National —
Parliament speaker Wan Muhammad Noor Matha has yet to decide the final date for the next round of Thailand’s prime ministerial vote pending the Thai charter court’s ruling on the ombudsmen’s petition.
Mr. Wan explained that he is currently awaiting the Constitutional Court’s decision on whether or not to accept the ombudsman’s petition to investigate the rejection of Pita Limjaroenrat’s re-nomination for a PM seat by 394 parliamentarians.
The court is scheduled to make a decision on Wednesday, August 16th.
The 394 parliamentarians previously voted to disallow Pita, leader of the election-winner Move Forward Party, from being re-nominated, citing a meeting regulation that bars the same motion from being submitted twice in the same session.
However, Pita argued that the PM nomination is not governed by a meeting regulation but rather by the constitution. His party then filed a petition with the ombudsman seeking a court ruling to invalidate the decision of the 394 parliamentarians who disagreed with renominating him for a Prime Ministerial vote.
The ombudsman then accepted the petition and forwarded it to the court as well as asking for any future PM vote to be suspended until the charter court reaches a verdict.
Mr. Wan, meanwhile, further stated that the next PM voting may happen either on Friday the 18th or next Tuesday, the 22nd of August if the court decides in a manner that allows the vote to proceed.
“There are several possible outcomes of the court’s decision, so we must wait to see it first before we can schedule the next joint sitting of MPs and senators to elect the PM,” Mr. Wan said.
He will discuss setting the voting date with both the upper and lower portions of the House as soon as the charter court makes a decision, Mr. Wan added.
