Thai Court Ousts Prime Minister Over Election Fraud-- Airport Siege Ends

With 300,000 tourists stranded in Thailand-- and the economy losing at least $2 billion-- Thailand's Constitutional Court banned Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat from office for 5 years. Flights to and, more importantly, from Bangkok's two airports will resume Thursday.

Somchai, the brother-in-law of crooked billionaire/fugitive and ex-PM Thaksin Shinawatra, was booted out of office over election fraud. Thaksin's party, the People Power Party (PPP) was disbanded. Somchai, whose illegitimate right-wing government had fled to Chiang Mai, agreed to the terms of the court ruling, although some leaders of his banned party said they would reconstitute the government under another party name (the Party for Thais) and hold on to power.

Under the court ruling, Mr. Somchai and 59 executives of the three parties are banned from politics for five years. Twenty-four of the banned executives are members of Parliament and will have to resign their seats.

It was not immediately clear that the six-party governing coalition still had the 241 seats required for a parliamentary majority, said Gothom Arya, a former election commissioner who is director of research at Mahidol University in Bangkok.

Some seats will be declared vacant with Tuesday’s decision and will require by-elections, Mr. Gothom said, and there could be some defections from the governing coalition.

This CNN report was a little premature in it's gloom and doom: