A by-election Sunday with a contender campaigning from his jail cell will provide an opportunity to take Thailand's political temperature barely two months after large-scale anti-government protests in the streets of the capital were put down with the use of deadly force.
The poll is seen as a test of strength for the so-called Red Shirts, who from March to May camped out on some of Bangkok's major thoroughfares to demand Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva dissolve parliament and call a general election. They charge he came to power illegitimately.
There are six candidates vying for the House of Representatives seat in Bangkok's Constituency 6, left vacant by the death of the incumbent, a member of the ruling Democrat Party.
Panich Vikitsreth, a former Bangkok deputy governor and vice minister for foreign affairs, will try to hold the seat for the Democrats.
His only serious challenger is Kokaew Pikulthong, who to register his candidacy on behalf of the opposition Pheu Thai Party had to be escorted from prison, where he is being held on terrorism charges for his alleged role in the violence that accompanied the recent protests. Kokaew was a leader of the Red Shirt protest movement.
"This by-election is Bangkok residents' referendum on the government," said Pheu Thai spokesman Prompong Nopparit.
Democrat campaign spokesman Thana Cheeravinij made the same point: "The Democrats' triumph in this election would show people's confidence in the government and their approval for us to lead the country through the crisis."
Thailand has been in a state of political turmoil since 2006, when a coup ousted then-Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was popular among the rural and urban poor. Since then, his supporters and opponents have staged a bitter struggle for power.
The Red Shirts, comprising Thaksin's supporters and other opponents of the coup, staged violent protests in April last year and then relaunched their campaign against Abhisit in March this year.
An escalating series of confrontations ended on May 19, when the army moved in to sweep the Red Shirt demonstrators from the streets. Over two months, almost 90 people died and more than 1,400 were hurt in politically related violence.
After losing the battle of the streets - and with a state of emergency providing the basis for continuing government repression - the Red Shirts have been left with little to do except lick their wounds. Kokaew and most of the group's other top leaders are in detention, and government efforts at "reconciliation" pointedly dictate terms meant to discourage a Red Shirt resurgence.
A morale boosting opportunity for the Red Shirts came with the June 11 death from cancer of Democrat lawmaker Thiwa Ngernyuang. An election campaign opens up political space otherwise denied them under the terms of the state of emergency.
The Pheu Thai Party is closely aligned with the Red Shirt movement by way of their shared support for Thaksin, who is in self-imposed exile after fleeing ahead of a corruption conviction in 2007.
Polls suggest the Democrats will win an easy victory and Pheu Thai points out handicaps under which it campaigns - generally hostile mainstream media, censorship of its own print, broadcast and Internet organs, and Kokaew's detention.
"We have to figure out how to win this fight with our hands and feet tied," said party spokesman Prompong.
Their opponents are unsympathetic.
"Every political party had it in their power to select who would run," said Democrat Thana. "Pheu Thai Party chose Kokaew, knowing absolutely that there could be a problem with his campaign since he was being detained. Pheu Thai can't say this is unfair for them."
The constituency is considered Democrat territory, and the party is also counting on a backlash caused by the violence associated with the Red Shirt movement, culminating with arson at 30-odd locations as their protest ended on May 19.
"Through this election, we would know if people would like to return to the same chronic cycle (of unrest), since one of the contenders was a protest leader," said Thana.
"Some people argue that the violence of May will have turned people away from sympathy with the reds," wrote 'Chang Noi,' pseudonymous columnist for the newspaper The Nation. "Others are guessing that the heavy-handedness of the crackdown and the government's subsequent triumphalism will have increased sympathies for the reds. The election will show which of these predictions is right."
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