When Thai voters go to the polls on 8 February, they will receive three ballots: two for the general election, and one for a referendum which will ask them whether they want a new constitution.

It will be a watershed moment for Thai politics. Written by a junta-appointed drafting committee, the 2017 Constitution is seen as a deeply flawed document. Civil society networks and political parties have proposed amendments but most of these attempts have failed. For many, a vote in favour of a new referendum would open the door for the public to have a say in the drafting of the nation’s fundamental law, while a vote against would make it likely that future amendments become impossible.

Concerns have been raised among civil society, however, that a large group of voters may not even know that the referendum is happening. The Election Commission of Thailand (ECT) is accused of voter suppression; it has not done much to inform voters about the referendum, and allowed only three days for overseas and out-of-constituency voters to register to vote. A campaign launched by a network of civil society organizations advocating for constitutional amendments is now in full swing, informing people about the referendum and calling for a vote in favour.

The deciding match

The People's Constitutional Drafting Group (ConForAll) organised a park run at Benchakitti Park on 7 January to campaign for people to vote in favour of a new constitution.

“Thailand is a country that has never been fully democratic,” said Yingcheep Atchanont, Director of the legal watchdog NGO iLaw. “Since we became a constitutional monarchy around 93 years ago, we have been in a cycle of military coups.”

The pattern, Yingcheep explained, is that a coup would be followed by an election conducted under a set of rules designed by coup leaders that are not entirely democratic. Thailand has had 20 constitutions, the majority of which were drafted by junta-appointed bodies after the previous constitution was repealed in a coup. He said that the public has never really been allowed to participate in the drafting process or to elect a drafting body.

As a result, he said, Thailand’s constitutions are written to deal with what the elite see as political problems, such as to prevent specific people from assuming office or to keep coup leaders in power.

“[The Constitution] has never been a law that incorporates the will of the people about what they want the country to be,” he said.

The referendum will be the first time in history that the Thai public has been asked whether it wants a new Constitution to replace one written by a junta. Failing to gain approval for a new Constitution would mean the status quo imposed by coup leaders would put down deeper roots in Thailand, and Yingcheep said that without a vote in favour, he does not see how the 2017 Constitution can be amended.

Although he speculates that it is more likely for the majority to vote in favour of a new Constitution, Yingcheep said that the road ahead is not easy. Given the political situation, he noted that the ‘powers to be’ are still seeking to dominate the drafting process. He said he hopes to see an overwhelming majority vote in favour of a new Constitution.

“If that happens, it would be an important declaration from the people that they want democracy, that they want the power to be theirs. They do not want a system designed by the military,” he said. “It would be an important starting point for democracy.”

Yingcheep Atchanont

For Yingcheep, the challenge is not trying to get enough turnout for the referendum or people who disagree. He noted that campaign events in Bangkok have not been disrupted and that the organisers were given permission to use public parks for the events. Instead, the challenge is that voters may not know the referendum is happening or what its implications are.

The government and the ECT have not been trying hard enough to make sure people understand what is happening, Yingcheep said. He speculated that the now-caretaker government of Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul did not really want to call the referendum but had to because amending the Constitution was one of the conditions set out in the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) between the Bhumjaithai Party and the People’s Party which guaranteed the votes for Anutin to become Prime Minister after the removal of Paetongtarn Shinawatra.

He also noted that because the referendum is taking place at the same time as the general election, political parties may be too busy with their own campaigns to help convince people to vote in favour of a new Constitution. The hope, he said, now lies with active citizens mobilized to help spread the news.

“Whether it will be successful or not is in the hands of the people, not in the hands of the political parties, and the government will definitely not do it,” he said.

iLaw and other civil society organizations have launched a campaign informing people about the referendum and calling on them to vote ‘yes.’ They are organizing park runs in Bangkok every Wednesday leading up to election day, with other events also taking part in other provinces. Meanwhile, volunteers are visiting markets to hand out flyers and speaking about constitutional amendments. Yingcheep hopes that the events will attract a large number of participants and volunteers, which could help raise awareness.

“If ordinary people stand up and do it, then it’s possible. If not, I don’t know how many millions will go to the polls on 8 February without knowing what the third ballot paper is,” he said.

Changing a flawed rulebook

The current Constitution of Thailand was drafted by a 21-person committee appointed by the coup leaders in the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) with no public participation in the drafting process.

It was adopted in 2017 following a public referendum held amidst repression of dissidents and critics for disseminating information “distorted from the facts or having violent aggressive, rude, inciting, or threatening characteristics.” Persuading voters to vote in a certain way or refrain from voting carried a prison sentence of up to 10 years and a fine of up to 200,000 baht. Meanwhile, the NCPO issued orders restricting media freedom and prohibiting political protests. This prevented open discussions about the pros and cons of the Constitution and the referendum. Over 200 people faced charges for campaigning about the referendum. Some parts of the Constitution were also changed after it was approved in the referendum.

The 2017 Constitution has been criticised by civil society as designed for the NCPO junta and its network to remain in power. For the first five years after the Constitution was adopted, the NCPO-appointed Senate was empowered to join the House of Representatives in the vote for a Prime Minister. In 2019, 249 of 250 senators voted for NCPO leader Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha as Prime Minister. In 2023, the Senate refused to vote for Move Forward Party leader and Prime Minister candidate Pita Limjaroenrat, even though the party won the most seats in the House and he was able to secure the majority of MPs’ votes.

After the end of the term of the first Senate, new senators were selected in a process where candidates voted among themselves with no public participation. It has been noted that this created the opportunity for a conspiracy to manipulate voting, and that many of the current senators are connected to the Bhumjaithai Party.

Bills proposing amendments to the Constitution require approval from one third of senators, giving whoever dominates the Senate effective veto power. So far, 26 constitutional amendment bills have been proposed, and all but one were rejected. According to iLaw, 13 of these bills were approved by a majority in the House of Representatives but could not gain enough Senate votes to pass.

A protest in front of parliament in May 2025 called for the Senate to suspend appointments of independent body members as investigation is ongoing over vote manipulation in the Senate selection. Civil society members have made the demand on the grounds that the Senate should not be appointing people to the bodies responsible for investigating senators. (Photo by Ginger Cat)

The Senate is also solely responsible for appointing members of independent bodies, including the ECT, the National Anti-Corruption Commission and the Constitutional Court. In 2025, the Senate approved as Constitutional Court judges 2 candidates with connections to the Bhumjaithai Party, while rejecting independent experts like political scientist Siripan Nogsuan Sawasdee.

The Constitutional Court has the power to dismiss prime ministers and MPs, dissolve political parties, or declare elections invalid. It has repeatedly invoked vaguely defined ‘ethical standards’ to dismiss politicians from office or dissolve political parties. Since 2017, it has dissolved three political parties, dismissed a handful of MPs, and in the past two years alone, dismissed two Prime Ministers, Srettha Thavisin and Paetongtarn Shinawatra, over ‘breaches of ethics.’ Meanwhile, under the 2017 Constitution, citizens are no longer allowed to petition for the dismissal of politicians or members of independent bodies.

When it comes to rights and freedoms, the 2017 Constitution says that the exercise of rights and freedoms must not affect national security, peace and order, or good morals. Previous constitutions specified only certain cases of national security.

A number of rights enshrined in previous constitutions are also not included in the 2017 Constitution. These include the right to a free basic education, the right of consumers to be informed, the right to an efficient justice system and to state-appointed legal representation, the right to welfare for the disabled, and the right to healthcare. Instead, these are now “duties of the state.”

In previous constitutions, citizens were able to file lawsuits when their constitutional rights were violated and were entitled to compensation. When these rights are framed instead as duties of the state, citizens are powerless to seek such compensation.

Voter suppression or mismanagement?

But getting to the referendum has not been smooth sailing. In recent weeks, the ECT has been under fire for several mishaps which have led many to accuse it of voter suppression. Civil society organizations and voters have criticized its decision to open registration for overseas and out-of-constituency referendum voting in the narrow window of 3 – 5 January. The period was said to be too short, and it fell just after the New Year holidays, when many voters were returning from trips and might not have had the chance to register. Some voters who registered to vote early or overseas in the general election may also have been left unaware that they have to register separately to vote in the referendum. Demands for the registration period to be extended have been denied.

Concerns were also raised that the registration website might not have been able to handle the influx of people accessing it over the last days of registration; in previous elections the site had gone down. On 5 January, some netizens reported that they had issues accessing the website. Some also said they were unable to register to vote because the website was down and they could not access it before registration closed.

Moreover, early voting is not allowed in the referendum, so people who have registered to vote early in the general election because they cannot go to the polls on 8 February will not be able to vote in the referendum. ECT Secretary-General Sawaeng Boonmee posted on Facebook that this is because the law allows only out-of-constituency voting, which in the case of the referendum means another province as each province is considered one constituency.

According to the ECT, 2,402,178 people registered for advance or overseas voting in the general election, while 1,598,056 people registered to vote overseas or out-of-constituency in the referendum. The difference of over 800,000 raised concerns among civil society that these voters may effectively be denied the right to vote in the referendum.

Sawaeng said during a press conference that one should not assume people who register to vote early in the general election will also want to vote outside of their constituency in the referendum. He also said that the registration period cannot be extended because the ECT needs the time to complete other administrative tasks, and that since registration should not take more than three minutes, everyone should be able to do so if they manage their time well.

The election observer group We Watch noted that the sample ballot paper in the information booklet published by the ECT is blue when it will actually be yellow, and instead of telling voters to mark the ballot with an ‘X’, the booklet just tells voters to make a mark without specifying that they need to put a cross.

Former Election Commissioner Somchai Srisutthiyakorn posted on Facebook that this might cause voters to misunderstand that they can mark the ballot with any symbol, which would lead to a large number of invalid ballots.

The ECT has since published an online version of the booklet with an accurate sample ballot paper. Sawaeng told reporters that the content of the booklet was provided by the Cabinet, and that the ECT was responsible only for its publication and distribution. We Watch said that the ECT and the Cabinet have acted unprofessionally. Although a corrected version has been published online, the booklets have already been delivered to voters and the Cabinet and the ECT should take responsibility for their mistakes.

The ECT has also been accused of trying to manipulate voters’ decisions; several passages in the booklet have been seen as steering voters towards a vote against. In the list of possible reasons for not drafting a new constitution, the booklet states that drafting a new constitution could lead to more political conflict than section-by-section amendments where the debate would be more limited. It also notes that drafting a new constitution may mean having to waste money on conducting a referendum for final approval.

The list of reasons for and against, according to the booklet, came from parliamentary debates on constitutional amendment bills.

The ECT is also facing criticisms over the layout of polling stations and the polling station plan which it has published and which is difficult to understand. Although votes for the general election and the referendum are cast at the same polling station, the procedures for the two votes will be kept separate. Voters must present their ID at the first desk to receive the ballot papers for the general election, mark their ballots and put them in the ballot boxes, before repeating the entire process for the referendum vote. Concerns have been raised that the process is unnecessarily complicated and could confuse voters who may inadvertently exit the polling station without voting in the referendum. Civil society organizations have demanded that the ECT change the layout so that all three ballot papers (for constituency MPs, for party-list MPs and for the referendum) are collected at one polling desk and marked in the same booth, but the ECT has refused. An administrative lawsuit has been filed against the ECT over this issue.

The road ahead

A participant in another park run organised by ConForAll took pictures in front of a backdrop calling for a vote in favour of a new constitution. (Photo by Ginger Cat)

The referendum is the first of three that the Constitutional Court has ruled are necessary to rewrite the Constitution. While a double majority – a turnout of more than half of all eligible voters, at least half of whom vote in favour – was previously required, an amendment to the Referendum Act made in 2025 means that only a simple majority is now required.

If the majority of voters approve the drafting of a new Constitution, Parliament will have to pass a bill to amend Section 256 of the current Constitution to set up the process of forming the drafting body and drafting the new Constitution. If this amendment receives parliamentary approval, a second referendum is needed to gain public approval.

If the amendment to Section 256 is approved by the public, members of the drafting body can then be selected and begin the process of drafting a new constitution. The completed draft will then have to be approved in a third and final referendum.