THE chaos in Thailand following the occupation of Bangkok’s two main airports has trapped at least 100,000 tourists and transit passengers in the country. The economic and reputational damage to the Thai tourist industry is substantial, with mass cancellation of bookings for the Christmas holiday season that begins in two weeks. There is, however, a greater cost to Thailand’s image as a stable country in which the rule of law prevails.

The demonstrators who before they moved on to the airports had also occupied Parliament, are members of the People’s Alliance for Democracy, (PAD) who are protesting the continued premiership of Somchai Wongsawat of the People Power Party. The PPP won a free and fair election in December 2007. The protesters claim Somchai is a puppet of his brother-in-law Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted as premier in a military coup in 2006. Thaksin, a successful businessman, has since been convicted in his absence of corruption. Whether Somchai is a puppet or not is no excuse for large-scale disobedience. Since 1947 Thailand has suffered a series of military coups often ended by public protest that has then brought in elected governments. The irony here is that a party which styles itself an alliance for democracy is actually protesting not another military coup, but a duly elected rival political party.

This is a dangerous departure. It is compounded by the fact that the army commander in chief has gone on record that he believes Somchai should quit. Fearing a coup, the prime minister is in the north of the country in one of the rural areas from which his party has drawn its electoral strength. It has been the refusal of the army to help restore public order that has been key to the growing chaos. The police, meanwhile, either doubt their ability to take on the thousands of protesters, or like the army, think Somchai ought to go. Therefore by default the rule of law has been abandoned.

This dereliction of duty by the security forces is serving to polarize opinion in the country. Moderate opponents of Somchai who demand that the democratic process be respected are dismissed out of hand as supporting the PPP government. There is a widespread assumption that the hugely influential constitutional monarch, King Bhumibol Adulyadej approves the protests and that the army would not have challenged Somchai without his tacit consent. Were that to be the case, the king’s view may be changing as his country teeters closer toward violence and bloody confrontation. Yet another coup would, of course, stop the rot but do any Thais really want to go back to being governed by the generals? The PAD leaders may fondly imagine that they would be asked to form a new government, but given their minority position in Parliament, this would be difficult. The emptiness of the PAD case against the PPP is that they are not also calling for fresh elections, because they know full well that they are likely to lose them again. Their disruptive protests are, therefore, utterly illegitimate.