Loyalists of the self-exiled Thaksin expect the army to bring in electoral and other reforms to end Thaksin’s political influence. But the army says it is being even-handed and politicians and activists from both sides have been among over 250 detained since the coup, though more seem to have been allied to the ousted government of Thaksin’s sister, Yingluck Shinawatra.
The junta has said it wants national cohesion and to “lead Thailand back on the path of democracy,” and that the reconciliation centres will be part of that effort. “The model is Prayuth’s and it is intended to build peace because even within the same family politics can’t be discussed,” said Colonel Banpot Poonpien from the army’s Internal Security Operation Command. Agencies
