We need to make it a perfect mess - a suicidal, masochistic state of mind that can be liberated only after a total breakdown of the system. The politicians and their proxies have taken the country to the brink but are telling us they are certain that due to some form of inexplicable magic, we won't fall off the cliff. This time, don't bet on it. They have courted disaster one time too many now.

The fact that nothing of this nature has happened before doesn't mean the system will survive to engage in another political calamity, because recent events have confirmed we don't learn from history. In fact, judging from some of the quotable quotes from our leading politicians in both major camps facing possible dissolution, our leaders even take great pride in being able to go to absurd lengths to plunge the country into unfathomable catastrophe. They seem to specialise in getting us into calamitous dead ends, but not one has shown the least capability to disengage us from certain tragedy. And now that the paralysed Election Commission (EC) has accused both the country's major parties - Thai Rak Thai and the Democrats - and three smaller ones of electoral fraud, and disbandment has been recommended, the snowball effect won't stop until sense and logic are restored.

An 11-member committee appointed by the Office of the Attorney-General, working with extraordinary speed, concluded that the accusations were valid and suggested the Constitution Court be asked to dissolve the parties. Attorney-General Pachara Yutithamdamrong will now have to decide whether to endorse - and forward - the recommendations to the court.

What this new twist in all the political machinations means is a free fall into an unfathomable dark hole. Even if things proceed along the path predicted by the pundits - with individual party members involved in the backroom manoeuvres, and not the parties themselves, made scapegoats - the country's political landscape will be forever devastated. Faith in the political system will be so badly shaken that nobody can be sure how long it will take to restore confidence in politics.

Thai Rak Thai stands accused of trying to influence smaller parties to run in the April 2 election, which has since been declared null and void by the Supreme Administrative Court. The Democrats have been charged with attempting to influence smaller parties from a different direction - persuading them not to field candidates in certain constituencies, so that Thai Rak Thai couldn't capture the required 20 per cent of the vote to win a seat. The three small parties accused of being involved in these same illegal acts have been caught in between - having been used either to participate in or to stay out of the election.

The EC, after having been pressured into pointing an official finger at the ruling Thai Rak Thai, went for a masochist double act by throwing the same serious accusation at the main opposition party. And as if to prove they could really shake heaven and hell at the same time, it went ahead and dragged the three smaller parties into the game, as well.

Nobody knows what will happen next. There is no precedent. Opinion is so badly split over the issue that every target is fair game, which means nothing is considered fair game any more.

For one thing, it's unclear how long the Constitution Court will take to hand down its decision. Estimates range from 25 days to three months. Defendants and state prosecutors are both in a position to prolong the country's political agony - which may happen to be the real intention of certain parties involved - by summoning endless streams of witnesses to testify in their favour or against their opponents.

Nobody knows whether the court will consider the five cases simultaneously or carve them up individually. Either way, the court stands accused by partisan observers of partisanship. Lumping the five cases together could be seen as a politically motivated decision. Treating them separately could be interpreted as putting the country through an unnecessarily torturous trial.

As the controversy rages on, the date of the next election, earlier proposed as October 15 by the EC, is up in the air yet again. In fact, all election activities will come to a halt and await the outcome of this sensational turn of events in the Constitution Court, whose reputation and independence have never been so sorely tested.

As the country is haunted by this farcical stalemate, the caretaker government will continue to preside over the nation's political vacuum - a vacuum that threatens to turn a lame-duck government into a walking corpse.

And all this, however incredible it may sound, is the result of one man's decision to dominate the country's political landscape and his stubborn refusal to give up power, despite a deafening public outcry. We all probably suspected that Thaksin Shinawatra was a capable man, but we probably never realised that one politician's narcissism could plunge the entire country into a mess of such historic proportions.

Suthichai Yoon