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Published on October 23, 2007

The planned merger of the Pracharaj, Matchima Thippatai and Ruam Jai Thai Chat Pattana parties, which fell through on Sunday, was an example of bad politics and helps explain why the form of parliamentary democracy that was introduced 75 years ago has never taken root and thrived in this society. The unsuccessful attempt by the three parties to combine forces and contest the December 23 general election under one banner put all party leaders and their followers in a negative light. If nothing else it showed that the three parties do not really have genuine political ideologies based on shared values among their members.

These parties cannot be described as real political parties in the strictest sense because their leaders and secretaries general, who hold the parties' purse strings, actually own the parties and dictate tactics and policies on a whim.

Party members, many of whom were paid to join and continue to receive monthly allowances from party leaders and financiers, have no say whatsoever on how a party is run or what policies it formulates. They are there to do the bidding of their political masters and little else. The leaders of these political parties are usually ambitious individuals with stacks of cash that they spend to induce promising politicians, such as former members of the House of Representatives, to join their parties, which are often set up overnight.

By adding as many former MPs as possible to their stables, they hope to be able to win a large number of House seats to serve as a springboard to power. In other words, these party leaders treat their members as tools to achieve their political objectives or pawns in the political bargaining process - not as honourable representatives of the people.

If that sounds familiar, it is because deposed prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a telecom tycoon-turned-politician, and his now-defunct Thai Rak Thai party used similar tactics, which enabled him to capture the top political prize in his first run for national leadership in 2001. That leaders of the Pracharaj, Matchima Thippatai and Ruam Jai Thai Chat Pattana parties thought they could emulate Thaksin and succeed in finding their way to Government House is an insult to Thai people's intelligence.

The Election Commission (EC), whose job it is to ensure a free and fair ballot, should investigate how these political parties managed to persuade so many former MPs to defect from other parties to join their start-up groups and find out whether money has changed hands. Under the new legislation governing political parties and the electoral process, which is being debated in the National Legislative Assembly, using money to persuade politicians to switch parties or to buy votes will constitute a serious offence punishable by the dissolution of any party found to practise such underhanded tactics.

Politicians found guilty of accepting money to switch allegiance or voters found to have accepted bribes in exchange for voting for particular candidates also face the possibility of being prosecuted.

Let's hope that such stringent legal measures will work as intended and keep corruption-prone politicians in check, while improving the chances that honest politicians with a genuine desire to serve the people and ideologically sound parties will win more seats in Parliament.

Thailand's future as a democracy hinges on the ability of Thai society to learn from the painful lessons of its past. Thai society must make a clean break from the old corruption-prone patronage system and totally reject corrupt politicians and their bogus political parties, who have been allowed to take the people for a ride for too long.

It may be difficult - if not impossible - to root out the ingrained patron-client system of relationships that largely defines politics among the rural masses. What the EC and the Surayud government should do is seek to ensure strict enforcement of laws to punish corrupt politicians and reduce vote-buying and other dishonest practices. At the same time, a well thought out public education campaign must be launched to help a new generation of young, more idealistic voters better understand how democracy works and how they - individually or collectively - can make a difference by rejecting corruption-prone politicians and their bogus parties in the upcoming election.

The Nation