Thailand's House of Representatives on Monday elected veteran MP Chai Chidchob, nominated by the ruling People Power Party (PPP), as the new House Speaker to succeed Yongyuth Tiyapairat who earlier resigned due to electoral fraud charges against him.
Chai Chidchob, a party-list member of parliament of PPP, won 283 votes, mostly from the PPP MPs, against the only rival Banyat Bantadtan, a MP and former leader of the opposition Democrat Party, who won 158 votes in the 480-seat House, according to local TV Channel Eleven.
The special parliament meeting to vote a new House Speaker was called after the PPP, the core party of the coalition government, agreed unanimously last week to choose Chai as the party's candidate for the top parliament post vacated by PPP MP Yongyuth.
First Deputy House Speaker Somsak Kiartsuranand, a PPP MP, chaired Monday's meeting.
80-year-old Chai Chidchob, a multi-time MP and veteran politician from the northeastern province of Buri Ram, is father of Newin Chidchob, one of the 111 executives of the former ruling party Thai Rak Thai (TRT) who were banned from political activities for five years after the TRT was disbanded on a court order on electoral fraud charges last May.
Chai won a seat in the House as a PPP party-list MP candidate in the Dec. 23 election in Buri Ram.
Chai will fill the vacancy left by Yongyuth Tiyapairat, a former deputy leader of PPP, who is facing trial for electoral fraud charges in last December's general election and resigned from his post as House Speaker and Parliament President on April 30.
Source:Xinhua
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