Under pressure, Thai PM wins confidence vote
BANGKOK: Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha won votes of confidence in parliament on Saturday, helping to steady his government after it had come under intense criticism for bungling its response to the coronavirus pandemic.
Prayuth still faces pressure from street protests that have been demanding he step down. Pro-democracy activists opposing his policies have been seeking his resignation since last year and stepped up their efforts in recent weeks.
Major, though not huge, rallies were held this past week in defiance of limits on public gatherings as a virus-fighting measure, and another was scheduled for later on Saturday, with organisers vowing to continue until he gets out of office.
Arriving at parliament ahead of the voting on the censure motions against him and five members of his cabinet, Prayuth had declared to reporters: “I am confident every day.”
Asked if there will be a cabinet reshuffle soon, he said, “It’s not time yet.”
Prayuth prevailed by a comfortable margin in the House of Representatives, with support from 264 lawmakers showing only a few defections from the 271 members of his ruling coalition, despite intense rumours of a plot among them to force him out.
There were 208 votes in support of the motion, 34 short of the 242 simple majority of the 482 total members the Opposition needed to succeed.
During four previous days of debate, little attention had been given to the details of the opposition’s harsh accusations that Prayuth’s administration had botched the coronavirus response, countenanced corruption and mismanaged the economy.
Thai media were instead abuzz with rumours that the secretary-general of the ruling, military-backed Palang Pracharath Party, which put together the coalition government that named Prayuth prime minister two years ago, was leading the effort to unseat him and pull the main opposition Pheu Thai Party into the coalition.