Peta Limgarwenrat fails in his first attempt to be elected Prime Minister

Reformist Peta Limjaroonrat, the coalition candidate who won the Thai elections on May 14, was unable to muster enough votes on Thursday, July 13 to be elected prime minister by the 500 MPs and 250 senators. He is now counting on a second vote in parliament, Wednesday, July 19, to reach the prime minister, after his initial failure. The senators, appointed in 2017 by the generals who organized the 2014 coup, stood in the way of the reform camp embodied by PETA and its allies: only thirteen senators gave him their support, while he would have needed 51 more votes to achieve it. majority in both chambers. Out of the 249 members of the Senate, The senator who resigned on Wednesday, 159 abstained, thirty abstained, and the others voted against.

There were pressures and incentives. They were not allowed to vote in agreement with the peoplesaid the candidate on Thursday, as he left the Thai Parliament, smiling less than usual. I accept the outcome, but I don’t give up. » With an absolute majority in the House of Representatives, the winning coalition, which brings together the PETA Party, Move Forward (“Moving Forward”) and the political formation associated with former Prime Minister-in-exile Thaksin Shinawatra, Pheu Thai (“For Thais”), along with six other small parties, It should try again to bring its leader to Congress for a vote in the middle of next week.

A mass rally was permitted near Parliament, in the square, where several thousand supporters of PETA, mostly from the working classes, dressed in orange hats and shirts or umbrellas, were allowed to move forward, to follow the counting of votes on a giant screen. “It is really disappointing. We can’t let that happen. He stole our victory. [“Pita”] He is our prime minister.says a woman in her 50s nicknamed “Emme,” who, in front of her photographs of her candidate, in his 40s burst forth with the appearance of a young senior with impeccable English—a Harvard graduate—who conquered part of his mind with his straightforward and blunt approach to problems. facing the Kingdom. Like others, however, I expected this outcome. Many of these provincial supporters are former ‘red shirts’, the color of the Thaksin clan supporters, who, for the time being, are showing unwavering support for their coalition partner.

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