Thai courts vow to make new poll free and fair

BANGKOK, May 9 (Reuters) Thailand's top courts will supervise new elections to ensure they are free and fair after the April 2 poll boycotted by the main opposition parties was declared unlawful, a Supreme Court spokesman today said.

But it remained unclear when the election would be held, how the courts would supervise it and whether Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the target of months-long street campaign, would seek to retain the job if his party won a third successive victory.

However, the chiefs of the Supreme, Administrative and Constitutional Courts agreed at a meeting their supervision of the new poll would help restore the loss of public confidence in elections, spokesman Jaran Pakdeethanakul told reporters.

''The three courts agreed unanimously to supervise the election to ensure it is free and fair,'' he said.

Jaran gave no details of how the courts would supervise the election, but he said Supreme Court judges would propose that the next meeting of the three courts ask the Election Commission (EC) to quit to accept responsibility for the April 2 poll.

''All four Election Commissioners must sacrifice,'' Jaran said, without naming a date for the next joint court meeting.

But the EC said it needed time to study a full statement of the Constitutional Court's verdict before it made any move.

''So far, there is no commissioner who says he will quit and none of them has moved their belongings out of their offices as reported by some media,'' EC secretary-general Ekachai Warunprapa told reporters.

BACK IN SPOTLIGHT Today's meeting of the top judges was their second in two weeks since revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej told them to sort out the ''mess'' after parliament failed to produce a quorum to convene and form a new government.

It came a day after the Constitutional Court ruled that the inconclusive April 2 election was unconstitutional and said a new one should be held to try to resolve the deadlock.

Thaksin called the election three years early to counter a Bangkok-based street campaign against him, but the plan backfired when the three main opposition parties refused to take part, campaigning instead for a protest ''no'' vote.

He announced a ''political break'' after the poll, handing day-to-day power to a deputy even though he remained prime minister officially.

However, his return to the public eye on Friday -- leading the cabinet to an audience with the king to mark Coronation Day -- intensified speculation the move was purely cosmetic.

Thaksin would run in the new election, but it was too early to say whether he would assume the premiership for a third time or keep his pledge to step aside, a close aide today said.

''I believe the prime minister will continue to run under the party's banner, but whether he will continue to be the prime minister, that I can't answer,'' Prommin Lertsuridej, Thaksin's top political strategist, told reporters.

Another aide said the economic impact of the political crisis and high oil prices would require Thaksin's return to power.

''The country has been badly bruised and many parties have thought of Prime Minister Thaksin,'' Deputy Public Health Minister Anutin Charnvirakul told reporters. ''When the time comes, he will come back to solve the crisis.'' Thaksin, however, kept his own counsel.

''Why are you still following an unemployed man?'' he asked a crowd of reporters following him and his wife to a posh shopping mall in Bangkok.

REUTERS OM KN1650