Thaksin Shinawatra: Meaning (information, definition, explanation, facts)

Thaksin Shinawatra (Thai: ทักษิณ ชินวัตร, IPA: [tʰáksǐn tɕʰinwát]; born July 26, 1949), Thai politician, is the current prime minister of Thailand and the leader of the populist Thai Rak Thai party. As he used to be the head of the Shin Corporation which controls (among others) Thailand's largest mobile phone operator Advanced Info Service (AIS), he was the richest man in Thailand before transferring ownership of the company to his family, maids & drivers. His wife Potjaman Shinawatra has long been supporting him both in the political front stage and in the business back stage. He has three children: Panthongtae Shinawatra, Pinthongtha Shinawatra and Praethongtharn Shinawatra.

Early career

Thaksin was born in Sankamphaeng in Chiang Mai Province. Thaksin's great-grandfather Seng Sae Khu (also known as Khu Chun Seng; surname ) was a Hakka Chinese immigrant from Guangdong who arrived in Siam in the 1860s. In 1908 he settled in Chiang Mai. He married a Thai woman called Sangdi. His eldest son, Chiang Sae Khu, was born in Chanthaburi in 1890, and also married a Thai woman, called Saeng Somna. Chiang's eldest son, Sak, adopted the Thai surname Shinawatra ("does good routinely") in 1938 during the Phibun regime's anti-Chinese campaigns, and the rest of the family also adopted it, including Loet, Thaksin's father, born in Chiang Mai in 1919. Loet married Yindi Ramingwong. Thaksin is thus one-eighth Chinese by blood.

Thaksin's grandfather Seng Sae Khu (aka Khu Chun Seng) made his fortune through tax farming — a common (though unpopular) occupation in those days. Later the Sae Khu/Shinawatra clan added to their fortunes via the silk trade (Shinawatra Silks), catering to the tastes and interests of the Thai bureaucratic elite, and then by moving into the spheres of finance, construction and property development.

By the time Thaksin was born Shinawatras were already one of the richest, most influential and powerful families in Chiang Mai, enjoying close relations to the royal family, the army and the bureaucratic elite, as well as other wealthy families in the region.

Thaksin attended Monfort College, a high school in Chiang Mai. He went on to the Thai Police Cadet Academy and upon graduation, he joined the Royal Thai Police Department in 1973. He later went on to obtain a Master's Degree in criminal justice from the Eastern Kentucky University in the United States, in 1975. In 1978 he received a doctorate in criminal justice at Sam Houston State University in Texas. After reaching the position of Deputy Superintendent of the Policy and Planning Sub-division, General Staff Division, Metropolitan Police Bureau, Thaksin quit the police to form the Shinawatra Computer and Communications Group in 1987. One of the group's members, Shinawatra Paging, is now Thailand's largest mobile phone operator AIS. In 1990, Thaksin made a daring but successful bid for a 20-billion baht, 20-year concession to operate the Thaicom Satellite.

Thaksin entered politics in 1994 as foreign minister in the Palang Dharma Party ("Moral Force Party" - PDP), promising to clean up politics. He became leader of the PDP in 1995 and was subsequently appointed Deputy Prime Minister in the cabinet of Banharn Silpa-Archa. His brief spell in the PDP ended in 1996, however, when the party imploded during the general election held that same year. He returned to politics in 1997 as Deputy Prime Minister in Chavalit Yongchaiyudh's short-lived cabinet. It is alleged that during this tenure, Thaksin used his position to obtain inside information that helped his businesses survive the forthcoming Asian Financial Crisis. To date, these claims have never been investigated.<ref>Pasuk Phongpaichit & Chris Baker, Thaksin: The Business of Politics in Thailand (Chiang Mai, Thailand: Silkworm Books, 2004), pp. 57-59.</ref><ref>SONDHI’S LATEST CLAIM: Thanong tip-off ‘profited Shin Corp’ - Kamol Sukin & Kornchanok Raksaseri, The Nation, December 17, 2005</ref>

After the fall of Prime Minister Chavilit's government, Thaksin formed his own Thai Rak Thai ("Thais Love Thais" - TRT) party in 1998 and started campaigning against the alleged corruption of other Thai politicians. In the January 2001 Thai elections he won a sweeping victory and became Prime Minister of Thailand.

Like Silvio Berlusconi of Italy, Thaksin has been dogged by the conflict of interest between his post as Prime Minister and his massive business interests, and in 2001 he only narrowly escaped conviction (and a 5-year ban on holding political office) for concealing financial assets. It has been alleged that the judges were bribed to acquit him and investigations are underway. In his defense, Thaksin insisted that the concealment of his financial assets was an honest mistake.

Thaksin's government has been unabashedly populist, spending money on popular causes like cheap agricultural loans, subsidized universal health care, urban transport infrastructure, school information technology, and the One-Tambon-One-Product (OTOP) rural SME development program. His supporters claim that these economic policies, dubbed Thaksinomics, are responsible for bringing about Thailand's economic recovery from the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. Critics, however, charge that Thaksinomics is little more than Keynesian fiscal pump-priming re-branded as something new and revolutionary.

Thaksin's 2003 campaign against drug dealers was alleged to amount to the extrajudicial execution of several hundred suspects, and was heavily criticized by civil rights watchdogs. There have also been complaints that Thaksin has been stacking the civil service with his relatives and business associates, for example by elevating his cousin, General Chaiyasit Shinawatra, from a remote district to Army commander-in-chief.

He was re-elected in the February 2005 elections. In spite of reports of widespread corruption in his administration, Thaksin won a landslide victory, with his Thai Rak Thai party sweeping 374 out of 500 seats in Parliament, while the main opposition Democrat Party lost more than a quarter of its representation, retaining only 96 seats. Thaksin's party gained the seats mostly from the north and north-eastern area with his populist campaign. The extensive publicity that Thaksin received on television in the aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami is cited as an important factor in driving Bangkok's unpredictable middle-classes to elect Thai Rak Thai in a surprising 32 out of 37 constituencies. TRT also did well in the central provinces, the traditional stronghold of the Chart Thai Party. However, in the southern region , where several border provinces are plagued by a separatist insurgency, Thaksin's party only managed to win one seat.

In late 2005, Thaksin filed several libel lawsuits against Sondhi Limthongkul, journalist and owner of one of the five biggest newspapers in Thailand and a staunch critic of the prime minister. The cases were withdrawn after King Bhumibol Adulyadej indirectly advised against such legal action during his annual birthday speech. Facing increasing criticism from the media, In November 2005, Thaksin cancelled his weekly press conferences until the end of the year, insisting that the planet Mercury was not properly aligned with his star and was thus causing him misfortune. A government spokesman later explained the decision was based on the prime minister's busy schedule and his willingness to let other members of the cabinet answer specific questions, rather than astrological reasoning.

Main article :Thaksin Shinawatra $1.88 billion deal controversy

On Monday, January 23, 2006, three days after new Thai Telecommunication Act (2006) passed on Friday January 20, his family sold all stake in Shin Corporation, a leading communication company in Thailand, to Temasek Holdings with tax liability exemption. The Shinawatra and Damapong (Potjaman's maiden name) families netted about 73 billion baht (about US$1.88 billion) tax-free from the buyout, exploiting a regulation that individuals (as opposed to corporations) who sell shares on the stock exchange pay no capital gains tax.

The prime minister has faced growing pressure to resign, since the sell-off of his family’s controlling stake in Shin Corp to Temasek, the Singapore’s government investment agency. Critics have accused him of insider trading and structuring the deal to avoid paying hefty taxes, among other irregularities.

About 50,000 protesters rallied at the Royal Plaza on February 11, 2006, accusing Thaksin of corruption and abuse of power. It was the second major anti-Thaksin demonstration. The first rally on February 4 involved about 100,000 demonstrators.

Another anti-Thaksin demonstration led by the People's Alliance for Democracy was scheduled for February 26 2006 at Sanam Luang.

On March 5, 2006, while Thaksin was campaigning for the April 2006 elections in the rural areas, tens of thousands of protesters in Bangkok, shouting "Thaksin Get Out" and "Restore Power to the King", demanded the resignation of the Prime Minister. The anti-Thaksin rally included the burning of an effigy of him in a mock funeral to cries of "Thaksin out! Thaksin out!" [1],[2] It was described as "the biggest anti-government demonstration in Thailand since 1992" in some news reports. [3] The protest also included a satirical Chinese opera and performances of anti-Thaksin lam tat singing.[4]

In February 2006, 28 senators submitted a petition to the Constitutional Court calling for the prime minister's suspension for conflicts of interest and improprieties in the sell-off of Shin Corp under articles 96, 216 and 209 of the Thai constitution [5]. The senators said the prime minister violated the Constitution and was no longer qualified for office under Article 209, but the court rejected the petition on 16 February. [6]

Another impeachment attempt is an attempt by Thai university students network, led by Thammasat University students. They run a petition to launch a bid for an impeachment proceeding against the PM via the Senate. At the time of writing (27 Feb 2006), the tally already exceeds 50,000 signatures, the minimum number required by the Constitution in order to launch the bid.

Thaksin announced a House dissolution on 24 February 2006, in a bid to defuse the political crisis triggered by his family’s sale of Shin Corp. A snap general election will be held on 2 April. Mr Thaksin’s decision to call for a snap election three years ahead of schedule came ahead of a planned anti-government rally held on 26 February. In his weekly radio address following the announcement of his decision, the prime minister promised a series of new populist measures, including pay rises for government workers, an increase in the minimum wage and debt relief for farmers. [7] Nevertheless, the mass rally proceeded as planned focusing on ousting him and bringing him to justice for the alleged corruption which some estimate to total about 7 billion US dollars (300 billion Baht) [8]. Organizers estimated that as many as 150,000 people turned out for the rally. The opposition Democrat, Chart Thai and Mahachon parties announced a boycott of the election on 27 February. [9]

• In January 2006, Thaksin staged Back Stage Show: The Prime Minister, a reality show about his work on solving poverty in Amphoe At Samat, Roi Et Province. Although many people and scholars commented that this show was nothing but a marketing event to boost the PM's image, Thaksin claimed that this show is a learning model for other government officers to follow.
• In Chinese-language media, Thaksin's name is given as Qiu Daxin (; pinyin: Qiū Dáxīn); Qiu is the surname of Thaksin's great grandfather and Daxin is a transliteration of Thaksin. Neither Thaksin nor Thai-language media, however, use this version of his name.

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