On Friday, August 16, the Thai parliament passed a bill designating Paetongtarn Shinawatra as the nation’s next prime minister, elevating a further member of the infamous and contentious political dynasty to the position.
The poll took place two days after former prime minister Srettha Thavisin was dismissed from office by Thailand’s Constitutional Court.
The ruling coalition of Paetongtarn’s Pheu Thai party nominated her as the lone candidate to succeed Srettha, and she went on to win 319 votes in the House of Representatives. Before she may formally assume office and form a Cabinet, King Maha Vajiralongkorn must still give her his approval.
After her aunt Yingluck Shinawatra, Paetongtarn will be the second female prime minister of Thailand and the youngest to assume the office.
Paetongtarn thanked her followers and expressed her sense of honor at the decision in Thai interview with reporters at her party’s Bangkok headquarters.
“I will do my best in this position,” she said.
The youngest child of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was overthrown in a military coup in 2006, is Paetongtarn. One of Thailand’s most important leaders is Thaksin.
Paetongtarn’s aunt Yingluck was removed from office before the military seized power in a 2014 coup, and her father Thaksin went into self-imposed exile in 2006 for more than 15 years to escape corruption charges after the military toppled his government.
Thaksin, a telecoms billionaire and former owner of Manchester City Football Club, returned to Thailand from exile in August last year.
He has retained an outsized grip on Thai politics and many saw him as continuing to influence the Pheu Thai party, firstly through his sister Yingluck and now through his daughter.
