Pita Limjaroenrat is a Member of Parliament of Thailand. He led the Move Forward Party (MFP) into Thailand’s May 2023 election, in which the MFP won the most votes and most seats in the lower house of Thailand’s legislature. However, in Parliament’s votes on who would lead Thailand’s post-coup government, Pita failed to secure enough support from Thailand’s Senate, whose members were appointed by military leaders after the 2014 coup. Srettha Thavisin, a member of the anti-coup Pheu Thai Party, ultimately was named as prime minister in August 2023 after forming a coalition with military-linked parties.
After the election, prosecutors launched legal proceedings against Pita and the MFP, alleging that Pita had ties to a media company in violation of election laws and that the MFP’s proposed changes to lese-majeste laws violated the constitution. The proceedings threatened to remove Pita from office and dissolve the MFP. Pita subsequently stepped down as leader of Move Forward, but remains a senior adviser and key figure in Thailand’s main opposition party and largest liberal party.
Pita was found not guilty of violating election laws in the case regarding his ownership of shares in a defunct broadcasting company. However, soon after, the court ruled that the MFP’s pursuit of amendments to the lese-majeste law was unconstitutional.
Just days later, a petition was filed to dissolve the MFP due to the Constitutional Court’s ruling that seeking to amend the lese-majeste law was tantamount to seeking the overthrow of Thailand’s system of government.
In this interview, conducted on February 2, Pita spoke to Richard Yarrow, a Research Fellow at the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at Harvard Kennedy School, and Saly Sirothphiphat, a student assistant at the Harvard Asia Center Thai Studies Program, about the way forward for the MFP and his vision for Thailand’s future.
“We could compromise on prioritization, the pace of change, but not the reason for our existence and values that we bring,” Pita said, “…[B]ecause there’s always fighting against the old political order or fighting against an inertia, we need to push ahead with our ideas so that people rally behind us to help.”
Can you tell us about your upbringing and how it has influenced your policy and public service vision?
I was born in Bangkok to a middle-class family. My father was a businessman. My mom worked in a bank and retired early to take care of us full-time. I went to an American school called Bangkok Christian College, a Christian-based primary school that emphasized learning English.
Then I moved to a small town in New Zealand, and during that time I started to become interested in politics. I stayed with a home-stay family and we had three channels to watch at the time. Either you watch rugby, an Australian soap opera – “Home and Away” was the name – or parliamentary debates. The prime minister then was Jim Bolger [and I remember watching him] talk about agriculture and environment policies back then.
My father was an agricultural businessman, and he would take me around Thailand to watch over the rice or tapioca fields and think about how to add value to agricultural products. I wanted to get out of Bangkok and learn English, and my father picked New Zealand for me because it was much closer to Thailand than America and very quiet, with no grunge music, no drugs, and no chance to get a tattoo like I could if I went to America. But also, I think he chose New Zealand because of his love of agriculture and his wish to expose me to a country that could be rich because of agriculture.
That’s when I started to see how Thailand spends so much resources and time and energy to sell something relatively of low value. Whereas in New Zealand, if they grow grapes, then they turn it into wine. If they raise sheep, then they make cosmetic or skincare products. Instead of worrying about perishability, they de-commoditize. I think my father wanted to show me that if you de-commoditize agriculture, like how the French, Californians, or Japanese do it, then a country could prosper without relying on dirty industrial sectors.
I returned to Bangkok after high school graduation. I went to Thammasat University, a university rich in political history, such as Black October and the times the military shot students, accusing students of being pro-communist. I started to become Thai again, after having green hair and long hair and skateboarding and surfing, “kiwi style.” And I started absorbing stories that professors would tell us or that seniors would tell us about the brutality of Thai politics.
Later, I worked at Boston Consulting Group, and we did a project for the Tourism Authority of Thailand on post-tsunami tourism recovery. That’s when I started to think about how public sector work is different from private sector work. I could be advising Fortune 500 companies on how to maximize shareholders’ value. But the public sector is about service. That’s when I got interested in pursuing a joint degree with the Kennedy School and MIT Sloan, and then 10 years after graduation, I ran for public office.
Thailand had two big court decisions in the last few weeks. How do you see your political career and the MFP’s plans progressing given how the court decisions will shift parts of the MFP’s core platform?
I think we still have to try our best to fight the case. There’s definitely risk. Thailand has, over and over again, a vicious cycle of minority constitutional hardballs trying to wipe out elected officials [from] becoming the prime minister to forming the government, and not to have any political space at all.
The second case that ruled on treason was a very harsh one. We still want to insist on our good intention and goodwill that to [propose] an amendment of a criminal code – it has not even happened yet – does not mean in any shape or form overthrowing a country or overthrowing the governance of Thailand.
Some people [look at] all the military coups and attempted coups which tore apart constitutions, that changed the form of governance from democracy and constitutional monarchy to dictatorship, without any opposition, without freedom of the press – and they don’t call that treason. The [coup leaders] ended up with one of the longest-serving prime ministers in Thai history and ended up in a very high position. That should make one ponder what the intention of this case really is.
What do you think are the compromises the MFP could make in order to lead a stable government in the future?
We could compromise on operations, but not on values. We could compromise on prioritization, the pace of change, but not the reason for our existence and values that we bring. If Thailand is truly a parliamentary democracy, then the system is designed for compromise, and Parliament is the best place for compromise. There can be no monopolizing, because even if you submit an amendment and it reflects the people’s choice, then you still would debate about it. There will be checks and balances with votes after votes after votes in the lower and upper house, and also checks at the constitutional court level.
If we were to allow a system of compromise on a fair playing field, we would not have 250 [military-] appointed senators in the upper house, [making us] compromise “looking up” all the time. That’s not really a compromise because you’re looking up, [it’s like] fighting the inertia to push something up a mountain. There’s a Thai saying, เข็นครกขึ้นภูเขา [khen khrok khuen phukhao], which means to push barrels up the mountain, you cannot compromise on your energy. You have to go all into it to push the barrel up the mountain.
If we had a level playing field, then [it is easier to] have some consensus building. But because there’s always fighting against the old political order or fighting against an inertia, we need to push ahead with our ideas so that people rally behind us to help push the barrel up the mountain.
If we compromise our values or compromise our political integrity or accountability – like, I take ballots and then slap people in the face and think, I can do whatever I want – then I would be better off not being a politician because it’s not a lifelong occupation, it’s a privilege given by the people over a short time. I didn’t plan to [be in politics] for more than 10 years anyway. I have no regrets about not compromising on my integrity and my values.
What would a compromise in terms of operations look like, or in terms of less sensitive policies such as the current government’s stimulus proposal?
A default, if you don’t compromise on anything, would mean Cabinet positions are given proportionately according to how many votes each party gets. I would be happy to compromise on which ministerial posts [are given to] other parties. That’s the kind of negotiation that I was happy to do as long as we were very clear on what we were trying to achieve.
If they were to ask me to delay by a couple of years on matters that I promised to people, and if I could explain that we have limited resources, limited budget, limited time, and I have to prioritize policies – like I need to raise the competitiveness of Thai SMEs before I raise taxes, for example. I was happy to compromise on these because I knew that you have a coalition for a reason, you do not have a single-party government, and I also wanted diverse views from different parties in different regions.
For some political parties, there is a transaction-based politics where they have invested a lot of campaign finance to get a certain number of MPs. Then, they need ministerial posts in order to have a return on investment. But we do our own campaign financing – our grassroots average donation is around $15. Because of that, I have the autonomy to decide on what kind of compromise I could do.
Thai diplomats have long espoused a “flexible,” perhaps amoral, short-term interest approach to foreign policy. Your campaign focused on a longer term interests or values-oriented approach, which seemed to mark a break from existing foreign policy approaches. How would you describe your campaign’s positions in relation to recent Thai foreign policy? What policies would you want to change?
In today’s foreign policy, it’s “no words, no weight.” If you don’t show your position, then you are not relevant under the emerging world order. There will be times where quiet diplomacy works better than being loud on your values. But for countries like Thailand, the second largest economy of ASEAN and a middle power, if you don’t speak up on critical moments, then you are no longer relevant in the world order.
Without a clear direction of mutual boon for countries, you cannot rebalance and you cannot achieve the status of a middle power. You will punch below your weight all the time. When that happens, the indirect impacts that your diplomacy tries to dodge will come to your doorstep anyway, such as the [problem of rising] prices of fertilizer, soybeans, and animal feed coming from the Russia-Ukraine crisis. President Jokowi of Indonesia, for example, flew over and tried to mitigate the situation along with other countries’ leaders.
Otherwise, many issues that Thailand will face – whether it’s cross-border haze coming from Myanmar, Cambodia or neighboring countries, or even Indonesia or Malaysia related to palm oil deforestation, whether it’s global inflation, whether it’s the shortage of labor coming from Myanmar for work in fisheries and restaurants, which affects tourism – will be impacted if you don’t take a stance in [global issues].
My foreign policy priority is to bring back ASEAN centrality with the region’s emerging new leaders. Singapore will have Lawrence Wong, another Harvard alum, [as the prime minister after a planned leadership transition] and Indonesia will have their election soon. [Editor’s note: Indonesians voted on February 14, with Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto claiming victory based on preliminary results.] With Malaysia and the Philippines, the five founding members of ASEAN can achieve that relevance and centrality back.
The Myanmar crisis is something of a chicken and egg problem. There is a fragmentation of views between ASEAN members over the crisis, which does not translate the Five-Point Consensus to anything except for bullet points. If Thailand gets more involved because of the proximity of the problem and proximity of resources, then we could establish a humanitarian corridor for Myanmar. With the right incentive and pressure of ASEAN and the international community, the people of Myanmar will be able to return to the negotiation table and finally have elections and democracy without more violence.
That’s when ASEAN centrality will be achieved. And that’s when half a billion people will be able to speak and the world will have to listen and we will be able to navigate the polarized Sino-American rivalry.
How do you rate the current government’s economic policy?
It could be much better. I would argue that current economic policy requires a structural shift – not a short-term one, not a helicopter money approach that would stimulate consumption, as our problem is actually industrial competitiveness and export competitiveness. It’s very clear in industry and exports that Thailand is losing competitiveness. [Meanwhile] the corruption index came out recently and the level was even below or the same as it was under the military junta prime minister. I think that’s one of the key factors for someone to choose whether to invest in Thailand or not.
It is concerning that [the government] is taking a long-term risk in terms of fiscal space for a short-term [consumption] stimulus. If we were a rich country with a lot of fiscal space, I would not object, like with Singapore’s helicopter money kind of campaigns. But [the Singaporeans] also tackle the root causes in corruption, education, competitiveness, and infrastructure.
It’s important for us to make sure that we allocate our resources to become competitive again. Hence, more revenue for the government to get out of the vicious cycle of a middle income trap.
This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.