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Published on December 27, 2007

The party would also look into cases by inviting its candidates to defend themselves, but would respect the commission's ruling on the matters.

Abhisit made the statement after Surachet Masdit and Pimpattra Wichaikul, two party candidates, were summoned by the EC on Tuesday to defend themselves against allegations that they committed electoral fraud by misleading voters about other candidates' popularity.

Abhisit said the government's stability depended on how it governs the country, not the number of parliamentary seats it had.

He said the People Power Party should tell people the truth about its attempts to persuade other parties to help it form the new government.

It should not make announcements regarding agreements while there was still uncertainty. Doing so would be telling lies to people even before it had taken office.

He said it was unusual for a party winning 233 out of 480 parliamentary seats to take this much time to form a government. Waiting till January 3 to announce the coalition would be too late.

If People Power can gather all other parties to join the government, the Democrat Party would accept being left as the sole opposition.

He said the Democrats could negotiate the allocation of ministries with parties it is trying to form a government with but it wouldn't be right to include the Education Ministry, because they made a promise to voters that they would develop the country's education. However, that didn't mean the Democrats would control only one ministry.

Abhisit and some winning candidates yesterday went on a motorcade to thank Bangkok voters for their support. They included new Bangkok candidates Sakoltee Phattiyakul and Atavit Suwannapakdee.

Democrat Party won 27 out of 36 Bangkok constituency MP seats.

Kornchanok Raksaseri

The Nation