Name: Thailand's ruling party wins big with nationalist message | DW News
Uploaded: 2026-02-09T17:11:47.000Z
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In Thailand, the ruling conservative prime minister has claimed victory in the general election in what's seen as a stunning turnaround.

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The vote was sparked after Anatin Charnviracul's minority government was threatened with a no confidence vote.

Now his party is set to double its number of seats in parliament and that'll help informing a new coalition in bringing about political stability.

The Progressive People's Party which led pre election polls is projected to come in second.

An unexpected victory for Thailand's conservative prime minister.

He staked his election campaign on nationalism and it paid off.

At this moment our people have given us more than what we expected this morning.

Nationalism is in the heart of everybody in Thai party.

Thailand has been swept by a wave of nationalism in the wake of a fierce border conflict with Cambodia last year.

Anutin saw the opportunity to ride that wave to power, calling snap elections after less than 100 days in office.

And while his party Bhumjumtai did come out on top, it won't score a majority outright.

His opponent from the Progressive People's Party conceded defeat but also refused to form a coalition with the conservatives.

I have to say that if the conservative Bumjaitai as the main party can form a government then we are ready to be in the opposition.

As I have said before, I cannot support Bumjaitai's candidate.

If Anutin does ultimately form the next government, he will have to tackle a struggling economy as well as a precarious geopolitical landscape.

And our Asia Pacific bureau chief Georg Matthis joins us now from Bangkok.

Georg, this is the first decisive victory in years for the Prime Minister and his ruling conservative Bunchai Thai party.

Terry, it really depends who you are talking to.

Bangkok was taken in this election in an orange wave.

It's all of the constituencies went into the hands of the People's Party, the Progressive Democratic Party that was came up second in this race and is not getting into the seat of power as things are currently looking.

And so obviously people, voters here this morning, people I talked to are rather disappointed.

If you look more into the northeast of Thailand for instance, where the Bon Chai Thai Party with Anutin Shanri Raccoon was campaigning very strongly.

Where you have that conflict with Cambodia going, people are overjoyed to see a government of their tastes, a conservative government, a nationalist government and what they say will be a strong government for Thailand.

What were some of the promises that Prime Minister Anhotin has made that garnered so many votes.

Well, I talked to the foreign minister of Thailand, who is from that party, and

he said to me a key thing for them is the economy and also the fact that they have the people, they have the personnel, and

The competitor in this race is a party that has only been in the opposition.

So clearly that is something the economy is something where they really registered strongly with voters.

And then of course, you have that conflict with Cambodia where you can have long arguments whether it's a necessary, necessary conflict, who started it first reality is that hundreds of thousands of people had to be evacuated from the border because of Cambodian shelling.

And so these people have voted in favor of a nationalist party that has promised them security.

Well, Thailand has overwhelmingly voted in favor of a referendum calling for a new constitution.

Well, clearly everybody here agrees that there needs to be some change after the political limbo the country has been in the past three years with autonomous institutions such as the Constitutional Court commissions.

All of these institutions, by the way, in the hand of the conservative establishment, mainly in Thailand, have meddled with politics, have had huge influence in politics, have de installed two prime ministers in this country.

And so this will be interesting to see how the new conservative coalition will be able to change that constitution.

However, you will have another referendum on how it's to be done and another referendum.

Then finally, once the blueprint is hammered out of what that new constitution could look like.

So a couple of years, we'll have to wait for that.

Georg, thank you for filling us in there.

That was our Asia Pacific bureau chief, Georg Mattis.

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Thailand's ruling party wins big with nationalist message | DW News

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