Party blames low voter turnout for Bangkok poll, won by city Democrats
The New Politics Party failed to win a single seat, while the Democrats beat Pheu Thai Party easily in Bangkok's city and district council elections, which saw far less voter turnout than expected by the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA).
New Politics Party secretary general Suriyasai Katasila blamed low voter turnout as one reason for the party's humiliating defeat.
He said that being a new party with few achievements and the fact the party did not cheat contributed to its election defeat.
Suriyasai said the party would have had a chance to win some seats if voter turnout reached 60-70 per cent. He believed party supporters had not exercised their voting rights and "silent" power.
Unofficial election results showed the Democrat Party left other parties far behind, winning 210 out of 256 total district councillor seats.
Pheu Thai Party won 39 seats, while independent candidates won seven seats.
The Democrats were also leading in the Bangkok city election, with a total 61 seats.
Suriyasai thanked all voters who voted for the party, saying all votes they received were pure because they were not bought. The party would use the lesson learnt from this election to prepare itself for the general election, if Parliament was dissolved, and the gubernatorial election in the next two years.
BMA permanent secretary Charoenrat Chutikarn, who is in charge of the city election, said voter turnout for the district councilor election in 36 districts stood at 925,697 from a total 2,737,054 eligible voters, or 42 per cent. The district with the highest voter turnout was Thung Khru, where 52 per cent of residents voted. After visiting a polling booth at Ban Manangkasila in Dusit district after the election ended at 3pm, Charoenrat said only 200 voters turned up at the polling station to exercise their voting rights out of some 700 eligible voters.
The BMA had earlier predicted about 50 per cent of some four million eligible voters would cast ballots. The BMA will seek out reasons behind the unusually low voter turnout. Charoenrat said one of the reasons believed to contribute to the problem was candidates did not carry out sufficient election campaigns to encourage voters to exercise their voting rights.
He also blamed the poor weather yesterday as a reason, insisting that the BMA has tried to its best to get voters to the poll. He cited poll results that showed voters were aware of the election.
No disruptive incidents had taken place during the election and the poll results would be revealed quickly, due to low voter turnout.
Statistics from 2000-2008 showed some 72 per cent of residents in the capital exercised their voting right during the MP election in February 2005.
But the lowest turnout was the 40-per-cent turnout for the Senate election in March 2008.
The Bangkok Election Commission received 16 electoral complaints in seven districts. Bang Khuntien had five complaints, the highest of all districts. Lat Krabang and Don Mueang followed with two complaints each.
Most of the complaints were about electoral promises.
PM's Office Minister Ongart Klampaiboon expressed confidence the party would win not less
than 35 seats in the Bangkok city poll.
He said the area of greatest concern for the party was outer districts of Bangkok which were strongholds for Pheu Thai. He did not believe local election results would reflect what will happen in the general election, saying it was a different ball game. Voters paid more attention to individual candidates in local elections, while they looked instead at party candidates in the general election.