The door to have reform of the monarchy done through the parliament was shut when the Constitutional Court ruled on Wednesday that the pledge by Move Forward Party to amend the law was unconstitutional and tantamount to an attempt to subvert the political system with the King as Head of State.
More precisely, young Thais who seek to reform the monarchy institution – to bring it closer to those in the United Kingdom, Japan and Sweden, now feel the moderate path towards reform of the institution is increasingly impossible, if not impossible. Some have lost faith in being monarchy reformists and are becoming anti-monarchists.
The ruling basically sent some of them underground into supporting republicanism espoused by some Thai political exiles in Europe. That middle path where people could reasonably and safely discuss reform is increasingly not viable and dangerous – one risks being charged under the lese majeste law itself for talking about reform as one has to state why a reform is needed and what is wrong with the current situation.
Some, like Progressive Movement co-leader Piyabutr Saengkanokkul, described the ruling as a “judicial war” and criticized Move Forward Party’s decision to remove its lese majeste law reform policy and pledge from its website on Thursday, a day after the ruling. It was a desperate attempt by the party to avoid potential party dissolution by the court at a later date as the motion to petition the court anew to make another ruling on whether the party should be dissolved is now in motion.
Piyabutr, who is a co-founder of what eventually became Move Forward Party, warns by doing so, the party may lose support from its 14 million voters and end up being dissolved all the same. It is Catch 22 and I understand both Piyabutr and the party’s decision.
In its ruling, the court, in which many of the judges were chosen through the then junta-appointed senate, partly stated that “the dignity of the monarchy ensures the dignity of the nation” and so the law cannot be removed from the national security section as proposed by MFP.
This a judicial overreach, by a court which most likely sees itself as the ultimate guardian of the old system, and an attempt to make the monarchy and the state inseparable. In Thailand, one can even criticize the Buddha, despite majority of Thais professing to be Buddhists. Allow me to give it a try. Prince Siddhartha, who became the historical Buddha, behaved unfairly by abandoning his wife and son in search of dhamma.
Or I can say that the story about the historical Buddha being able to take seven steps right after being newly born is just an embellished story aimed at making the man more sacred. There is no legal repercussion for me to type these words. Now, if I were to type something similarly critical towards the king (even if things I state are factual), I risk facing a maximum imprisonment term of 15 years.
This is the year, 2024, or the of Our Lord Buddha 2567, and Thais are still struggling with the issue of fundamental freedom of speech and press freedom, instead of this generation of young Thais committing more time and energy on other pressing issues like the environment and economic inequities.
Basically, the ruling on January 31 shows that Thailand is not just semi-democratic, but a “controlled semi-democratic” state where rouge generals and Constitutional Court judges interfere and suppress the mandate of the electorate whenever they see it “necessary” in order to preserve the status quo and suppressing political freedom despite growing calls for change, largely from the younger generation.
The latest court’s ruling was one such blatant example and likely would not be the last.
