Icheoku says, congratulations to the people of Thailand for a successful peoples action! At last, your rejected government of
Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat is no more! Kudos to your grand meeting of the mind and firmness of purpose; together your wish and desire have materialised. Be assured that every real democrat the world over, is very happy for you and may you find in your next leader, a person deserving of your trust and confidence.
At
Icheoku, we believe that
a government is owned by the people and not the other way round, which explains our felicitations for what you were able to accomplish today, December 2nd, 2008 with the forced resignation of the discredited
Prime Minister (pictured left) Somchai Wongsawat's government.
Your week-long blockade and seige of
Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi International airport, was a project well orchestrated and worthy of all the effort put therein. The People's Alliance for Democracy (PDA) of Thailand showed to the world the effectiveness of a mass action and how to topple an unpopular government by the people that installed it. The over 350,000 stranded passengers brought the much needed attention to your quest and the fall of the government today, marks a new beginning for the people of Thailand. Your court of justice, the military and your police all played their patriotic roles by not allowing themselves to be tools of oppression in the hands of the government which mandate, you had since withdrawn. The court especially became the agent of speedy change by disbanding the governing party of the ousted
Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, banning him from politics in the process. The nine-judge constitutional court found the
People Power Party (PPP), the Machima Thipatai party and the Chart Thai party
guilty of vote-buying in the last general election, in 2007. Icheoku says it was the same year 2007 that the
Peoples Democratic Party in Nigeria equally stole the election in Nigeria and imposed a sickly frail man
Umaru Yar'Adua on the country as their president from his hospital sick bed in Germany. But Nigerians are still waiting, anxiously praying and hoping that their
Supreme Court will muster enough courage like the Thai Constitutional Court to sack Umaru Yar'Adua and possibly disband the rogue and arrogant PDP, banning their leaders from politics for at least five years.
The court's ruling in Thailand, following several months of PAD-led protests that crippled the political process in that country, shows that a meaningful goal-directed opposition can effect a change in the politics of a country, whose elections were as corrupt as Nigeria. If only Nigerians can wake up and smell the coffee! The name of the country is Thai-land, meaning the land of Thai people and not Somchai Wongsawat-land, hence it does not belong to the rejected Prime Minister but the Thai people! The lessons of the successful removal of the Wongsawat led Thai government is two-fold:
that mass action works and that the government is owned by the people and not the other way. Hopefully, Nigerians will take note of the non-violent revolution that just took place in Thailand!
The Thai army was ordered to quell the peoples protest but refused! The Thai police was also ordered to kill the protesters but refused leading to the removal of the police chief! It shows that the security forces of Thailand is there to protect the Thai people and not to become a tool of oppression and mayhem in the hands of the government as obtains in Nigeria! Remember the
Odi and Zaki-Ibiam massacres of Nigeria's Olusegun Obasanjo's very repressive government when the military was ordered to kill thousands of innocent Nigerian protesters?
. The Thai people's revolution is a testament on who really owns the land - the people and not the government!
In Nigeria the despots in power own the land and the Nigerian people are mere guests that can easily be dispatched at the whims of the men of power in collusion with the equally highly corrupt and blood-thirsty security agents! So, Nigerian security officials have you seen that
an illegal order can be refused or disobeyed and that the protesters you are usually sent to annihilate are fellow Nigerians whom you are sworn to protect and not to kill.
The Thailand People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), is a motley collection of businessmen, elites, middle-class, academics, opposition party members and royalists that were united by their
common hatred of the former leader Thaksin Shinawatra. Is there any way in hell Nigerians can become as united for their common hatred of the despicable Olusegun Obasanjo and the very insulting manner in which he imposed Umaru Yar'Adua on Nigerians, to coalesce and install a desirable government in Nigeria? Remember, the Thai people viewed the now ousted government, "elected" in December 2007, as an
illegitimate Thaksin proxy! Icheoku says, this is exactly on all fours with the Nigerian situation since Umaru Yar'Adua is equally viewed as the
illegitimate Olusegun Obasanjo proxy! Also could the Nigerian Supreme Court be as courageous as the Thai's constitutional court and throw away the handicapped Umaru Yar'Adua? Only time shall tell.
It is equally note-worthy that the PAD co-leader
Chamlong Srimuang, is a retired major-general who is championing the common interest of the Thai people. This is unlike in Nigeria where retired military leaders are the root-cause of most of all the troubles facing Nigerians. It gets even better to note that this retired major general led the 1992 "people power" protest against a military-led government.
Thai Army chief Anupong Paochinda, a member of the military council that ousted Thaksin, insisted
the army would not get involved, perhaps mindful of unrest in 1992, when soldiers
opened fire on pro-democracy demonstrators, killing dozens. He added that politics must
be resolved by political means!
Icheoku asks,
does this Thai army chief position resonate with the Nigerian military authorities to provide them with the much needed position in case of any future but unlikely non violent protest by the Nigerian people against the illegitimate Umaru Yar'Adua led PDP government? Once again,
Icheoku says, congratulations for a job well done, Thailand!