Chat Thai, Mahachon face uphill battle for list seats Defections, declining popularity mean neither party is likely to reach 5% vote threshold

After losing about half of its MPs in a widespread defection to the ruling party this year, the Chat Thai Party is unlikely to get any party list seats in the next general election.

A similar situation faces the new Mahachon Party, which has seen its early popularity wane.

In the last election Chat Thai narrowly won six party list MP seats, but this time around, it has an uphill battle thanks to the election rules. The charter stipulates that in order to be eligible for party list MPs a political party must win at least 5 per cent of the total votes cast for all party list candidates.

The last election was the first under the new government charter that mandates the 500-seat Parliament be divided among 100 party list MPs and 400 constituency MPs. In 2001, Thai Rak Thai won 48 party list MP seats, followed by the Democrat party with 31. New Aspiration, Chat Pattana and Chat Thai parties won eight, seven, and six seats respectively. Many small parties received none.

Since then three parties – Seritham, New Aspiration and Chat Pattana – have merged with Thai Rak Thai, along with two large factions of the Chat Thai party. As a result, the majority of party list seats will once again be swept up by Thai Rak Thai and the Democrat party, while Mahachon and the remnants of Chat Thai will fight for the scraps.

Judging, however, from the number of party list votes in the last election, the chances of the latter parties receiving any party list seats are small, or almost nil. The door seems to have slammed shut, especially on Mahachon.

Chat Thai won 1.5 million votes in the last election, or 5.3 per cent of the vote, just a smidgen above the cut-off point for party list seats. Most of the votes, more than 700,000, were from its strong central region base, followed by 500,000 from the Northeast. The rest were spread around the country.

About 270,000 came from constituents loyal to partly leader Banharn Silapa-archa and another 140,000 from Chon Buri. It was apparent that most Chon Buri party list votes were attributable to the sway of strongman Somchai “Kamnan Poh” Khunpluem, who has had firm control of who gets party list MP seats in the province for some time. But his group of MPs has defected to the ruling party. As a result, it is likely that Chat Thai will lose more than 10,000 party list votes from the province.

Meanwhile, in the Northeast, most votes in Buri Ram were care of Newin Chidchob’s 140,000 constituents. All of Newin’s MPs have switched their allegiance to Thai Rak Thai, leaving yet another party list void for Chat Thai.

Using simple arithmetic, Chat Thai has lost almost 300,000 votes before the election even starts. This does not include the MPs fleeing to other parties in other areas. And even though other MPs have defected to Chat Thai, the egress of votes is greater than the ingress.

Despite the loss of votes, Banharn refuses to let go of his dreams. He has pinned some of his hopes on the assistance he will receive from the merger of Chuwit Kamolvisit’s First Thai Nation Party with Chai Thai.

But the chances are slight that Chuwit can whip young voters into a frenzy as he did in the recent Bangkok gubernatorial election. A Bangkok election and a general election are two different animals. Many youths who voted for Chuwit in Bangkok have said they would not vote for him again because in the gubernatorial election personality appeal counts more than policy platform, and all candidates had platforms that were similar. In a general election, party platforms matter.

Another reason for Chuwit supporters changing their minds was that the massage parlour tycoon described himself as an independent alternative, but in the end he caved in and became part of the old-boy network of politics.

Hence, there is little chance that Chat Thai’s party-list votes in Bangkok will grow to 300,000 from 30,000.

And so, Chat Thai’s hope of a share of party list votes has become a mirage. At the most, the party can hope for a coalition partnership with the Democrat party. But that would steer financiers away from Chat Thai thanks to the Democrat’s reputation of spurning big business contributions and financiers avoiding the party.

Interest in the fresh Mahachon party started fading after Thaksin Shinawatra made it clear the party would not be a partner in a governing coalition.

Even though a number of Mahachon candidates are former MPs, including runners-up in the last election, the slim odds that these candidates will be successful in the next election should yield the party no more than 20 seats.

Most importantly, the party does not have a loyal enough following to help it gain a large amount of party list votes – even in Phichit, the home province of the party’s chief adviser, Sanan Kachornprasart. The province is the territory of the Democrat’s secretary general Pradit Pataraprasit. During the last election, Thai Rak Thai won 110,000 party list votes in the province, 10,000 more than the Democrat party.

In Samut Prakan, which used to be the stronghold of Vatana Asavahame, Thai Rak Thai won a whopping 180,000 party list votes. Vatana’s Rassadorn party won 49,000, ranking it third after the Democrat party.

It is easy to see why Mahachon won’t come close to gaining 5 per cent of the party list votes.

Somroutai Sapsomboon

The Nation