Analysis: Some new faces but old divisions to haunt Thailand’s May election

BANGKOK, March 21 (Reuters) – Thailand’s general election set for May 14 will bring new faces into the fray but is likely to be over-shadowed by old animosity between the military-royalist establishment and popular opposition parties challenging the status quo.

The confrontation in the kingdom has shaped a tumultuous two decades of street protests, judicial intervention and coups that were quelled in recent years, largely by COVID-19 curbs, but could well play out again.

The main election contest will be between the rural-based political juggernaut founded by telecoms tycoon Thaksin Shinawatra, and the conservative, Bangkok-based political elite, dominated by pro-military forces that have ruled since the last coup in 2014.

The prospects of a democratic winner either standing up to the pro-military order, or working with it, will determine the political and economic trajectory of…