Though these latest acts of "civil disobedience" - a term popularised by the anti-Thaksin movement - will not in any way alter the outcome of the polls, they did send out a very powerful political message.

It was unprecedented that so many people, among them ordinary and unsophisticated men and women on the street, willingly and courageously ran the risk of legal prosecution by challenging what they believed to be a political charade imposed on them. Political heroism was not even uppermost in the minds of some of them. For these disgruntled voters, tearing up their ballots was their last desperate act to show their frustration with the current political system.

Dr Chaiyan, a political science lecturer known for his strong political views, gave civil disobedience its most concrete form when he ripped up his own ballot in front of an army of cameramen on April 2. His was obviously a premeditated move to bring publicity to what he saw as the illegitimacy of the snap election.

There was no doubt that many of those who destroyed their ballots at the polling booths in the South on Sunday drew their inspiration from the Chulalongkorn lecturer. But it was definitely more than simply a copycat action, as some news commentators tried to suggest.

Southerners have traditionally been more active politically than those in most other parts of the country. Outside Bangkok, the People's Alliance for Democracy draws its biggest support for its campaign to oust Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra from the South. In the April 2 election, voters in practically every southern province signalled their rejection of Thaksin and his Thai Rak Thai Party with an overwhelming number of abstention votes.

But their "no vote" - like those in other major cities - was more than just a resounding "no" to Thaksin. In a larger context, it was a reflection of the voters' anger with a political system presided over by Thaksin and fraught with corruption and cronyism. So when Thaksin dismissed the ripping up of election ballots as "absurd", he might have forgotten that he himself was largely responsible for this sudden upsurge of "absurdity". In the eyes of his critics, his decision to dissolve the House to escape scrutiny of his family's controversial Shin Corp-Temasek deal was certainly no less politically absurd.

Of course, destroying election ballots is an action that cannot be legally condoned. Its perpetrators must be prepared to face the legal consequences. But it's certainly no more legally objectionable than the misuse of power and corruption that was so widespread in the Thaksin administration. While those who tore up their ballots stand ready to face the legal penalty of one year in prison, a Bt20,000 fine and suspension of political rights for five years, practically no one has yet been held accountable for the far graver offences committed by political office-holders.

For voters in Songkhla in particular, Sunday's election rerun was nothing short of a slap in their face. They had overwhelmingly rejected all Thai Rak Thai candidates in the April 2 election through their abstention votes, denying them the minimum 20 per cent of the vote required to be elected. The political comedy was about to repeat itself there in this past Sunday's poll when the Election Commission (EC) threw all semblance of independence out the window to allow a second round of registration candidates, just a few days before the ballots were cast. With more than one candidate in each constituency, the 20-per-cent rule would not apply.

The commission was essentially handing the Thai Rak Thai candidates an election victory on a gold platter. It claimed that non-Thai Rak Thai candidates had been pressured by protesting villagers to bypass the first round of registration. And now a candidate with a few thousand votes can claim to represent Songkhla citizens, despite the fact that there were tens of thousands of abstention votes.

For voters in Songkhla and the rest of the South, the EC and the electoral process have become yet another symbol of the Thaksinomics that they so detest. Their defiant destruction of the ballots and casting of abstention votes were directed as much at Thaksin as at the EC, whose legitimacy as an independent agency is now a big question mark.

The EC has consistently betrayed the public's trust in its independence. Today, it is considered nothing more than a political tool of the powers that be. And that's why voters should not be faulted for dismissing the election and its reruns as nothing more than a sham.

Casting abstention votes and ripping up election ballots is definitely a political aberration. As is the political situation we are in today.

End the political absurdity, and people will certainly stop acting absurdly.

Thepchai Yong