Polarised to the point of extreme

Former prime minister Anand Panyarachun gave a warning over the weekend that Thai politics has become too polarised and that we are beyond reconciliation. Our differences should have been resolved through negotiation but the feeling of mistrust is too high for the opposing sides to overcome the current impasse.

Anand is right. A feeling of mistrust remains high and it will only keep rising. Recently, when government agencies decided to reshuffle their staff or pursue legal cases against graftbusters, society looked at these developments with a sceptical eye, wondering if there were political motives designed to undermine the other side.

Thailand can pride itself on having democratic electoral institutions. But the overpowering mistrust stems largely from the public's lack of faith in the institutions responsible for delivering justice. And when the legal process cannot instil confidence, the "legitimacy" that usually accompanies an election winner is somewhat lacking.

When legal processes lose credibility, this paves the way for bad elements to rise to the fore and the country inevitable finds itself on a slippery slope again. The opposition is left without much recourse besides the old tactics of the far left and right - street demonstrations that seek to undermine the government by citing the authorities' attempt to exploit the institutions, and the questioning of the "legitimacy" of the government.

The worst has already happened but the problem is that another coup could still occur. After the general election in December, it looked like the rule of law could finally return. But when people started to have some hope that certain institutions would respond to allegations about politicians, and to clear the legal doubts, the government began trying to undermine those very institutions. Very quickly, there were government questions over the validity of the Assets Examination Commission, for example.

The AEC's origin has been politicised, but what the country should do is stay calm and explore the "essence" of its mandate and its investigations. When one side tries to deny this, there is no doubt that the showdown is reaching a potentially dangerous end-game.

Thai society can now be seen exactly as Anand has described it: when one side says something, the other does not listen; while one section of society wants to see certain cases cleared through the legal process, the other contrives to avoid it by exploiting loopholes. Therefore, the proposal to have four former prime ministers act as mediators to defuse the political conflict will not work if both sides are unwilling to enter into discussions to sort out the impasse. While the divisions between Thais may not be beyond cure, the real problem now is that society is in a shambles because the leaders of both sides refuse to talk to each other. People have suffered the collateral damage because of their feuds, leaving the current political mechanism in disarray.

The birth of the "White Shirt" movement reflects growing social frustration and the lingering belief that the present polarisation, no matter how severe, can still be solved through the practice of give and take. But with extremism the name of the game, we still can't see any light at the end of the tunnel.