It is interesting to hear a responsive disagreement of the new PM toward the online lottery in Thailand, especially in this hard time of his cabinet. Whatever Mr. Abhisit has in mind this is truly a high stake bet of his political gambling.
It takes substantial political will and unusual leadership to put this agenda forward and more importantly the independency of the government from conflict of interest with special interest groups. If Mr. Abhisit’s cabinet can really succeed this lottery campaign this time, it surely a genuine evidence to support his claim of clean and citizens-agenda-led politics.
What lies ahead?
There are a number of credible threats against this noble political will. First of all, this political campaign needs considerable amount of political mandates and supports from both inside and outside the parliament. Without enough mandate, it is very likely that this campaign will be transformed to some extend, e.g. partially amend the condition of the online lottery operation or even, in the end, let it starts the operation untouched.
As this cabinet was formed by a fragile coalition of diverse types of politician, when there is a political negotiation, it is very likely that online lottery will be put on the table for the exchange of the other political campaigns. This bargaining process will be surely triggered by the special interest groups who would have suffered a big loss if this project does not go through due to the sunk cost of the project that has been accumulated for years.
On the outside of parliament, the supports for Mr. Abhisit’s political will is also ambiguous. His political operative team may have had problems on how should they evaluate the true state of political supports for Democrat party nationally. Regarding lottery issue, everyone understand that the majority of Thai citizens addict to this gambling, especially the swing voters. As the possibility of re-election and the reality of by-election is looming very soon, it is very risky to take the definite stand on this issue at this time. Imagine how many electorates have been eagerly waiting for the online lottery and who will they vote for if the current PM wants to abolish this project.
Is it politically rational?
It is open for debate why Mr. Abhisit start the debate on this issue at this time given the current political landscape and the uncertain future. Perhaps, he wants to throw some rocks for asking the way, asking his true constituents to come forward and show some supports. Or he may wants to send a strong signal to voters and all the influential players in Thai politics to clearly define himself the type of politician he is, he obviously wants to define it by himself and choosing his own game.
It is good to hear the new PM chooses to stand on the minority side of the argument in this political debate because the public provided lottery should, in principle, designed to rapidly reduce the addicted behavior of gamblers and in the mean time its quasi-fiscal revenue can finance other public spending. Gambling is bad per se and leads to all other undesirable problems in society. Government should not become addicted to the lottery itself either financially or politically.
Every political games are uncertain and nothing more than a lottery per se. Most politicians choose to play a safe bet or play the profitable one for their own political career, which is often a big lost of political opportunity for Thailand. After all political mandate is truly an artificial political dynamics. If Mr. Abhisit honestly wants to succeed this anti-online lottery campaign, he needs to bring out his best political leadership and convincing arguments about why he wants to do so and how this can benefit Thai people in the long term. Whatever it takes to make the majority of Thais to understand, it is surely worth trying. If this campaign succeed in gaining political momentum from inside and outside the parliament, the future of Thai politics and Mr. Abhisit are promising.
