By Eniola Amadu
Thailand’s Constitutional Court has sacked Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra from office over ethics violations after a year in power.
The Thailand’s youngest prime minister, Paetongtarn, becomes the sixth prime minister from, or supported by, the billionaire Shinawatra family to be ousted by the military or judiciary in a turbulent two-decade struggle for power between Thailand’s rival elites
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The court, in its ruling, revealed the young prime minister violated ethics during a June phone call that was leaked, during which she appeared to bow to Cambodia’s former leader Hun Sen, at a time when both countries stood on the brink of armed conflict. Fighting broke out weeks later and raged for five days.
The Constitutional Court’s decision has opened the way for parliament to elect a new prime minister, a process that could be prolonged as Paetongtarn Shinawatra’s Pheu Thai party struggles to maintain its slim and unstable majority with reduced power
The ruling ends the premiership of 39-year-old Paetongtarn, daughter and protégé of influential tycoon Thaksin Shinawatra who was a political newcomer, and rose suddenly to power after the surprise dismissal of predecessor Srettha Thavisin by the same court a year earlier.
Meanwhile, Paetongtarn has apologised over the leaked call, saying her intention was to prevent war.
She is the fifth prime minister in 17 years to be ousted by the Constitutional Court, highlighting the judiciary’s pivotal role in Thailand’s long-running power struggle between the Shinawatra political dynasty and a powerful conservative-royalist establishment backed by the military.
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Until a new premier is chosen, Deputy Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai and the current cabinet will govern in a caretaker role, with no deadline set for parliament’s vote.
