<div style="text-align: justify; "><b style="font-size: 1rem;">Reformist Pita Limjaroenrat will again ask Thailand's parliament to endorse him as prime minister Wednesday but with little chance of wooing the military-appointed senators who scuttled his first bid.</b><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Pita's Move Forward Party (MFP) won the most seats in May elections, buoyed by the hopes of young and urban Thais wearied by nearly a decade of army-backed rule, but its efforts to form a government have stumbled.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Thailand's conservative establishment vehemently opposes the party's pledge to soften the kingdom's strict royal defamation laws, and Pita's first tilt at the premiership fell 51 votes short last week.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Parliament opened to weigh his candidacy again on Wednesday but few believe the 42-year-old Harvard graduate has managed to turn the numbers in his favour.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He has vowed to step aside to make way for a coalition partner to form a government if his second attempt fails.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"Pita is less likely to get the vote passed," Napisa Waitoolkiat, a political analyst with Naresuan University, told AFP.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Thailand's senate is stacked with military appointees -- a reliable brake on the kind of liberal reforms sought by MFP and its progressive voter base.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Only 13 of 249 serving senators voted for Pita last week and Napisa said his only likely pathway to power was to successfully court many more members of the chamber.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"And I don't think the senate is going to be brave and courageous enough to do that," she said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Pita was optimistic on Monday that several MPs who missed the vote could be persuaded to rally behind him.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"We still are talking to find more support," he told reporters.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">- 'You cannot allow that' -</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But other roadblocks have been thrown in front of his candidacy.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">A possible motion by military-aligned lawmakers could see parliament rule Pita ineligible to be considered a second time.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Constitutional Court will be in session as parliament meets, and may decide to proceed with a case about whether Pita should be disqualified from parliament entirely for owning shares in a media company.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Doing so is prohibited by Thailand's constitution, even though the station has not broadcast since 2007. Pita, wealthy from a family-run agrifood business, has said the shares were inherited from his father.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If the case does proceed, Pita could be given an interim suspension from parliament while his candidacy for prime minister is being considered.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The court has also agreed to hear a case alleging that MFP's campaign promise to amend Thailand's royal defamation law is tantamount to a plan to "overthrow" the constitutional monarchy.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Pita's party has ignored strident opposition to its pledge to revise the law, which can allow convicted critics of the monarchy to be jailed for up to 15 years.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Napisa said MFP's reformist platform also posed a threat to powerful, family-owned business monopolies that play an outsized role in the kingdom's economy.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"If you are those people, you cannot allow that," she said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">- 'Justification for crackdown' -</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">If Pita's next bid fails, the coalition backing him is expected to fall in line behind property tycoon Srettha Thavisin, potentially relegating MFP to serve in opposition.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Srettha's Pheu Thai party is seen as a vehicle for the Shinawatra political clan, whose members include two former prime ministers ousted by military coups in 2006 and 2014.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But as a successful entrepreneur liked by business leaders among the Thai elite, the 60-year-old is seen as a potential compromise that would smooth the way for the coalition to take office.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Prawit Wongsuwan, 77, a former Thai army chief who served as number two in the junta that took power in 2014, has also been floated as a candidate by parliament's military bloc.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Thai voters roundly rejected army-backed parties in May's election, and political analyst Thitinan Pongsudhirak said the prospect of a Prawit premiership could spark a backlash in a country that is no stranger to political unrest.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"If Move Forward is excluded, there will likely be protests... if protesters overreact, a Pheu Thai-led government would have some justification for a crackdown." AFP</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd24/kh</div>