Bangkok: The daughter of highly influential political figure Thaksin Shinawatra will become Thailand’s youngest-ever prime minister and the third from her family to hold the office following a fast debate and vote in the nation’s parliament on Friday.
Paetongtarn Shinawatra, 37, was put forward by the governing coalition headed by her father’s Pheu Thai Party, surprising many pundits who suspected he wished to shield her, for now, from the poisoned chalice of high office in a political system frequently manipulated by the royalist and military establishment.
Leader of the Pheu Thai party, Paetongtarn Shinawatra arrives at the party’s headquarters in Bangkok, Thailand.Credit: AP
Friday’s vote was triggered by Wednesday’s surprise sacking of Pheu Thai prime minister Srettha Thavisin by the Constitutional Court, which ruled 5 to 4 that his gifting of a cabinet post to a man who had spent time in jail was a serious ethical breach.
Paetongtarn already leads Pheu Thai, but the position is not an elected office. The party won the second most seats at last year’s election and put forward Srettha for prime minister when Pita Limjaroenrat, the leader of the winning Move Forward Party, was blocked by military-appointed senators, whose terms and powers to vote on the prime minister have since expired.
In a tumultuous week in Thai politics, Move Forward was dissolved by the same court last Wednesday after the judges determined that the party’s intention to loosen strict laws that criminalise criticism of the monarchy was tantamount to insurrection.
Paetongtarn’s father, Thaksin, has recently returned to Thailand after years of exile and is widely seen as Pheu Thai’s de facto leader. Leading a popular, anti-establishment movement that has regularly clashed violently with royalists, Thaksin in 2001 became the first Thai politician to win an overall majority of seats. He was ousted by a military coup in 2006 but has remained a significant figure in Thai politics, even from abroad.
Former leader of Move Forward Party, Pita Limjaroenrat, center, shakes hand with his supporters at Move Forward Party headquarter in Bangkok, Thailand.Credit: AP
Paetongtarn’s aunt, Yingluck Shinawatra, became prime minister in 2011 but three years later she, too, was forced out in a military coup.
The new prime minister’s public entry into politics came in 2021 when Pheu Thai announced she would lead an inclusion advisory committee. She was named one of its three prime ministerial candidates ahead of last year’s polls.
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