The land is red, 1st episode of Thailand's Democracy

One of the dominant actor groups in this game is equipped with the Queen and a King. The King with a estimated personal net worth of US$35 billion. A 90 years old General, called Prem, the only gay in the village and a powerful politician called Suthep. Yes for sure additionally to this core group there are a lot of bystanders and the typical paycheck receivers involved. What is happening in Thailand?

Basically there are two parties the yellow and the red shirts and they are fighting who is up and who not. Today one insider told me that actualy the yellows are the communist, but what they have on their side is the army with all the nessesary equipment such a group needs to have.

So what happened, that brought more then 500.000 people out of there seats from all corners of Thailand to the capital Bangkok. The redshirt won the election twice, then later the redshirt winner was removed by the military and now a yellow shirt puppet Abhisit installed as prime minister with the backing from a group of old friends.

Nothing special for a democratic system, but Thailand is not the typical western democracy, it is a system of open and hidden corruption which plays between the aristocracy, the military and the buddhist clerics. Between that triangle of power holders, the business people floating, who try desperately to get there share of the public taxes, so they switch side as they need to harvest.

The ousted former prime minister Thaksin was a businessman which basically accumulated a lot of money and land, for his clan during his reign. Nothing special in Thailand, many politicians and army people did that before. But something went wrong, a Thai Taxi driver told me that Thaksin has fallen out with the Queen. Madame hates him now and told to here son, which is highly interconnected with the army, to act. So its an family affair, a typical aristocratic power game.

I have no inside what Thaksin's plan was, but a Bangkok taxi drivers said to me, that without him, many public projects would have failed, because of corruption. Some weeks ago, Mr. Thaksi's enormous wealth has been sized by the supreme court and Mr. Thaksin is now in exile, commuting between Montenegro, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and …. The supreme court decided not to take all his money away, he is still 600 Million of whatsoever heavy, but if he enters Thailand, he will end up in jail.

Today is the 13th day of the red shirt rally in Bangkok, which happens in the center of the city under a summer heat of 37 celsius. It is a huge undertaking and serious logistics are involved.

There is a simpatico mix of people of all classes, races and interests. Hope and good mood is in the air, I love such a gathering of people who hope for better and believe in a cause. A lot of positive energy is around a pleasant atmospheric change to the usual dull shopping vibes. Predominantly western and arabic tourist in trance, bouncing from one t-shirt shop to the next copycat shop for commodities they normally cant afford.

The city is alive and vibrant and many people speak out in all kind of styles and surfaces, intellectually, naive, poetic and the majority talks speechless, just with there eyes and make it clear, that they do not agree with the present government.

All boils dow on one fact, the last government has been removed by the army, so basically it was a military putsch. Thailand is sorounded with delicate geopolitical positions, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam and China. Thailand is compared to all of them somehow democratic, and in a democracy removing an elected government by military power, does not look good at all.

So many people up an down the country ask for new elections and as it looks now the red shirts will win and this is the problem for the current placeholders. The other issue is, it does not look good for the military elite, if the red shirts come into power, for sure the military will be punished for there mistake and they know it. It is just a matter of time when this will happen.

The police force, my sources say, are predominantly red shirted and sympathizing with the crowd. So what will happen, it is not public jet. Today the army and tanks came closer to the demonstration place, still on distance, but people worrying that they will try to dissolve the anti government rally.

I for my self missing such a activity in western democracies, people who hit the street and voice themselves. The people in the west are afraid, tired and are missing the emotional power to go out and demonstrate for their rights.

The young generation is completely sucked in consumerism and social fear. Yes we have similar corruption in the west and no one complains. The farmers in the west only demonstrating, if they are not subsidized as they wish, the workers go out when they loose their jobs or pay is reduced. There is no political will and no engagement with the political nomenclature in the west, we have no political party culture which is a live.

That what is happening these days in Bangkok has my sympathy and support, it is an huge educational process. People think, listen and sometimes talk among each other, this is lifting the population out of anonymity and apathy. The peoples channel, the TV station broadcast live around the clock from the rally and brings the speeches and thoughts in the remote corners of Thailand. This is lived democracy.

To be continued.