Thailand: Pheu Thai likely to win May 14 election, but MFP’s popularity is rising fast

• ?MFP's Pita most preferred choice for PM in at least 2 polls
• ?Coalition govt of Pheu Thai, MFP most likely scenario in our view
• ?Senate could back minority conservative govt, but its functioning may be difficult
• ?Constituency seat estimates differ significantly
• ?EC aims at voter turnout of more than 80%

While the main opposition Pheu Thai Party still leads in opinion polls and remains the most likely winner of the general election on May 14, the popularity of the liberal opposition Move Forward Party (MFP) has increased significantly in recent surveys.

The new House of Representatives will comprise 400 constituency MPs and 100 party-list (proportional representation) MPs. While the prediction of the party-list seats from survey data is relatively straightforward, estimating the distribution of constituency MPs is much harder and two pollsters have made such estimates, which differ significantly.

Until recently, Pheu Thai had been reluctant to discuss potential post-election coalitions and had been declaring it is aiming at a landslide victory on May 14. However, Paetongtarn "Ung Ing" Shinawatra, one of the party's prime ministerial candidates, announced on Monday their three conditions for forming a coalition government. The conditions are that the other parties must accept Pheu Thai's policies, that the prime minister must be a Pheu Thai candidate, and that Pheu Thai must oversee the major ministries. The MFP also signalled it is open to a coalition with the Pheu Thai. The most serious problem for such a tie-up is MFP's proposed policy of amending the strict royal insult law. Paetongtarn said that their condition is that the MFP does not seek repealing this law.

We remind that a military junta, led by General Prayut Chan-o-cha, had been in power over the period May 2014 - July 2019. After the general elections in 2019, a coalition government led by Prayut has been formed. In 2023, the House was dissolved on Mar 20 and the government has been functioning in a caretaker capacity since then.

Meanwhile, Thailand's next prime minister will be selected jointly by the new House and the military-appointed Senate, which has 250 seats. The new PM will therefore need the support of at least 376 MPs and senators.

The Pheu Thai and the MFP seem set to have large representation in the House. However, the Senate is likely to prefer a coalition that includes the ruling Palang Pracharath Party (PPRP) or the conservative United Thai Nation (UTN) Party. The PPRP is led by Gen Prawit Wongsuwon, who is also the party's candidate for PM. Gen Prayut is UTN's first prime ministerial candidate.

In theory, a coalition including (one of) these military-linked parties and other conservative players will need only 126 MPs in order to form a government, under the likely assumption that the Senate supports it unanimously. However, such a "minority" government may find it challenging to pass important legislation, such as the budget bill for the next fiscal year or survive no-confidence votes in the House. A scenario of a conservative military-linked minority government may also lead to civil unrest. If serious enough, such turmoil can trigger a new military coup.

We note that junior ruling partner Bhumjaithai Party urged its members to file a complaint against Srettha Thavisin, one of Pheu Thai's prime ministerial candidates, the Bangkok Post reported last week. To be filed with the Election Commission (EC), the complaint is about remarks that allegedly discredited Bhumjaithai. If the EC accepts the complaint, it may urge the Pheu Thai to be dissolved. On a related note, a candidate of the PPRP on Wednesday asked the EC to consider disqualifying MFP leader Pita Limjaroenrat from politics. The reason is that Pita allegedly holds 42,000 shares in iTV Plc, a broadcaster that ceased operations in 2007. According to the constitution, a shareholder of a mass media organisation cannot run in a general election.

In summary, we assign the following probabilities to the above post-election scenarios - a single-party government of Pheu Thai (20%); a coalition government of Pheu Thai, MFP and possibly other smaller liberal parties (50%); a minority conservative government (25%); some large disruption, such as the dissolution of a large party or civil unrest (5%).

Hypothetically, a coalition including for instance Pheu Thai and the PPRP would be very stable. However, Pheu Thai has been rejecting consistently any cooperation with Gen Prawit or Gen Prayut.

OPINION POLLS

In this section we present the results of nationwide surveys by Super Poll, the Nation Group, the National Institute of Development Administration, and Suan Dusit Rajabhat University. The Super Poll and the Nation Poll both estimated distributions of MP seats, but their results differed in important ways. There were two Super Polls, conducted from Apr 5-13 and from May 1-5. The full results of the second and the main prediction of the first are presented in the table below.

The main difference between the two polls is that the number of MPs for Pheu Thai has dropped, whereas the number of MPs for the Move Forward Party has increased significantly. This trend is largely in line with the results of other recent surveys. The April and May Super Polls had samples of 6,073 and 14,332 respondents, respectively.

Meanwhile, the latest Nation Poll covered 114,457 eligible voters and was conducted from April 24 to May 3. The survey was organized in a way that allowed estimating the distribution of the constituency seats.

There is a certain margin of error associated with these estimates. In particular, the conservative parties may perform better that the respective point estimates. According to the pollsters, the ruling coalition parties should have avoided competing against each other in virtually all constituencies. This would have allowed a consolidation rather than splitting of the conservative vote within the constituencies, the experts said.

Pita Limjaroenrat, leader of the Move Forward Party, is the most preferred choice for prime minister, according to the same survey. He was chosen by 29.37% of the respondents. Pheu Thai's Paetongtarn "Ung-ing" Shinawatra and Srettha Thavisin ranked second and third with 27.55% and 13.28%, respectively. Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha of the United Thai Nation Party was fourth with 8.85%. Bhumjaithai Party leader Anutin Charnvirakul was chosen by 4.05% and no other politician received more than 3%.

This was the second pre-election Nation Poll. The first one was conducted on Apr 7-12 and its methodology did not allow estimating the distribution of constituency seats. Another remarkable difference is that the share of the undecided respondents has fallen significantly in the second survey.

The Super Poll and the Nation Poll agree that Pheu Thai will win the highest number of seats. However, the latter expected that the main opposition party will win as many as 247 constituency seats. Another difference is that the Super Poll ranks Bhumjaithai second, whereas the Nation Poll ranks Move Forward. The Super Poll consistently predicts significantly better performance of the conservative ruling coalition parties.

The large differences between the results of these two major opinion polls translate in different post-election scenarios. If the election results are closer to the Nation Poll's figures, then a government of Pheu Thai and possibly Move Forward seems the most likely outcome. If the results are closer to Super Poll's figures, then a conservative coalition cannot be ruled out.

Two new nationwide Nida Polls have been released since the first Election Watch. They were conducted from Apr 3-7 and from Apr 24-28. Their results are as follows:

A comparison of the first, second and third pre-election Nida Polls shows that the top three parties are the same. However, while Pheu Thai remains the leading player, its support has dropped significantly, especially since the second survey. The support for the MFP has risen, with the bigger gain also seen in the latest survey. The support for the UTN has been largely stable.

According to the most recent survey, Pita is the most preferred choice for prime minister. The previous one indicated that Paetongtarn was the most preferred choice for PM. In the latest survey, Pita was chosen by 35.4% of the respondents and was followed by Paetongtarn with 29.2%. In the previous poll, the percentages were 20.3% and 35.7%, respectively. Meanwhile, Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha of the United Thai Nation Party remains third with 14.8% and is followed by Srettha Thavisin of the Pheu Thai (6.8%), Sudarat Keyuraphan, leader of Thai Sang Thai Party (2.5%), Jurin Laksanawisit, leader of junior ruling partner Democrat Party (1.8%), etc. The share of the undecided was 3%.

The Pheu Thai Party was the most popular political party in a Suan Dusit Poll conducted on Apr 10-20, local media reported. The survey included as many as 162,454 eligible voters. Pheu Thai was supported by 41.4% of the respondents and was followed by the Move Forward Party (19.3%) and junior ruling partner Bhumjaithai Party (9.6%). The previous Suan Dusit Poll was conducted in March.

There are no changes in the top three parties. However, the support for Pheu Thai has dropped by 4.8pps, whereas the support for Move Forward has risen by 3.9pps. In early April, Pheu Thai vowed to distribute a THB 10,000 one-time handout to all Thais aged 16 year and over via digital wallets on Jan 1, 2024. It seems to us that the decline in the support of Pheu Thai could have been bigger, if it had not made this pledge. Meanwhile, Bhumjaithai remained the third most popular party, but its support moved into the single-digit territory.

ELECTION FRAMEWORK

The new House of Representatives will comprise 400 constituency MPs and 100 party-list (proportional representation) MPs. A party must receive at least 1% of the total number of valid party-list votes cast in order to win a list-MP seat.

There are more than 52mn eligible voters. Some 2.35mn people had registered for advance voting, which took place on May 7. The turnout in Bangkok was 91.8%, above the 87% registered during the same stage of the Mar 2019 election.

The EC expects the voter turnout to exceed 80% on May 14 as it steps ups a campaign to raise awareness of the vote, the Bangkok Post reported. The EC has said that the unofficial election result should be known by 22:00 on May 14. The official results of at least 95% of the constituencies must be announced no later than 60 days from May 14, according to the law.