Thailand’s parliament has voted on the nomination of Paetongtarn Shinawatra, daughter of former Tahiland leader Thaksin Shinawatra, as the Southeast Asian country’s next prime minister.
Paetongtarn, 37, is backed by a coalition of 11 parties with more than 300 members in the 493-member House of Representatives. He was officially nominated by Pheu Thai Party Secretary General Sorawong Thienthong.
The new Thai prime minister is a scion of the white elephant country’s influential Shinawatra clan, and the youngest person to hold the post in Thailand, determined to bring stability to the country after his predecessor was ousted by a court for ethics violations.
Paetongtarn Shinawatra, 37, is the second woman to serve as Thailand’s prime minister and she follows two former prime ministers in her family. Former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, whose billionaire father served as prime minister from 2001 to 2006 before being ousted in a military coup, returned to Thailand from a 15-year exile last year and is expected to play a bigger role in Thai politics now that his daughter is at the helm.
Paetongtarn becomes the third member of the influential Shinawatra clan to lead the country and the youngest prime minister in Thai history.
He was chosen after the country’s Constitutional Court dismissed Srettha Thavisin as prime minister in an ethics violation case related to the appointment of a tainted lawyer as a minister.
His big homework ahead is how to assuage voters’ concerns over the high cost of living and foreign investors who are worried about Thailand’s turbulent politics.
Paetongtarn Shinawatra Profile
Known by her nickname Ing, she is the youngest daughter of Thaksin Shinawatra, the patriarch of a political dynasty that has dominated most Thai elections since the turn of the century.
Paetongtarn studied political science at Thailand’s prestigious Chulalongkorn University and later earned a master’s degree in international hotel management from the University of Surrey in the UK. At the age of 17, he made headlines when he worked part-time at McDonald’s and his father stopped by.
She is married to Pidok Sooksawas, a commercial airline pilot. The couple has two children, including a baby boy who Paetongtarn gave birth to while he was campaigning for the general election last year.
Activities before entering politics
Most of Paetongtarn’s professional experience from 2011 until entering politics was in the Shinawatra family business empire, which includes golf courses and companies in real estate, hospitality, and telecommunications.
Until earlier this year, he was chief executive of the hospitality business at Rende Development Co, which is run by his sister, Pintongta Shinawatra Kunakornwong and cites the luxurious Rosewood Hotel in Bangkok as a key project.
Currently, he is the largest shareholder in public property company SC Asset Corp Pcl, with a 28.5% stake worth about 5.2 billion baht (US$152 million), according to data reported by Bloomberg.
Before assuming the post of prime minister, Paetongtarn must relinquish his business positions and comply with shareholding rules, in accordance with Thai law.
His Early Career in Politics
Paetongtarn had a front seat in Thaksin’s career. At the age of eight, he joined his father in his first government job as foreign minister. At 20, he hid in a safe house as military tanks patrolled the streets of Bangkok as the army seized power from him. Two years later, he watched his father flee Thailand to escape corruption charges that he says were politically motivated.
Paetongtarn officially began his political career when he joined Pheu Thai in 2021 as director of the party’s innovation and inclusiveness committee. Two years later, he led Pheu Thai’s pre-election campaign and ran as one of three prime ministerial candidates, promising to end nearly a decade of rule by a military-allied government, led by Prayuth Chan-Ocha.
He has vowed to end the cycle of coups against his family–Thaksin was ousted in 2006 and Yingluck’s government was toppled in 2014–because the Shinawatra family was perceived as a threat for more than a decade by the royal elites who control some of the country’s most powerful institutions and businesses.
Ironically, he now relies on the pro-royalist conservatives with whom Pheu Thai formed the government. Thaksin made a deal last year to return to Thailand after more than a decade in exile and facing corruption charges.
Predicted Policies to be Made by Paetongtarn
As Paetongtarn’s victory helps Pheu Thai secure its leadership in the new government, it suggests little change to the policies pursued by Srettha’s government.
Her government will most likely focus on boosting growth through looser fiscal policies as well as addressing the high cost of living and near-record household debt.
She advocates lower interest rates and criticizes the central bank, saying that central bank autonomy is becoming an “obstacle” to solving the country’s economic problems.
However, what remains to be seen is whether this change in leadership will be the right pretext for his administration to cancel the US$14 billion digital wallet cash distribution program.
The program was a key campaign promise of the Thaksin-backed Pheu Thai party and is central to Srettha’s efforts to help the economy grow annually by 5% like most of its Southeast Asian neighbors.
When asked about this by reporters on the eve of his nomination, Paetongtarn said only that he would review the program once he was in power.
