Red-Shirt Rally - Day 2

[Gaybutton]

Today is the second day of the three day Red-Shirt protest rally during which they hope to bring down the current Thai government. Yesterday was a much lighter turnout than was expected. Now we'll see what today brings:

 

The following appears in the BANGKOK POST:

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Red Rage Rising

 

Jatuporn says clashes are unavoidable, Abhisit 'hopeful' for peaceful protests, UDD rural hordes head for the capital

 

Published: 13/03/2010

 

The United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) yesterday attracted fewer than expected numbers to what it called a "prelude" to its mass rally to bring down the government.

 

Security forces said about 6,500 to 7,000 red shirts showed up at six locations across the capital yesterday.

 

The red shirt supporters of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra gathered to perform ceremonies to bless their cause and curse their enemies.

 

The crowds dispersed after a few hours and were told to meet tomorrow at Sanam Luang.

 

UDD leaders including Jatuporn Prompan, Veera Musikhapong, Weng Tojirakarn and Jaran Dithapichai, led the red shirts to several sites around the city, including the 11th Infantry Regiment, where the government's peacekeeping operations command is based.

 

The gatherings did not adversely affect traffic in the city.

 

As the red shirt protesters in Bangkok dispersed, those in the provinces gathered en masse to start their long journey to the capital.

 

About 14,000 people left Chiang Mai with another 10,000 on the way from Udon Thani in the Northeast.

 

Groups of red shirts, numbering in the tens and hundreds, from provinces in the North and Northeast, all headed for Ayutthaya's Wang Noi district, a key mustering point for the UDD and a security choke point.

 

Mr Jatuporn said yesterday's events in Bangkok were just a "prelude" to tomorrow's big event, and the numbers did not matter.

 

"We have thought it through," he said. "We want to save energy for the big battle on Sunday.

 

"Today's activity is not a rally. It is more of a preview. I hope the government enjoys its estimates [of the size of the rally] until it sees the real thing."

 

The UDD set up its stage at Pan Fa Bridge on Ratchadamnoen Klang Avenue last night. Activities will begin this morning, said Mr Jatuporn.

 

The red shirts' rally to force the Abhisit Vejjajiva administration to step down should not exceed seven days, he said.

 

He warned the government not to incite violence as clashes between protesters and security forces would only escalate its downfall.

 

"The government has deployed 50,000 police and troops, so confrontation is unavoidable," he said. "Those who have less patience will lose."

 

Mr Abhisit yesterday said he hoped the rally would proceed peacefully.

 

He said the fact that the government's chief negotiator and a core UDD leader have already established a communications channel was a positive sign.

 

Mr Abhisit said the government has a lot more to do to ensure effective communications because red shirt demonstrators are in several groups and are supervised by different leaders.

 

The prime minister said he has suggested that security forces and red shirt guards could work together to search rally participants for weapons.

 

He also brushed aside UDD leader Natthawut Saikua's threat to mobilise the UDD to bring Bangkok to a standstill if the government refuses to step down.

 

A house dissolution would not solve the political deadlock, said Mr Abhisit.

 

"I have no idea how the situation will develop but I plan to do my best to keep things under control," he said.

 

People's Alliance for Democracy coordinator Suriyasai Katasila said the rally would not draw 50,000 people.

 

Numbers were low due to splits in the red shirt movement and the realisation that Thaksin was exploiting the UDD.

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And this, from THE NATION:

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Thaksin's Last Chance

 

By Tulsathit Taptim

The Nation

Published on March 13, 2010

 

More than ever now, Thaksin Shinawatra needs the rural poor to bail him out.

 

Yesterday's quiet showing by his red-shirted supporters based in Bangkok and its surburbs was downplayed as a calm before a real storm, but whether that's true or not, their provincial counterparts have to produce nothing short of a hurricane in the next couple of days.

 

He could take heart in the fact that red tides were streaming into Nakhon Sawan last night from upper North. The meeting point, rally organizers hope, would be flooded with more than 100,000 people before dawn, making the last stretch of the journey to Bangkok one of the historic political moments.

 

Thaksin knows better than anyone that this particular red campaign can't end with a whimper. While there can be plenty of excuses for the low turnouts at rendez vous spots around Bangkok yesterday, he can't afford to be seen as being abandoned by the rural poor during arguably his darkest hours.

 

No more court case coming up. Pheu Thai, his virtual political party, is facing no dissolution threats. If Thaksin can't turn the asset seizure ruling into a groundswell of sympathy now, the only chance for a "red upheaval" will be lost forever.

 

According to police, only 6,500 protesters gathered yesterday at various spots around Bangkok, far below the initial target of 10,000 people at each gathering point. A lot of factors may contribute to the low turnout _ hot weather, limited financial supplies, the "no-violence" campaigns, the widespread fear of violence as well as the seemingly poor coordination among the organizers.

 

Rivals of the red shirts claimed there were other reasons as well. They said news that Thaksin's family members and close relatives were leaving Thailand during this time left a bad taste in his followers' mouths. Some red sympathizers might have also felt reluctant to join a "pro-democracy" rally that took place only days after the Supreme Court seized his "ill-gotten" money.

 

"If you are red members you can get somewhat confused," said Suriyasai Katasila, a yellow-shirted leader. This is not to say, however, that most red shirts would renounce a campaign to retrieve Thaksin's money. It's only that protest organisers' reluctance to associate the rally with Thaksin's confiscated wealth has left them with the less attractive, or even boring, cause of overthrowing an illegitimate Democrat government.

 

That the "three buddies", as the three red shirt leaders are called, spent most of yesterday appearing on red cable TV discussing same old issues raised eye-brows. They offered no good explanation why they were not leading the crowds on the first day of the rally, only saying yesterday was just a "prelude" and the reds' real force would be seen at the weekend.

 

It seemed everyone was pinning his hope on the rural poor to weave their political magic and save Thaksin. News reports from the province showed lively preparations in various northern and northeastern provinces, but along with that also came a setback, as a group of red supporters were caught on camera receiving payment from those who looked like organizers.

 

Whether or not the apparent scandal was an exception or a rule didn't matter as far as Thaksin was concerned. He has to do whatever it takes to make sure the red rally creates a big impact at least in terms of numbers. This desperate situation has prompted fears that if the red shirts could not form a mass big enough, chances of "statement through violence" may increase.

 

Considering the fast-growing "peace" movement in the city and the government's preparations, a repeat of last year's Songkran turbulence seems unlikely, at least for now. To bounce back from the court setback, Thaksin will need pure power of the poor to relaunch himself. The irony of it is not even the fact that he remains one of Thailand's richest men, but the red shirted leaders' description of this campaign as one to expose a yawning gap between Thailand's Haves and Have-nots.

[Gaybutton]

A good number of photos of the goings on are posted on the Gay Ting & Tong board:

 

http://www.gaytingtong.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=6675

[Guest voldemar]

As you insigtfully noticed yesterday:

 

 

That's it, folks. Now it's a little after 3:00pm in Thailand. I believe I was right about what I predicted. If nothing has happened by now, then I doubt it will. As I said . . . all media hype and nothing but bullshit.

[pong]

OK then-as yesterday-this is again (1 min earlier-8.59 now here)-from right beside Ratch damnern Ave.

Yesterday afternoon I went to Sirikitti centre (the 3d travelmarketfair in 5 weeks...), then to dinner, Sukhumvit for some spa-treatment and came back by 21.00. It was unusually quiet on all streets-even more quiet as sundays. A few dozen redhsirts on Ratchdmnn-but at least 5 times as much riot police. There was also a gathering of redshirts at Lumpini Park/corner of Silom-but others told this had also vanished by 18.00.

In the eve Ratchdmnnnalso barely had any redshirt. Spoke with a soldier (looked surprised-I tried to read what was on his shield). Lots of them standing guard.

This morning there were tents erected all along Ratchdamnn-and some pissoirs that would delight the followers of some cfs-threads. Saw just 2 redshirted ladies-who were busy preparing meals. A little later that nasty and far too loud music was put on.

I noted that a lot of bisnises had closed shop. Reports that various farang-backpack-tourist buses are cancelled for this period. It did seem also a little more quiet in farang nbrs as in this week before.

[pong]

one more not really that nice report though:

also in the newspprs this morning (I thing some Thai ones) was that the protest might last for the whole week. Now I really hope that is not the case-2-3 days is OK-just let them have their right to demonstrate. But traffic off, things closed-and maybe even delivery problems for the whole week etc is getting pretty annoying.

AGAIN: this ONLY applies to the old parts of BKK-city, where most of you dont even have a clue of where it is or what is there to be done or how to get there. The airport where anyone seems to extremely preoccupied on, is 33 kms away from here. Silom/Surawongse is 6-7 kms away. You may ever have read/heard about rental boys on Saranrom park-thats about 1 km away.

[Gaybutton]

As you insigtfully noticed yesterday:

Aside from your usual sarcasm, what point are you trying to make? Perhaps you forgot what you wrote yesterday, all about how everything is scheduled only for March 14 when it fact everything was scheduled for March 12-14.

 

Maybe you are impressed by the goings on so far. To me it all is still not much of anything. The newspaper articles this morning back up what my thoughts were. Even the Red-Shirt leaders expressed disappointment over the numbers of participants.

 

I don't care much whether I turn out to be right or wrong. If I'm wrong I'm sure we're all champing at the bit to see you come here to gloat.

 

I made my prediction. Where's yours?

[Gaybutton]

It's about 1:10pm in Pattaya. A circuit around town was just about the same as yesterday. Nothing at all out of the ordinary.

 

I would expect the most interesting observations to come from Bangkok today. If you are in Bangkok, please let us know what you see and experience.

[Guest lvdkeyes]

We just went to Villa Market from Jomtien via Second Rd. and returned via Beach Rd. The traffic was very light for a Saturday.

[Guest voldemar]

Aside from your usual sarcasm, what point are you trying to make? Perhaps you forgot what you wrote yesterday, all about how everything is scheduled only for March 14 when it fact everything was scheduled for March 12-14.

 

Maybe you are impressed by the goings on so far. To me it all is still not much of anything. The newspaper articles this morning back up what my thoughts were. Even the Red-Shirt leaders expressed disappointment over the numbers of participants.

 

I don't care much whether I turn out to be right or wrong. If I'm wrong I'm sure we're all champing at the bit to see you come here to gloat.

 

I made my prediction. Where's yours?

I never said that everything is scheduled on March 14. The rally is scheduled on that day. But surely it does not stop there. As for my predictions, I do not practice Vudu

science or have a Cristal ball. Suffices to say that the rally will be huge (and hence you will prove to be wrong to no surprise) and Reds will not try to seize the airport as your another local expert Fountain hall claims.

Some people may live in Thailand (and even BKK) for many years , claim to be experts on everything Thai but in reality have no clue.

[Guest RichLB]

Can any of you more aware of the political realities of Thailand shed some light on what is to be believed. I read in the Bangkok Post that little has been happening in regard to the Red Shirt Rallies as of the morning of the 13th. Then I read the news clips on Ting and Tong (site posted above) and it seems quite a lot has been happening. While I understand quite a bit of Thai, I'm no where near an expert, but depending on which TV station you might be watching, you'd get entirely different impressions of events - one station reported that all air traffic has been diverted to Chiang Mai from BKK, but no other station has mentioned this.

 

So, the question remains...Is there a reliable source of objective reports on what is happening in BKK and other places in relationship to the Red Shirt Rallies?

[firecat69]

Nothing of consequence happening in Bangkok.

 

I went from the River to Siam Paragon via Skytrain and returned via taxi. between 12- 4pm. Traffic extremely light on roads and no demonstrators seen.

 

Siam Paragon appeared to have about 1/3 of the people normal on a Saturday..

[Guest gwm4sian]

Can any of you more aware of the political realities of Thailand shed some light on what is to be believed...........

 

So, the question remains...Is there a reliable source of objective reports on what is happening in BKK and other places in relationship to the Red Shirt Rallies?

 

That, as they say, is the 64 thousand dollar question. Everybody who is anybody in Thailand has some sort of affiliation to promote or axe to grind. To those of us westerners brought up on the likes of the BBC and independant news reporting, the different spins provided by different TV stations and newspapers are mindblowing. I don't know of any "good" source of news - probably the safest is to take an overage of the whole lot!

[Gaybutton]

I do not practice Vudu

You also do not practice spelling. What you do practice is crawling out from under a rock every so often to write put-down posts. It's perfectly obvious that you're hoping for responses from me to your kinds of comments. What I've written on this post is all you'll get.

[Guest fountainhall]

Reds will not try to seize the airport as your another local expert Fountain hall claims

Wrong! I never claimed the reds would seize the airport - as my post makes perfectly clear -

 

As for taking over Suvarnabhumi, I am pretty certain the government and the army must have plans to bring in the tanks to stop hordes descending on the airport. It's not that difficult to road-block the access roads from the north. However, and here's the rub - unless they also ring-fence the public roads that run up both sides of the airport just outside its perimeter, tens of thousands of red shirts could relatively simply just tear down the fencing, rush in and just sit down on the runways

I was stating a pretty obvious fact relating to airport security. Since you did not notice when you read the post, please note now the use of "unless they ring fence . . . the red shirts could . . ."

[Gaybutton]

In addition to the following articles, I found myself stuck in a major traffic jam on Sukhumvit today, between Pattaya Klang and Pattaya Tai. I managed to make a U-Turn, get out of it, and return home. I made that turn long before I was close enough to see what was causing it. It could have been a Red-Shirt thing. It could also have been caused by an accident or something else.

 

Other than that, it again appeared to be a perfectly normal day in Pattaya.

 

The following appears in the PATTAYA DAILY NEWS:

 

for photos, see: http://www.pattayadailynews.com/en/2010/03/12/rebel-rousing-red-shirts-tour-pattaya-en-route-to-bangkok-demo/

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Red Shirts Contingent Tour Pattaya En Route To Bangkok

 

Pattaya, 12 March, 2010, [PDN]: Early this afternoon, Mrs. Jureeporn Sindhuprai, President of the People Love Democracy Association of Pattaya led a group of over 300 Red Shirts to first pray and give homage to the shrine of King Taksin, behind Rungland Village, South Pattaya and secondly to assemble in front of Pattaya City Hall, before moving off on a ‘rebel rousing’ tour of the city.

 

The ‘rebel rousing’ took the form of broadcasting stirring rhetoric from a bus with the intent of recruiting local people to join their group going to Bangkok. Their speech attacked the Prime Minister and the President of the Privy Council. Over 50 Pattaya Police and police volunteers provided security at different points in Pattaya.

 

Mrs. Jureeporn Sindhuprai announced that, so far, between 1,000 to 1,500 local people will be going to Bangkok tomorrow. Most will be going by car and motorbike, with at least 100 of them going via the Chonburi By-pass to join the main Eastern Seaboard group on the Bangna–Trad Road. The demonstrators took 80 temporary toilets with them.

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And this, from PATTAYA ONE:

 

for photos, see: http://www.pattayaone.net/pattaya-news/15702/red-shirts-not-quite-on-the-rampage-yet/

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Red Shirts Not Quite on the Rampage, Yet

 

13th March 2010

 

Friday 12 March saw what many observers believe is the beginning of the end game as far as the so-called Red Shirt anti-government groups are concerned. The United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship, better known by the acronym UDD hoped to marshal up to a million demonstrators in Bangkok.

 

At the same time, regional rallies and demonstrations were also organized. In this bulletin we concentrate on the Red Shirt activities in and around Pattaya. The day before the official rallies our journalists traveled to Soi Petragoon in North Pattaya and the headquarters of what is called the Pattaya City Democracy Protection Club. If anyone was expecting a group of people to be sitting around in easy chairs playing a few games of Scrabble and chequers you would be disappointed.

 

The Club is just a glorified set of market stalls selling UDD t-shirts, scarves, baseball caps and other bits and pieces, including soap. On Friday morning a large group of red-shirted UDD supporters gathered in front of the King Thaksin the Great statue at the front of City Hall to pay homage, light incense sticks and pray for the overthrow of the government and good t-shirt sales. They were addressed by Khun Ronagit, one of Pattaya’s deputy mayors.

 

There were no reports of violence from within Pattaya and the UDD supporters stated they will be assembling in Soi Petragoon on Saturday morning and taking a bus or three to the rallies in Bangkok.

[Gaybutton]

I was stating a pretty obvious fact

That's right and it was perfectly obvious to everyone, and that includes voldemar. Just disregard anything he posts. Only a troll who comes out of the woodwork every once in a while to post garbage.

[Guest cdnmatt]

Other than that, it again appeared to be a perfectly normal day in Pattaya.

 

Why do you keep worrying about Pattaya, when the demonstration is in Bangkok? That's like me saying I don't see anything much happening in Khon Kaen, so all must be normal in the world.

 

I don't know, but considering that due to recent news reports, it looks as though a state of emergency will be declared tomorrow, there must be something going on.

[Gaybutton]

Why do you keep worrying about Pattaya, when the demonstration is in Bangkok? That's like me saying I don't see anything much happening in Khon Kaen, so all must be normal in the world.

Peripheral demonstrations were expected in Pattaya. There were none. Also, I comment on Pattaya because that's where I am. There have been Red-Shirt problems here before and I don't see a thing in the world wrong with letting people know whether there is any trouble here this time too.

 

There's also nothing wrong with saying nothing is happening in Khon Kaen. Some people expected this to cause chaos throughout the entire country. I wish people present in Thailand, no matter where they are, would post whatever they see, even if they see nothing happening at all where they are.

 

By the way, an arrest warrant has now been issued against Red-Shirt leader Arisaman Pongruangrong, accused of inciting riots during a speech he made on January 31. Where did he make that speech? At a Red-Shirt rally . . . in Khon Kaen.

[Guest voldemar]

Wrong! I never claimed the reds would seize the airport - as my post makes perfectly clear -

 

 

I was stating a pretty obvious fact relating to airport security. Since you did not notice when you read the post, please note now the use of "unless they ring fence . . . the red shirts could . . ."

And why would you want to discuss this option even hypotetically when it is pretty clear that they are not going to do that? Last april you made the same suggestions. On the contrary, you were very supportive of faschists from PAD when they actually seized the airport. Just quite recently in one of your posts you were very surprised that your taxi-driver in BKK was very supportive of Reds...

As I said, some people may live in Thailand for many years but never be able to understand anything which does not preclude them for claiming expertise on every subject matter related to Thailand.

[Guest cdnmatt]

I wish people present in Thailand, no matter where they are, would post whatever they see, even if they see nothing happening at all where they are.

 

Ohhh, ok. In that case, if you are actually curious, there were some gatherings of red-shirts over the past little while. Not demonstrations or protests, but they'd all get together at the auditorium in the city center. Nothing special, but I'd say around 600 - 1000 people.

 

They're gone now, and have already headed to Bangkok.

[Gaybutton]

if you are actually curious, there were some gatherings of red-shirts over the past little while.

Yes, I am curious. I am also curious about what city you are referring to. You didn't say.

[Guest cdnmatt]

Ohh, sorry. Khon Kaen. I'm somehow found myself living here these days. I do enjoy it though. :-)