The coup that failed

20 August 1997

A year ago this week, Chang Noi called Chavalit’s rise towards the premiership "a coup by other means". Not a traditional coup with tanks in the streets, oompah music on the TV, tight shirts, and dreary proclamations. But a coup-less coup. A coup for the age beyond coups. A political change with much the same roots and same results as the coups of the past. A resurgence of the authoritarian traditions in political life.

The remilitarization of Thai politics has been striking. General Chavalit and General Chatichai lead the government. General Chettha has been the most high-profile army commander since 1992. No surprise that Chalerm wants an army rank. It has again become the badge of political belonging.

Speaking at the military academy, Chavalit simply assumed future prime ministers would come from the ranks. The annual military reshuffle has recovered a lot of its old importance. An attempt was made to rehabilitate one of the disgraced generals of the 1973 era. The old military power blocs have reappeared after a five-year eclipse. Class Five got together for Sunthorn’s birthday and a nostalgic group photo. The Young Turks are rumoured to be spreading rumours.

The military hierarchy reportedly manipulated the recent cabinet reshuffle. The military’s favourite vigilante organization has resurfaced. So has the old grenade-in-the-garden trick.

In eight months, the political clock has wound back many years.

But it’s already clear, this "coup" has been a terrible failure. Why?

Some commentators point to Chavalit’s personal weaknesses, others to the drawbacks of his allies. But this is dangerous reasoning. It implies a tougher leader with better friends could succeed. Chang Noi thinks there are two bigger reasons: the economy cannot be managed this way any longer; the society cannot be managed this way any longer. The coup, even dressed up for the millennial era, doesn’t work any more.

Chavalit admitted from the start that he doesn’t understand the economy. But it’s more than that. Past military rulers tended to treat the economy not as a plant to be tended, but as an orange to be squeezed. From Sarit on, military strongmen teamed up with a few amenable businessmen for mutual profit. Politics today are more complex, but the underlying pattern looks the same. As the costs of elections and party management escalate, the links between ambitious politicians and generous companies become more important. Chavalit is known to look enviously at Suharto’s set-up: a presidency backed by the military and funded by a handful of Chinese business magnates who monopolise much of the economy.

Chavalit placed three party financiers in ministerial posts. Even as the economy has declined, political power has been used to deliver business advantage to selected friends. Tales of banks asked to make certain loans. Rumours of companies privileged to make a profit from the baht float. And now companies elbowing to the front of the queue for the IMF money.

Good economists and technocrats are reluctant to work for such a regime. They know they will not get the support they need in a crisis. They fear they will be asked to do things that they should not.

Businessmen both local and foreign no longer believe the government’s statements of economic policy nor its statistics. Many welcome the IMF, even though they fear the impact will be awful. They have run out of faith and hope. "If people come out on the streets", a businessman said recently, "the bankers will be right there in the front rank."

Chavalit approaches politics like a strategist manoeuvring for advantage on a battlefield. He won the election by carefully analysing the ingredients for victory: a northeastern base, godfather allies, support from village heads and teachers, and lots of money. He has seeded his people into key positions in the military, state enterprises, and key ministries. He has identified all the strategic hills on the political terrain, and planted a sunflower flag on each one.

If politics were just a battleground, he should be firmly in command. Instead he is imprisoned by his allies, and besieged on all sides.

He offers no vision, no view of what Thailand could be like in the future. With the country going through such rapid and jolting changes, people are anxious to understand where these changes are leading. The popularity of spirit mediums, fortune tellers, model builders and futurologists reflects this anxiety. When people look to political leaders, they want to know if those leaders have a vision, and what that vision offers them. Chavalit touted a promise of reform in everything. It looked vague but interesting. Yet it has turned out to be only vague.

The 1990s have been an extended public class in political education. The 1991-2 crisis. The fall of the Democrat angels. The scandals of Banharn. The development of the new constitution. The political management of the financial crisis from BBC to IMF. With press, TV and the circulation of migrants between city and village, this education has reached far beyond the well-educated and well-heeled.

Across the social range, groups have been grasping for the power to influence the extraordinary changes buffeting them. Sometimes this new political pushiness is identified only with the urban middle class. But it goes much wider. A few years ago, the protests of the rural poor were not heard beyond their village boundaries. This year they were fused on a national scale, and presented to government in a sophisticated negotiation.

Past military politicians claimed it was their duty to impose order (khwam riaproy) over the chaos and confusion (khwam wunwai) of uncontrolled political demands. Now this theme underlies the government’s confrontation with the media. Day by day, the government faces public scrutiny and public pressure. Politicians undergo trial by lens and microphone.

Increasingly the government sees the media, both local and foreign, as the source of confusion. Reporters who ask searching questions are accused of "creating chaos in this country". This confusion has to be countered by control, by censorship where possible, by intimidation where necessary, even by purchase.

Chavalit started by putting trusted men into state-owned electronic media, and adopting Prem’s strategy of holding slightly intimidating chats with press editors. Then came warnings, the media monitoring centre, censorship of news and comment on the state-owned channels, and the absurd witch-hunt against rumours.

In the perspective of history, Chavalit’s failed "coup" will be seen as an after-shock of the 1991-2 crisis, another hopeless attempt to control political expression, roll back democracy, re-establish "authority".

Chavalit had his political education in the military and in the Cold War era. Although he has moved beyond these roots, he has not moved far enough. He does not grasp the importance of Thailand’s globalising economy, or the sensitivities of Thailand’s emerging political society. He does not belong to the new Thailand that is emerging from the big changes of recent years. The people have moved on, but Chavalit has not.