Thailand will vote in the general election this Sunday The pro-democracy opposition starts as clear favourites. and can pull the government away from the Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-ocha, After decades of power.
The polling stations opened at 8:00 am (01:00 GMT) local time, and half a day later the three main candidates for prime minister had already cast their votes in a normal environment.
The current Thai president, who led the 2014 coup d’etat and reaffirmed his position in the 2019 election, voted an hour after the start of voting for an election he aspired to be re-elected for the conservative United Nation of Thailand.
Leader of the reformist Move Forward party, Pita Limjaroenrat and voted second in the polls, in the middle of the morning.
Shortly after noon, the political neophile Paetongtarn ShinawatraThe daughter of exiled oligarch Taksin Shinawatra and a clear favourite, the opposition Pheu Thai party used the game at a school in Bangkok’s central Ram Indra district, where she stopped to greet and take pictures with her supporters.
In the first hours of voting no major events reported “It’s calm at the moment, there are no serious problems except for some queues during rush hour,” prosecutor Kam, who works at a polling station in the Ekkamai district, told EFE.
Police agents inspected polling stations to ensure the “normality” of the day and prevent incidents such as vote buying, so at least one person was detained in Bangkok a police officer told EFE this morning.
An extremely involved appointment
The opposition starts as clear favorites in what is considered the most important in decades, after almost a decade of military-backed government, and Pheu Thai and Move Forward together have more than 70% of the support. surveys.
“I’m voting here today because we haven’t seen any change. We have had no democracy for nine years. And we as citizens have a fundamental role in deciding the course of the country,” he said.
Thais will have to elect their representatives to occupy 500 seats in the House of Representatives, of which 400 will be elected by constituency and 100 by party list.
However, the election of the prime minister will be carried out by joint voting in the Parliament, and in addition to the 500 deputies of the Lower House who are excluded from the elections, 250 members of the Senate, elected by the extinct military junta, will also vote.