Thailand: Hours Before Vote For PM, Court Suspends Pita Limjaroenrat From Parliament

The court order came as Pita Limjaroenrat, the leader of Move Forward, was due to contest a parliamentary vote to become prime minister.

Pita Limjaroenrat, leader of the Move Forward Party and Prime Ministerial candidate

Source : Getty

Hours before he was due to contest a parliamentary vote to become Thailand prime minister, the country's Constitutional Court suspended Pita Limjaroenrat from Parliament on Wednesday after accepting a case alleging he was unqualified to run in May's election, Reuters reported.

The court order came as Pita Limjaroenrat, the leader of Move Forward Party, was due to contest a parliamentary vote to become the next prime minister.

However, Move Forward Party said the suspension should not affect Pita's nomination for the prime ministerial vote. Under election rules, a suspended MP can still run for prime minister.

Earlier this month, Thailand's Election Commission urged the Constitutional Court to suspend Pita over allegations that he broke campaign rules as an MP.

The EC has alleged that Pita should be disqualified because of his past ownership of shares in a media company, which violates electoral rules, Reuters reported.

Under Thailand's election rules, a candidate is prohibited from being an owner or shareholder of a media company.

Pita, 42, has argued his ownership of shares in a media company was not a violation of election rules. He said he had owned shares in Independent Television (iTV), which were inherited from his father. However, Pita said he transferred the shares from his ownership. Independent Television closed in 2007.

In the May election, Pita's progressive Move Forward Party (MFP) emerged as the single largest party, winning 151 of the 500 seats of Thailand's Parliament Lower House. The win was seen as voters rejecting the rule of military-linked parties that ran the kingdom for nearly a decade since the 2014 coup.

After its victory, Pita, a Harvard graduate and former tech executive, formed a coalition with seven other opposition parties and the alliance has 312 seats. 

Pita needs the backing of more than half of the bicameral parliament to be endorsed as the next prime minister.

Last week, he lost the initial bid after being blocked by the army-appointed Senate in a joint vote on the premiership.