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Thailand’s Pita Limjaroenrat resigns as Move Forward Party’s leader, to remain involved in MFP
- Pita says he is resigning to pave the way for a member of parliament to become the Thai opposition leader
- His departure as MFP leader follows his suspension as an MP pending a court ruling over his shares in a now-defunct media company
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Pita Limjaroenrat, whose reformist party won the most seats at Thailand’s national elections in May, resigned as its leader on Friday.
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The young challenger led the Move Forward Party (MFP) to the top spot in the polls, capitalising on a swell of voters furious at a near-decade of junta-backed rule.
However, he was stopped from becoming prime minister by entrenched conservative blocs in parliament, and was later suspended as a member of parliament.
Harvard-educated Pita, 43, was blocked from the top job by the senate – whose members were hand-picked by the last junta – because of his determination to reform Thailand’s tough royal defamation laws.
The MFP left a coalition partnership with opposition rivals Pheu Thai, who went on to form a coalition government with pro-military parties, and said they would go into opposition.
“I resigned as the MFP’s party leader to pave the way for an MP that is able to have a voice in parliament, be the opposition leader,” Pita wrote on his official Facebook page.
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