By Thai Newsroom Reporters
DE FACTO PHEU THAI BOSS Thaksin Shinawatra today (May 28) asked the Office of the Attorney-General to delay tomorrow’s decision on a lese majeste lawsuit which might probably otherwise be filed against him, claiming he is currently infected with Covid-19.
The billionaire, politically powerful Thaksin had a lawyer file today’s formal request, on grounds of having caught the chronic infection, seeking an indefinite postponement of the OAG’s decision scheduled for tomorrow to publicly announce as to whether the agency may proceed with the lese majeste lawsuit, also known as Section 112 of the Criminal Code, against him.
The previously fugitive Thaksin, who had been accused of feigning “critical illnesses” upon his return from self-exile abroad last August to keep himself from jail and was finally released on parole last February, has earlier said he would attend tomorrow’s OAG announcement on the case filed against him.
Despite his previous evasion of court verdicts, the de facto Pheu Thai boss-cum-convict on parole might probably be released on bail in the lese majesty lawsuit if it was otherwise proceeded against him in court tomorrow.
Thaksin, who had earlier evaded court convictions delivered in his absentia over the last decade and a half, holding him guilty of power abuse and misconduct charges perpetrated during his previous premiership, had allegedly committed a verbal offence to the monarchy during 2015’s interview with a news agency in Seoul, marking the first anniversary of the coup staged by former army chief-turned-prime minister/now privy councillor Prayut Chan-o-cha to depose his sister/former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra.
Thaksin was accused by his critics of having stood behind the contentious naming of his former lawyer, Pichit Chuenban, as minister attached to the Prime Minister’s Office, prompting 40 senators to have filed an impeachment lawsuit to the Constitutional Court against the Pheu Thai-attached prime minister and the portfolioless minister who has already called it quits under pressure.
Though Srettha was spared a court order to otherwise suspend him from performing his official duties pending a court ruling on the impeachment case, expected to be delivered in the next few months, the real estate tycoon-turned-prime minister could possibly be pressed by the de facto Pheu Thai boss to step down in the meantime, the partisan source said.
That could possibly be part of a fresh secret deal between the de facto Pheu Thai boss and unnamed elements of the powers that be, given the approaching decision of the OAG on the lese majeste case against the former prime minister.
Upon his homecoming after 17 years in self-exile abroad last August, the billionaire, fugitive convict had manipulated to keep himself from being literally thrown in jail to otherwise serve a royal pardon-curtailed, one-year sentence on his previous wrongdoings.
Instead, the de facto Pheu Thai boss had been contentiously granted the allegedly double-standard privileges of staying in a private ward at Police Hospital for medical treatment of his “critical illnesses” the symptoms and details of which had remained a mystery to the public until he was released on parole earlier this year.
Thaksin has allegedly overpowered and steered the Pheu Thai-led government with Srettha, quietly pushed to power by Yingluck, being virtually viewed as a puppet pulled around by the de facto Pheu Thai boss.
During his privileged, six-month stay at the hospital, Thaksin had allegedly played a pivotal part in the power play, albeit in hush-hush, behind-the-scenes fashion, in which Srettha had practically remained non-involved, resulting in the surprise dumping of the Move Forward, the country’s largest elected party, from a Pheu Thai-led alliance, and the jaw-dropping setup of the Pheu Thai-led coalition government, allocation of portfolios among coalition partners, naming of Pheu Thai cabinet members and most certainly that of his daughter Paetongtarn Shinawatra as leader of the largest coalition partner.
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Top and Front Page: De facto Pheu Thai boss Thaksin Shinawatra. Photos: Thai Rath
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