Thai strongman Prayuth Chan-ocha finds it hard to show softer side

It is a rocky road from junta leader to man of the people, as Thailand’s prickly Prime Minister has demonstrated.

Elderly locals hug an uncomfortable Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha as he attends a government-sponsored event.

It is a rocky road from military junta leader to man of the people, as Thailand’s famously prickly Prime Minister, Prayuth Chan-ocha, has demonstrated this week in a last-ditch effort to woo voters ahead of next weekend’s elections.

From serenading supporters in his home province, to distributing soft-focus studio shots, and — less convincingly — stonily submitting to the hip-height embrace of tiny grannies on the hustings, Prayuth is pulling out all stops.

It remains to be seen whether enough of the country’s 51 million eligible voters, 7.4 million of them first-timers, believe the retired general is the right man to restore Thailand’s democracy.

The 64-year-old was, after all, the man who led the 2014 overthrow of a caretaker Thai government following six months of political crisis in which the administration of Yingluck Shinawatra and the popular Pheu Thai party (founded by her billionaire brother Thaksin Shinawatra) were forced out of office.

In his five years in power, Prayuth has developed a reputation for grumpiness. He once mused at a news conference that he could “probably just execute” a roomful of reporters.

The junta has worked hard to ensure next weekend’s long-­delayed elections favour the ­incumbent through a redrafted constitution that demands all 250 Senate seats be appointed by the military.

It also calls for the Prime Minister to be jointly selected by the lower house and the Senate, handing the military a decisive role in the appointment.

Yingcheep Atchanont, program manager for Thailand’s legislative watchdog iLaw, says few first-time Thai voters are persuaded by Prayuth’s sudden ­attempt at image reconstruction, and many more don’t understand why he has bothered.

“This is an abnormal election because all the rules have been drafted by the military junta which has also appointed their own to people to enforce those rules and laws,” Mr Atchanont told The Weekend Australian.

“I don’t know who created this new image and why they’re doing it now because he hasn’t looked like this for five years.

“Whether people like his new look or not doesn’t matter because he can still find his way back to power.”

Prayuth, now running for ­office at the top of the pro-military Phalang Pracharat party’s ticket, needs only 126 votes in the upper house to secure the prime ministership, in addition to the 250 Senate votes he will almost certainly command.

He has already had a handy headstart on his competitors thanks to his junta’s gag on all political activity, including gatherings of more than five people, before the start of official campaigning on January 24.

Most analysts expect Pheu Thai — the party most closely ­associated with exiled former prime ministers Thaksin and his sister Yingluck — to win the largest number of votes.

Polling this week by Thailand’s E-Saan Centre for Business and Economic Research showed Pheu Thai commanded 43.6 per cent support from those surveyed, popular new pro-Thaksin party Future Forward 23.2 per cent, while Prayuth’s Palang Pracharath Party was polling third with 11.7 per cent.

But the redrafted constitution favours smaller parties, making it more difficult for one party to win a clear majority.

In an effort to get around the new system, a number of pro-Thaksin smaller parties are also contesting the election. One of those, Thai Raksa Chart, was dissolved last month for naming a sister of the Thai king as its prime ministerial candidate.

Two Pheu Thai candidates face sedition charges, while three members of the anti-junta Future Forward party, including its charismatic young leader, Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, have been charged with computer crimes.