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00:00Peter, good to have you with us.
00:01Good to be back to the Blue Book.
00:02Well, the elections are just over the weekend.
00:05How confident are you that the People's Party is going to do well?
00:10Extremely confident in preparation, but you always have to expect different outcomes
00:15because, as you've seen in Thailand, election outcome and election result doesn't have to always be the same.
00:22It's quite different this time, though, because the military-appointed senators,
00:26the upper house that blocked me last time, is no longer inexistent.
00:31But to say that there's no establishment landmines around to change the mandate of the people, I would be naive.
00:41What landmines in particular?
00:44Law affairs, judicial violence and many things, character assassination, undue suspension of various things,
00:55as you've seen, you know, as a revolving door of prime ministers since 2023, I was the first one to go.
01:02And then prime minister says I was the second.
01:04Pa Thong Thanh was the third.
01:05And now we have the current prime minister, Mr. Anutin, who had 2% popularity at the time.
01:11So that's how it is here in Thailand.
01:15So this election will be very critical because it's either a democratic turning point or a cycle of instability that remains to be seen.
01:25People's party needs to do exceptionally well.
01:28I mean, some have pointed to the fact that you need 200 seats to somehow overcome the challenges.
01:35Do you see the people's party?
01:38Well, as a bit fan of Bloomberg, I've got to do some context.
01:42You know, it's domination of ideas.
01:44Even, you know, foreign international press feels like you've got to have a landslide because it's a parliamentary system.
01:54You know, whoever gets the majority should be able to govern.
01:57But it's a nomination of ideas of the bad elites that's saying that even if you come first, even if you form a coalition, but if it's not over 251, you can't govern, which is not true, like within principle.
02:11But we've seen it happen before, and hence the question.
02:13Exactly, realistically.
02:14So I've got to push back a little bit that, yes, we definitely aim and try our best to win as many as possible.
02:21But we're willing to work with other parties as well in order to form a coalition as long as they have the same principles and policies as us.
02:30So realistically, I'm sure you've done the numbers.
02:33Where do you think you'll stand?
02:34Can you get 155, 200, 251?
02:39I mean, what are the projections out there for you?
02:42Can I be realistic with you?
02:45Be realistic.
02:45This election outcome is highly unpredictable.
02:51In 2023, the deciding factor, the key success factor of the election winner three years ago was about political positioning.
03:03You know, Thailand just came out of a lost decade that was governed by the military coup junta, the juntas.
03:09So when I said, okay, no uncles, no us in Thai, obviously, it meant that, you know, it's a new generation against the military junta.
03:18And that political position carried the entire country to our victory.
03:24That just political position is not about policies or candidates or anything that much.
03:29But this time it's more complicated.
03:31You talk about how you're willing to work with the other parties.
03:34Yes.
03:34Which other parties?
03:35Pui Thái?
03:36Pum Chai Thái?
03:38Not Pum Chai Thái.
03:40Pum Chai Thái only if we come first.
03:42I cannot say much.
03:43I'm only a registered campaign participant.
03:47But you know the thinking of the party.
03:49So I cannot say much more than the party leader has to say.
03:50You have privy to the thinking of the party.
03:52I mean, what's the sense there?
03:54It's against the law to maneuver thinking of the party leadership.
03:59I'm just repeating.
04:01I'm just repeating what the party leader has said in the Thai press before.
04:05And I feel like they are pretty happy to work with any other parties without any corruption scheme.
04:13And they are willing to work with the incumbent Pum Chai Thái as long as they are second.
04:17Because they want to make sure that they control the coalition.
04:22What is the strategy?
04:23To win?
04:25To be in power?
04:26To be able to have a prime minister?
04:29Now it's a step, one step at a time.
04:31But the strategy now is to focus on what we can control and not to be over paranoid on things that we cannot control.
04:39One step at a time.
04:41And the way you do it is to have a solid campaign management for you to have the right precise, precision politics, precise messaging for various constituencies.
04:52And also to have the kind of implementation plan that makes sure that the voting turnout is as high as possible because that's really important.
05:01Back in 2023, it was 76%.
05:04Might not be enough.
05:06This time we should aim for 80% voting turnout.
05:09And I think that will be good for democracy and that will be good for People's Party.
05:13What's different this time around is that the people are also voting for either wanting a change or not of the constitution.
05:20Yes.
05:21How confident are you that constitutional changes can be implemented even if you win?
05:27I'm confident in the people that they will show up and try to amend the constitution so that it's the constitution by the people, for the people, with the people.
05:38In Thailand, it's 20 constitutions, only one drafted by people.
05:4319 was drafted by the military.
05:45So this time is a really good chance.
05:48However, the organization is not so good.
05:50You know, the communication and the PR was not so good.
05:53Thais living in Singapore and all around the world had two days to register to vote for a constitutional amendment.
06:00So I'm confident in the people but not so sure about the organizer or the election commission.
06:04So that remains to be seen.
06:05I'd like to know about your plans to revive the economy.
06:09I mean, we talk about how Thailand was once a tiger economy.
06:121988, to be precise.
06:14And now it's called the sick man of Southeast Asia.
06:17By financial times.
06:18Yes, and we're looking at about 1% to 2% growth, which is below world average, below Singapore, when Indonesia is going by 5% and Philippines is going by 5%, Vietnam is going by 6%.
06:30It will be the slowest growing country in Southeast Asia and among the slowest in Asia.
06:36If People's Party come to power, how do you reverse that?
06:39What would be the strategy priorities to reverse the economy?
06:43You know, after I got banned for two years, I traveled all around the world.
06:47I lived in Boston now.
06:49I traveled to New York and we're talking to investors and stuff.
06:52Predictability.
06:54Trust.
06:55You know, in financial markets and in the real sector, you know, upgraded infrastructure, future economy, and unlocking of domestic markets.
07:09I think that would be the three priorities.
07:11But in one word of a very large CEO company that told me that Thailand is too complicated.
07:18Simple as that.
07:19Because politics is too complicated and who's who is too complicated.
07:22I look at the energy sector and I feel like if there's a change of party, then the entire, you know, solar panel strategy will be changed.
07:30I look at the financial sector, the same thing.
07:33So predictability and trust is something that we have to restore.
07:36Governance is something that we need to restore.
07:38We have to upgrade our people, upgrade our infrastructure, and unlock the domestic market.
07:43And that's about your article precisely, which is the capacity utilization as well as the debt to GDP.
07:51Those are the two things that you had in your article this morning.
07:54And quality jobs.
07:55And quality jobs, exactly.
07:57How difficult might that be?
07:58I mean, the world is moving so quickly.
08:01AI is progressing so rapidly.
08:04Thailand runs the risk of really being left behind if you don't have your house in order.
08:09Well, if we start later, we've got to find the niche.
08:11And we have to be a strategist that thinks of opportunities, not just from assets.
08:19But for me, I think of liabilities as opportunities and new industries.
08:24If PM 2.5 is our weakness, how we control energy, how we do carbon accounting, how we come up with technologies to stop agricultural burning,
08:34like how Indonesia tried to do it as well with the palm oil industry, for example, then we should use that as a huge market pain point and use the existing technologies to do that.
08:47If agriculture is a pain point, is a weakness, how do we become the leader of precision agriculture?
08:55If aging society, 40, 43, you guys are 41, yeah?
09:00In the median age, whereas like Indonesia is 35, Philippines is 25.
09:04So we are poor in aging.
09:06So that becomes something like how do you have an industry that you can make people aging in place?
09:15Dementia village.
09:16In Copenhagen, they have dementia village.
09:18Like the entire village where all the retirees want to come because of universal design, because of all the pension,
09:24because of all the facilities that focus on the aging population, which builds on our tourism and builds on our public health.
09:33You know, it's something like that.
09:34You have to be able to look forward.
09:36If you're only a leader that you see like, okay, we are, our asset used to be automotive and electronics,
09:41and we want to use that, only that, as part of a strategy to push for opportunities, that's not a good leader.
09:47I feel like you've got to be able to do a quick SWOT analysis of strength, weakness, opportunities, and threats
09:53to link your internal capability of a country to the external environment that is so volatile as per your question.
10:00I want to talk about your political career.
10:03Of course, you're the almost prime minister.
10:06Almost got there.
10:07You've been banned for 10 years.
10:08Yes.
10:09Two years down, eight years to go.
10:11What's the plan?
10:13A lot of jazz, a lot of yoga, a lot of John Coltrane, a lot of squash now.
10:21I lost seven kilos after the election.
10:26But now I spend a lot of time on campus with Harvard Kennedy School where I graduated from in 2011.
10:34So I turned textbooks into reality into 2023.
10:39How to run for public office, campaign management, how do you give speeches in front of a public.
10:45I learned the textbook style.
10:47I turned it into reality.
10:48They banned me, so I got a return.
10:51And now I turned reality into textbooks and making sure that ASEAN youth, younger leaders, even Japanese, Colombians, and things like that,
11:01if they want to graduate and run for public office, I'm there for them.
11:05And I think that the role has changed from a player into a coach.
11:10You said this time around is different from 2023 when the key factor was political positioning.
11:15Yes.
11:15What's different this time around?
11:16So in 2003, it was about political positioning.
11:19This time is very segmented.
11:21It could be about conflicts because of the border conflicts between Thailand and Cambodia.
11:28It could be about climate change if you are from down south in Hadyai, not very far from Singapore or Malaysia.
11:34It could be about corruption if you follow scam operations and things like that, how Thailand is a platform.
11:41It could be about cash, which is about the economy, how it's growing by about 1 or 2%.
11:47So people are really struggling.
11:49So from 1P, political positioning, that it was almost like an umbrella for a landslide.
11:55Like anybody could relate to that, whether it's a military junta or a civilian government led by me.
12:01But this time around is very segmented into four Cs, like how I said to you.
12:07But I think People's Party this time is more institutionalized as well.
12:12You know, the environment is very segmented, but People's Party is more institutionalized.
12:18And now they have three prime ministerial candidates and many political rock stars rather than just me.
12:24So I think they're in good hands.
12:26A party that's maturing.
12:28That is growing.
12:30Still only seven years compared to any other.
12:33Still growing.
12:34And there's still some growing pain, something to manage, and they're not perfect.
12:37But I think they have created an institution with servant leadership.
12:42Servant leadership means leaders that create more leaders.
12:45You know, without relying on a superman or a single person.
12:49Are you not in a hurry?
12:51My time will come.
12:54Are you looking forward to that time?
12:56And what would you like to bring to the country?
12:58Yes, absolutely.
12:59I want to make sure that I'll still be vigorous, capable, relevant, more calm, more understanding.
13:12You know, my value propositions as a prime ministerial candidate back in the days was that I'm in the middle in terms of age at 42 at the time.
13:25I understand the generation that comes before me, and I understand the generations that are coming after me.
13:31I'm in the middle between the private sector working for Boston Consulting Group, as well as the public sector working in Ministry of Commerce before.
13:40And also ability to understand rural Thailand or to talk businesses with people with the Fullerton in Singapore or Tokyo Midtown or, you know, somewhere in New York.
13:51So I was, you know, in the common ground consensus.
13:55I mean, at the age of 54, when I return, I mean, I'll be aging a little bit, but I think I'll be more experienced and more understand and the same consensus as well.
14:05What's the dream for Thailand?
14:05For people to not having to work two jobs to survive, for Thais to be able to return to their families for dinner, not only Thai New Year or Chinese New Year, to see that it's more equal, to see that we have infrastructure outside of Bangkok so that people can work where they were born and have time with their family.
14:29It's just simple as that.
14:31I'm not taking Thailand to Mars, but it's just simple as that.
14:35Just when bad elites see me and they feel like I want to change Thailand to something that is so radical that they cannot see, it's just over-paranoid.
14:43But it's turning Thailand to Singapore, Japan, or any countries that they want to take vacations in.
14:48Simple as that.
14:49You know, it's nothing more.
14:52Something that attracts confidence and competitiveness.
15:04And I feel like after this election, if institutions allow the mandate of the people, rather than rewriting it, confidence will come in months.
15:16Competitiveness will come back in years.
15:18And then we'll be able to contribute to the world as we know it today.
15:24Peter, thank you so much for your time.
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