Thailand’s Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said Saturday that he will likely call early elections after the economy has firmly recovered.
“The likelihood is that there will be early elections once the economy is firmly grounded,” Mr. Abhisit told Dow Jones Newswires. “The early poll could be called any time,” he said, declining to specify a timeframe.
Calling early polls would help legitimize the rule of Mr. Abhisit, who was selected by Thailand’s Parliament late last year after top army leaders helped broker the formation of a new coalition government.
If Mr. Abhisit’s Democrat Party and its coalition allies secure a majority in parliament, it could help turn down the heat on years of turmoil in the country, which is badly split between supporters and critics of former prime minister and telecommunications magnate, Thaksin Shinawatra.
Since being ousted in a military coup in 2006, Mr. Thaksin has continued to rally his supporters from overseas, where he is evading imprisonment on a conflict of interest conviction — an allegation he denies.
via Thailand’s Abhisit: Early Poll Likely – WSJ.com.
