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Yingluck Shinawatra: Former leader of Thailand to face trial over rice subsidy scheme
ABC Radio Australia - March 19, 2015
Yingluck will appear before a Bangkok supreme court on May 19 and if found guilty could be jailed for up to 10 years.
She was removed from power by the judiciary just prior to last May's military coup and was banned from politics for five years as part of her retroactive impeachment in January.
The latest legal move against Yingluck – Thailand's first female prime minister and sister of fugitive ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra – could spell the end of her family's political dominance. The Shinawatras, or parties allied to them, have won every Thai election since 2001.
"The panel [of judges] has decided that this case falls within our authority... we accept this case," said judge Veeraphol Tangsuwan at Bangkok's supreme court.
The attorney-general filed criminal charges against Yingluck in February, accusing her of dereliction of duty in relation to the economically disastrous rice scheme, which paid farmers in the rural Shinawatra heartland twice the market rate for their crops.
The program cost billions of dollars and inspired the protests that eventually felled Yingluck's elected government and led to the military coup.
Yingluck did not attend the court on Thursday but would be legally obliged to attend the first hearing in May.
The army takeover last year was the latest twist in Thailand's turbulent political landscape, at the heart of which sits Thaksin, who was toppled by a coup in 2006 and now lived in self-imposed exile to avoid jail on a corruption charge.
Yet his influence persists in Thai politics, with Shinawatra-allied parties drawing the loyalty of the rural north as well as urban working-class voters for their populist policies.
But Thaksin was loathed by much of the country's royalist elite, which is backed by parts of the military and judiciary, and experts said the impeachment and charges against Yingluck were the latest attempt to extinguish the family's political prowess.
The junta has said it would hold fresh elections in early 2016 once reforms to tackle corruption and curb the power of political parties were codified in a new constitution.
But the draft charter has raised deep concerns in the kingdom and critics doubt whether it will bridge Thailand's political divisions. (ABC/AFP)
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