Sawt Falasteen - Conservative Thai tycoon wins parliament vote to become PM

The Shinawatras have been a mainstay of Thai politics for the past two decades, sparring with the pro-monarchy, pro-military establishment that views them as a threat to traditional social order.

Their Pheu Thai party has monopolised the top office since 2023 elections, but they have been bedevilled by a series of setbacks and a court ruling that resulted in dynasty heiress Paetongtarn Shinawatra's sacking as prime minister last week.

Construction magnate Anutin Charnvirakul rushed into the power vacuum, cobbling together a coalition of opposition blocs to shut out Pheu Thai.

Thaksin Shinawatra, the dynasty patriarch, flew out of the kingdom in the hours ahead of Friday's vote and was bound for Dubai, where he said he would visit friends and seek medical treatment.

Anutin won 311 votes, securing a comfortable majority of the 492 MPs in the National Assembly's lower house, official final results showed -- comfortably outstripping Pheu Thai's candidate.

"Parliament approves Anutin Charnvirakul to become prime minister," Deputy House Speaker Chalad Khamchuang said.

Anutin's elevation still needs to be endorsed by Thailand's king to become official.

- Cannabis champion -

Anutin leads the Bhumjaithai Party and previously served as deputy prime minister, interior minister and health minister -- but is perhaps most famous for delivering on a promise to legalise cannabis in 2022.

Also charged with the tourism-dependent kingdom's Covid-19 response, the 58-year-old accused Westerners of spreading the virus and was swiftly forced to apologise after a backlash.

He won crucial backing in Friday's vote from the largest parliamentary bloc, the 143-seat People's Party.

However, their support was given only on the condition that parliament is dissolved within four months in order to hold fresh polls.

"Governments change so often without real justification, it hardly shocked me anymore," 34-year-old Apiwat Moolnangdeaw told AFP in Bangkok.

However, he embraced the prospect of fresh polls soon to "set everything back to zero".

"Let citizens express their will," he said.

While Anutin's tenure may be short, Titipol Phakdeewanich, a political scientist from Ubon Ratchathani University, predicted his tenure would result in a "more conservative Thailand".

"The pro-democracy youth movement could face significant risks," he said, referring to an activist grouping that has called for reform of the monarchy and the constitution but has already been largely shut down.

- Dynasty in flight -

Pheu Thai put forward its own candidate in the vote for prime minister -- Chaikasem Nitisiri, who served as justice minister under a previous Shinawatra prime minister.

He secured only 152 votes.

The Supreme Court is due to rule on Tuesday in a case over Thaksin's hospital stay following his return from exile in August 2023, a decision that could affect the validity of his early release from prison last year.

While his guilt is not the subject of the case, some analysts say the verdict could see him jailed.

Thaksin said on social media he will return from Dubai to attend the court date "in person".

Anutin once backed the Shinawatras' Pheu Thai coalition but abandoned it this summer in apparent outrage over Paetongtarn's conduct during a border row with neighbouring Cambodia.

Thailand's Constitutional Court found on August 29 that Paetongtarn had breached ministerial ethics and fired her after only a year in power.

Pheu Thai is still governing in a caretaker capacity until the king endorses Anutin and the party made a last-ditch effort to forestall Friday's vote by requesting the palace dissolve parliament.

However, royal officials rejected the bid, according to acting prime minister Phumtham Wechayachai, citing "disputed legal issues" around Pheu Thai's ability to make such a move as an interim administration.

K.AbuTaha--SF-PST