The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday (3 August) to ban former Palang Pracharath MP Thanikan Pornpongsaroj from running in elections for life, after she allegedly asked another MP to vote on her behalf during a parliamentary session in 2019.

Thanikan was allegedly absent from a parliamentary session on 8 August 2019, during which the House of Representatives was debating the King Rama X Rajaruchi Medal Bill. Evidence gathered by the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) suggested that she had given her electronic voting card to another MP who voted on her behalf while she was participating in a panel discussion at the Institute of Academic Development Co. Ltd. in Bangkok’s Dusit district.

In August 2022, the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Holders of Political Positions sentenced Thanikan to 1 year in prison and ordered her to pay a 200,000-baht fine for malfeasance and abuse of power, but suspended her prison sentence for 2 years because it was her first offence. The Court said that only MPs present in the chamber have the right to vote on a bill and proxy voting is unlawful.

Thanikan filed an appeal with the Supreme Court’s appellate tribunal, but the court ruled to uphold the original sentence.

On Thursday (3 August), the Supreme Court ruled to ban Thanikan from running in elections and from taking any political position for life. It also banned her from voting in an election for 10 years.

The Court said that evidence and witness testimony suggested that Thanikan was not present in the chamber, and that, since the incident took place within less than 6 hours, the Court did not believe it to be possible for another person to take her voting card, vote under her name, and return the card to her without her knowledge. It also said that if another MP took Thanikan’s card and used it to vote by mistake, they should have informed the House and asked for the vote to be recast, but no one did so.

The Court said that if Thanikan lost her card, she would have searched for it before voting and others present in the chamber would have noticed and remembered such incident. However, she said that she did not know where she found the card and did not notice anything out of the ordinary, which the Court said is not normal. She also did not disclose the name of the MP involved in the proxy voting incident, further suggesting to the Court that she gave her card to another MP and asked them to vote on her behalf, which damaged the law-making process.

Thanikan is not the first former MP banned from running in elections for proxy voting. Three other former MPs from the Bhumjaithai Party have also each been sentenced to 9 months in prison and banned from running in elections for life for asking another MP to vote on their behalf while parliament was debating the 2020 national budget bill in January 2020.