{"id":5505,"date":"2025-08-22T19:19:34","date_gmt":"2025-08-22T19:19:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/rise-fall-repeat-how-the-shinawatra-clan-redefined-and-divided-thai-politics\/"},"modified":"2025-08-22T19:19:34","modified_gmt":"2025-08-22T19:19:34","slug":"rise-fall-repeat-how-the-shinawatra-clan-redefined-and-divided-thai-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/rise-fall-repeat-how-the-shinawatra-clan-redefined-and-divided-thai-politics\/","title":{"rendered":"Rise, fall, repeat: How the Shinawatra clan redefined \u2014 and divided \u2014 Thai politics"},"content":{"rendered":"
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BANGKOK, Aug 22 — Thailand’s billionaire Shinawatra dynasty has dominated the kingdom’s politics for 25 years, despite coups and court cases including Friday’s lese-majeste acquittal of its patriarch.<\/p>\n

A Bangkok court cleared 76-year-old Thaksin Shinawatra of breaching Thailand’s tough royal insult laws in an interview with South Korean media a decade ago.<\/p>\n

AFP looks at the Shinawatra family’s turbulent quarter-century of dominating Thai politics and battling the kingdom’s traditional conservative elite.<\/p>\n

Founding father<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thaksin served as a police officer before making his fortune in telecoms and launching the Thai Rak Thai (Thais Love Thais) party, promising to use his business savvy to uplift the rural poor.<\/p>\n

His populist policies won the devotion of countryside voters but the ire of the pro-monarchy, pro-military establishment that regarded him as an insurgent threat to the traditional social order.<\/p>\n

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He became premier in 2001 and was the first democratically elected Thai prime minister to serve a full term.<\/p>\n

He was then re-elected in a landslide by voters grateful for cash injections amid the Asian financial crisis, leading the first Thai party ever to secure an overall majority alone.<\/p>\n

\n
\n

Thailand’s suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra (centre) and her sister Pintongta Shinawatra (left) walk out of the Constitutional Court in Bangkok on August 21, 2025. — AFP pic<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

However, Thaksin was dogged by corruption allegations and months of protests. Tanks rolled into Bangkok while he was on an overseas trip in September 2006 and the military toppled his government.<\/p>\n

He purchased Manchester City despite his Thai assets being frozen the following year, and later sold the British football club for a sizeable profit.<\/p>\n

Thaksin took himself into exile in 2008 but never stopped commenting on national affairs – or, according to his critics, meddling in them.<\/p>\n

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A family affair<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thai Rak Thai was dissolved after the 2006 coup, but its successor, the People’s Power party, won the next election. Thaksin’s brother-in-law Somchai Wongsawat was briefly prime minister in 2008 before the courts ordered that People’s Power be dismantled, too.<\/p>\n

It evolved into the Pheu Thai (For Thais) party, which brought Thaksin’s sister Yingluck to power in 2011.<\/p>\n

Yingluck was pilloried as a political lightweight armed with little more than a winning smile and a hotline to her elder brother – who once referred to her as his “clone”.<\/p>\n

She courted the military but their shaky truce collapsed after a failed bid to pass an amnesty bill that would have enabled Thaksin’s return.<\/p>\n

The move outraged government opponents, who flooded the streets for months-long protests marked by violence, with dozens killed and hundreds wounded.<\/p>\n

Yingluck’s premiership was scuttled in 2014 by a court ruling and the military shunted the rest of her administration aside weeks later.<\/p>\n

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\"Supporters\n

Supporters of Thailand’s former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra gather in front of the Criminal Court in Bangkok on August 22, 2025. — AFP pic<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Inheriting influence<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thaksin threw his weight behind his youngest daughter Paetongtarn as she took up the Pheu Thai mantle in the 2023 election, transferring from a career in the hotel arm of the family’s sprawling business empire.<\/p>\n

She was a near-constant presence on the campaign trail despite being heavily pregnant, regularly leading rallies in stifling tropical heat.<\/p>\n

Pheu Thai finished second, but secured power by forming an unsteady alliance with their former enemies in pro-military parties.<\/p>\n

Paetongtarn was appointed prime minister in August last year after the party’s first choice, Srettha Thavisin, was thrown out by the Constitutional Court.<\/p>\n

Much like Yingluck, the 39-year-old Paetongtarn has been accused of being a Thaksin puppet.<\/p>\n

More legal woes<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thaksin pledged repeatedly while in exile in Dubai to return to Thailand despite being convicted on graft and abuse-of-power charges in absentia.<\/p>\n

He went back on the day Pheu Thai took power in August 2023, prompting speculation he had been granted leniency as part of a coalition bargain.<\/p>\n

He was immediately arrested and sentenced to eight years in jail, but was whisked to a police hospital within hours on health grounds.<\/p>\n

Thaksin later had his sentence cut by the king and was released six months after landing, without spending any time in prison.<\/p>\n

Another court case is investigating those events after complaints that Thaksin had not served his sentence properly.<\/p>\n

In another blow to the family, the Constitutional Court suspended Paetongtarn from office last month while it probes her actions during a diplomatic spat with Cambodia.<\/p>\n

The court will rule on the case next week, and could sack her as prime minister.<\/p>\n

With no suitable family members left to take on the mantle, that ruling could mark the end of the Shinawatras’ time in high office. — AFP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Rise, fall, repeat: How the Shinawatra clan redefined — and divided — Thai politics<\/sub><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BANGKOK, Aug 22 — Thailand’s billionaire Shinawatra dynasty has dominated the kingdom’s politics for 25 years, despite coups and court cases including Friday’s lese-majeste acquittal of its patriarch. A Bangkok court cleared 76-year-old Thaksin Shinawatra of breaching Thailand’s tough royal insult laws in an interview with South Korean media a decade ago. AFP looks at…<\/p>\n

Read More “Rise, fall, repeat: How the Shinawatra clan redefined \u2014 and divided \u2014 Thai politics”<\/span> »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5506,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5505\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}