Bangkok (AFP) - Thai political parties made a last raucous push for votes at campaign rallies Friday ahead of an election that could see a youth-energised opposition kick out the military-backed government.
Paetongtarn Shinawatra, the 36-year-old leader of the main opposition Pheu Thai party, was given a rock star welcome as she returned to the campaign trail for the first time since giving birth less than two weeks ago.
Voters are predicted to deliver a heavy defeat to the government of former army chief and coup leader Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha, with Pheu Thai and the rival opposition Move Forward Party leading the final polls.
But in a kingdom that has seen a dozen coups in the past century, there are fears the military could seek to cling on to power -- despite assurances from the current army chief there would be no intervention this time.
Paetongtarn, the daughter of billionaire ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra -- himself ousted in a coup -- arrived to an electric atmosphere at Bangkok's Impact arena.
"May 14 will be a historic day where Thailand will change from a junta rule to a democratic rule," she told around 10,000 supporters clad in Pheu Thai's signature vivid scarlet colours.
"Every time we become the government, we better the lives of the people."
Generational clash
Sunday's election is a clash between the opposition, fired up by the youth-led pro-democracy street protest movement of 2020, and the older conservative royalist-military establishment embodied by Prayut.
Pheu Thai, which draws on a deep well of support from rural voters in the northeast, is well ahead in the polls, but winning most seats in the lower house is no guarantee of taking power.
The prime minister will be chosen by the 500 elected MPs and 250-strong senate -- whose members were appointed by Prayut's junta, stacking the deck in favour of army-linked parties.
In 2019's controversial election, Prayut rode senate support to become prime minister at the head of a complex multi-party coalition.
The election is the first since the 2020 protests rocked the kingdom with unprecedented calls for reforms to the powers of ultra-wealthy King Maha Vajiralongkorn.
Move Forward, led by telegenic Harvard-educated entrepreneur Pita Limjaroenrat, 42, appears to have harnessed much of the energy of the youth-led protest movement, which voiced deep disaffection with the old political system.
Prayut, 69, has billed himself as the man with the experience needed to steer the country through turbulent times.
In keeping with the conservative, nationalist tone of his campaign, his closing rally was more sober than Pheu Thai's, with supporters decked out in red, white and blue -- the colours of the party and the Thai flag.
“We want the country to move ahead with confidence and strength," Prayut said.
The usually gruff former general, lagging in the polls, became emotional as he stressed the need for order, a message warmly received by his supporters.
"Thailand should change gradually, not drastically," 61-year-old housewife Nittaya Boonmalert told AFP.
"The opposition parties' policies are too extreme."
Critics say Prayut has overseen economic stagnation and a massive spike in the use of draconian royal defamation laws.
More than 200 people have been charged with insulting the monarchy in the wake of the 2020 protests.
Rights groups accuse Prayut's military-backed government of abusing the laws to crack down on dissent.
'Very pessimistic'
An unclear or disputed election result could lead to a fresh round of demonstrations and instability, further hampering the tourism-dependent country's already sluggish recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.
Thailand over the last two decades has been locked in a cycle of street protests, coups and court orders dissolving political parties.
Army chief General Narongpan Jitkaewthae sought to allay fears of a new putsch on Thursday, saying there would be no return to military rule and that the coups of the past were "very negative".
The Shinawatra family's bitter tussle with the royalist-military establishment has been at the centre of Thailand's rolling political drama.
Thaksin was removed in a 2006 coup, and his sister Yingluck Shinawatra by Prayut's putsch in 2014, and some analysts are sceptical that the military will release its grip on power now.
"I'm a realist.So, I'm very pessimistic about the electoral result being respected by the elite," Napisa Waitoolkiat, a political analyst at Naresuan University, told AFP.
