As opposition gains ground, General Prayut’s party releases stealth attack
The United Thai Nation Party on Sunday released an ominous video that is widely being interpreted as an attack on the Move Forward Party’s central campaign theme – “change”.
The nearly three-minute video presents a series of ominous simulated images and scenes that warn of an increase in elderly beggars, disrespectful children, defiled monuments, and young women turning to pornography because it is their “right”.
In the future Thailand may even lose its ability to protect its borders, the video warns.
Thailand is already a peaceful country with fine social values, the video says before asking Thais if they truly want to see a change to something worse.
One scene shows a retired government official reduced to begging on a pedestrian overpass.
Opposition parties have pledged to increase retirement subsidies for the elderly. The video mocks these pledges by suggesting that the real change that will happen is an increase in elderly beggars.
Simulations of the Democracy Monument and the headquarters of the Royal Thai Police being defiled are shown: The first with protest banners and the second with graffiti.
Should Thailand change into the land of street art for the entire world to see, the video asks.
Another scene shows a child scolding his mother for not allowing him to vote first for what dish to serve for dinner.
Should Thailand change into a country where every family member is equal, the video asks.
Another scene shows a grandmother being evacuated from her village near the southern border during a battle. She asks her grandson why no soldiers are protecting her village. He replies that mandatory conscription was abolished a long time ago.
The Move Forward Party is campaigning for an end to mandatory conscription.
In the final simulated scene, a mother learns that her daughter has made pornographic videos for cash.
When she asks her daughter about the porn videos, the young woman replies: “It’s my body. I have the right to do this. And I won’t get rich from a full-time job.”
The video ends with the question: “Do you really want to see Thailand change?”
Incumbent Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha is the candidate for prime minister of the United Thai Nation Party. Move Forward’s candidate is Harvard-educated Pita Limjaroenrat.
Recent polls show Move Forward and another opposition party – Phue Thai – leaving all other political parties in the dust, and that momentum is shifting towards Move Forward.
Pita is the most popular candidate to be Thailand’s next prime minister, according to the latest Nation and Nida polls. Pheu Thai’s Paetongtarn Shinawatra places second, while
Prayut is a distant third. A video released on Saturday by his party tried to soften his image. In the seven-minute “Talk with Uncle” video uploaded on the Facebook page of The United Thai Nation Party, General Prayut skips policy issues and discusses something he rarely has before – his personal life. He does admit, however, that he was born to battle. In fact, that is what the name given to him by his soldier father means, he says. "I have been involved in battles all my life,” Prayut says.
