Thailand PM's party takes wide lead in three-way election race

BANGKOK, Feb 8 - Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul's party was far ahead in Sunday's general election, leading a three-way race with a commanding margin that could make it easier to form a coalition and reduce the risk of further political instability.

Anutin set the stage for the snap election in mid-December during a border conflict between Thailand and Cambodia, a move political analysts said appeared to be timed by the conservative leader to cash in on surging nationalism.

At that point, he had been in power for less than 100 days, taking over after the ouster of premier Paetongtarn Shinawatra of the populist Pheu Thai Party over the Cambodian crisis.

With nearly 80% of polling stations reporting, preliminary results released by the election commission showed Anutin's Bhumjaithai Party with a sizeable lead over the progressive People's Party in second place, followed by the Pheu Thai Party.

PEOPLE'S PARTY REJECTS COALITION BID

People's Party leader Natthaphong Rueangpanyawut said that while votes remained to be counted, his party did not look likely to win.

Natthaphong said the party would not join a Bhumjaithai-led government, but would also not form a competing coalition.

"If Bhumjaithai can form a government, then we have to be the opposition," Natthaphong told a press conference.

With a message of structural change and reforms to Southeast Asia's second-largest economy, the People's Party had led most opinion polls during the campaign season.

But in a survey conducted during the campaign's final week and released on Sunday, the National Institute for Development Administration projected that Bhumjaithai would be the winner with between 140 and 150 seats in the 500-member House of Representatives, ahead of 125-135 for the People's Party.

"We have done everything that we can," Anutin told reporters, after casting his vote in Bhumjaithai's stronghold of Buriram city, northeast of the capital, Bangkok. "We hope the people will have confidence in us."

CONSTITUTIONAL REFERENDUM

Thai voters were also asked during the vote to decide if a new constitution should replace a 2017 charter, a military-backed document that critics say concentrated power in undemocratic institutions, including a powerful senate that is chosen through an indirect selection process with limited public participation.

The election commission's early count showed voters backing the referendum by a margin of nearly two to one.

Thailand has had 20 constitutions since the end of absolute monarchy in 1932, with most of the changes following military coups.

If voters back the drafting of a new national charter, the new government and lawmakers can start the amendment process in parliament with two more referendums required to adopt a new constitution.

"I believe that the party that wins in the next election will have an outsized influence on the direction of constitutional reform, whether we move away from the junta-drafted constitution or not," said Napon Jatusripitak of the Bangkok-based Thailand Future think-tank. REUTERS