| |||||
| Decades: | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| See also: | |||||
The year 2020 is the 239th year of the Rattanakosin Kingdom of Thailand. It is the fifth year in the reign of King Vajiralongkorn (Rama X), and is reckoned as year 2563 in the Buddhist Era. The year was most significantly marked the by the global COVID-19 pandemic, which reached Thailand in January, as well as widespread youth-led protest movements against the government and for reform of the monarchy.
Until 22 May 2014, the politics of Thailand were conducted within the framework of a constitutional monarchy, whereby the prime minister is the head of government and a hereditary monarch is head of state. The judiciary is independent of the executive and the legislative branches.
Vajiralongkorn is King of Thailand.
The Democrat Party is a Thai political party. The oldest party in Thailand, it was founded as a royalist party; it now upholds a conservative and pro-market position.
The 2006 Thai coup d'état took place on 19 September 2006, when the Royal Thai Army staged a coup d'état against the elected caretaker government of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. The coup d'état, which was Thailand's first non-constitutional change of government in fifteen years since the 1991 Thai coup d'état, followed a year-long political crisis involving Thaksin, his allies, and political opponents and occurred less than a month before nationwide House elections were scheduled to be held. It has been widely reported in Thailand and elsewhere that General Prem Tinsulanonda, key person in military-monarchy nexus, Chairman of the Privy Council, was the mastermind of the coup. The military cancelled the scheduled 15 October elections, abrogated the 1997 constitution, dissolved parliament and constitutional court, banned protests and all political activities, suppressed and censored the media, declared martial law nationwide, and arrested cabinet members.
The 6 October 1976 massacre, known as the 6 October event in Thailand, was a violent crackdown by Thai police and lynching by right-wing paramilitaries and bystanders against leftist protesters who had occupied Bangkok's Thammasat University and the adjacent Sanam Luang, on 6 October 1976. Prior to the massacre, thousands of leftists, including students, workers and others, had been holding ongoing demonstrations against the return of former dictator Thanom Kittikachorn to Thailand since mid-September. Official reports state that 46 were killed and 167 were wounded, while unofficial reports state that more than 100 demonstrators were killed. In the "Documentation of Oct 6" project, Thongchai Winichakul argued that official death toll should be 45, including 40 demonstrators and 5 perpetrators, because one demonstrator died in jail after the incident.
Prayut Chan-o-cha is a Thai retired politician and army officer who served as the Prime Minister of Thailand from 2014, when he seized power in a military coup, to 2023. He also served as the minister of defence, a position he held in his own government from 2019 to 2023. Prayut served as Commander-in-Chief of the Royal Thai Army from 2010 to 2014 and led the 2014 Thai coup d'état which installed the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO), the military junta which governed Thailand between 22 May 2014 and 10 July 2019.
In Thailand, lèse-majesté is a crime according to Section 112 of the Thai Criminal Code. It is illegal to defame, insult, or threaten the monarch of Thailand. Modern Thai lèse-majesté law has been on the statute books since 1908. Thailand is the only constitutional monarchy to have strengthened its lèse-majesté law since World War II. With penalties ranging from three to fifteen years imprisonment for each count, it has been described as the "world's harshest lèse majesté law" and "possibly the strictest criminal-defamation law anywhere". Its enforcement has been described as being "in the interest of the palace".
The history of Thailand since 2001 has been dominated by the politics surrounding the rise and fall from power of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and subsequent conflicts, first between his supporters and opponents, then over the rising military influence in politics. Thaksin and his Thai Rak Thai Party came to power in 2001 and became very popular among the electorate, especially rural voters. Opponents, however, criticized his authoritarian style and accused him of corruption. Thaksin was deposed in a coup d'état in 2006, and Thailand became embroiled in continuing rounds of political crisis involving elections won by Thaksin's supporters, massive anti-government protests by multiple factions, removals of prime ministers and disbanding of political parties by the judiciary, and two military coups.
General elections were held in Thailand on 14 May 2023 to elect 500 members of the House of Representatives. The Move Forward Party, led by Pita Limjaroenrat, surprised analysts by winning the most seats, followed by fellow opposition party Pheu Thai who had won the most seats in the 2011 and 2019 elections. Turnout was a record 75.22%.
The Milk Tea Alliance is an online democracy and human rights movement consisting mainly of netizens from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand, and Myanmar (Burma). It originally started as an internet meme, created in response to the increased presence of Chinese nationalist commentators on social media and has evolved into a dynamic multinational protest movement against authoritarianism and advocating democracy. Aside from the four main countries mentioned, the movement has also established a significant presence in the Philippines, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Belarus and Iran.
In Thailand, protests began in early 2020 with demonstrations against the government of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha. They later expanded to include the unprecedented demands for reform of the Thai monarchy. The protests were initially triggered by the dissolution of the Future Forward Party (FFP) in late February 2020 which was critical of Prayut, the changes to the Thai constitution in 2017, and the country's political landscape that it gave rise to.
Panusaya Sithijirawattanakul also known as Panasaya Sithijirawattanakul is a Thai student political activist and university student leader who is also the spokesperson of the Student Union of Thailand. She is well known for her criticism of the Thai monarchy. During the 2020 Thai protests, she was one of leaders who pioneered revotionary demonstrations calling for major structural reform of the Thai monarchy.
Arnon Nampa is a Thai human rights lawyer and activist. He is renowned in Thailand for openly criticizing the monarchy of Thailand, breaking the country's taboo. He was initially regarded as a prominent human rights defender during his tenure as a human rights lawyer and later accumulated multiple criminal charges due to his active involvement in pro-democracy activism. He is considered to be one of the leading figures of the 2020–2021 Thai protests, co-leading reforms to the monarchy reform movement by non-elite people for first time in Thai history.
Panupong Jadnok is a social activist, Ramkhamhaeng University student, and a leading protester in the 2020 Thai protests, from the Eastern Youth Leadership group, currently facing multiple charges including sedition.
On 3 August, a Harry Potter-themed demonstration was held, openly criticised the monarchy, and demanded amendment of increasing royal prerogative and lèse majesté law. The protest, which 200 people joined, featured a public speech by Anon Nampa. Paul Chambers, Southeast Asian politics scholar, noted, "Such open criticism of Thailand’s monarch by non-elites at a public place within Thailand with the police simply standing by is the first of its kind in Thai history."
This is a description of domestic and international reactions to the 2020 Thai protests.
On 5 September, approximately 300 members of the Bad Student group protested at the Ministry of Education for their three demands, i.e., an end to government harassment, reform of outdated regulations, and reform of the entire education system, delivering an ultimatum that the Education Minister should otherwise resign. A few days later, a debate was held between the Bad Student group and Education Minister Nataphol Teepsuwan, where a student representative raised the issues of restriction of freedom of political expression, arbitrary and physical punishments, and failure to protect students from sexual predators. The minister agreed to some of the issues but rejected some points, such as abandoning uniforms.
On 1 November, an estimate of over 10,000 yellow-shirted royalists demonstrated their support for the King at the Grand Palace, where he had participated in a religious ceremony at the Temple of the Emerald Buddha.
Benja Apan is a Thai student and activist. She is one of the leaders of the United Front of Thammasat and Demonstration (UFTD) group that agitated for revolutionary reforms to the monarchy on 10 August 2020. She became a prominent UFTD leader later in 2021. In the 2020–2021 Thai protests, she co-organized the German embassy in Bangkok protest in 2020 to pressure the King that resided in Germany, drawing more than 10,000 protesters. In August 2021, she led UFTD 'Car Mob' protest. She was arrested by Thong Lor police for lèse majesté following her reforms to the monarchy speech in front of Sino-Thai tower. She had been imprisoned await trial for 100 days in Central Women Correctional Institution from 7 October 2021 to 14 January 2022, and she was sentenced to 6 months in prison on contempt of court along the way.
"I'm not quitting," Prayuth told reporters after an emergency cabinet meeting, adding that emergency measures would be in force for up to 30 days.
