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Published on October 1, 2007

Samak Sundaravej needs to calm down - a lot. His ascendancy to the helm of the People Power Party (PPP) is controversial enough, but what really is affecting the already rough road back to democracy is what he has been doing since. At recent election rallies in the Northeast, he has openly announced that the dissolved Thai Rak Thai Party of ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra had now transformed into the PPP. While that is undeniably true, it was not necessarily the right thing to say.

We have called on the interim leadership, as well as the junta, to be fair to the PPP and Samak. They must be treated as ordinary Thai citizens with full political rights. Anyone outside the legal dragnet that caught Thaksin and many of his business and political associates must be accorded every right given to other politicians and political parties and there must not be harassment or intimidation. Having said that, the country also needs Samak's help as well. We need him to avoid creating conditions that could play into the hands of those who may want to delay the return to democracy. We want him to stop making the provocative proclamation that he is just a Thaksin nominee.

This claim could land the new party in legal trouble and thus prolong the country's political mess. The Constitution Tribunal found Thai Rak Thai guilty of electoral fraud. While the evidence of the party's guilt was damning, the punishment and the judicial process were controversial to say the least. But if Samak wants to rebuild Thai Rak Thai, he must do it in a smarter way, even if it requires a semblance of "dissociating" himself and PPP from Thai Rak Thai and Thaksin.

There have already been efforts to challenge the PPP's legitimacy following Samak's election campaign claims. The party's enemies argue it is illegitimate because it has confirmed that it is Thai Rak Thai in a new form. Since Thai Rak Thai was condemned by the Constitution Tribunal as a threat to democracy, Samak's claims must have given his opponents formidable ammunition. While everyone in the PPP is innocent because nobody in the new party has been charged in connection with Thaksin's alleged corruption or Thai Rak Thai's electoral fraud, Samak has unwittingly courted major trouble for the party he's supposed to lead.

It is not a bad strategy on Samak's part to play the role of political victim, although for most of his political life Samak has rarely been on the receiving end of political persecution. Yet he needs to take into account the country's best interests as well. Lowering his guard in a bid to seek the public's sympathy could result in negative consequences beyond his control. If the PPP were suspended or dissolved, it would not bode well for Thailand's rocky rehabilitation.

Samak has overlooked the simplest approach in his election campaign. He could tell voters that the PPP is a new "people's party", and it holds the public's interest above all. Saying that he will try his best to have the charges against Thaksin nullified cannot generate that kind of perception. But that is the least of his problems. Such statements can come back to the new party. And if the military falls for the bait, not only will Samak and PPP suffer, but the whole nation will also.

Thailand has been criticised by the international community for letting one man overshadow its political course. The coup was said to have been a misguided step in dealing with just one poor element of a fledgling democracy. Legal and constitutional reforms taken in the aftermath of the coup were said to have been designed just to prevent Thaksin's return to power. Samak, ironically, has underlined the criticism. He is trying to turn what is supposed to be a fight to regain democracy into a fight to bring the controversial leader back by whitewashing his past.

Although Thaksin was a democratically elected leader, there's a clear line between his name and "democracy". While Samak's political ideology is no secret to anyone - his past oppressive role and close association with right-wing military-backed rulers remain an outstanding part of modern political history - it won't hurt Samak's fresh political aspirations to forget being himself just once. Thailand can live with Samak pretending to be a champion of democracy for once, provided he does it the right way.