Banharn Silpa-archa, Former Prime Minister of Thailand, Dies at 83
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Version 0 of 1. BANGKOK — Banharn Silpa-archa, a former prime minister of Thailand whose scandal-ridden tenure preceded the country’s economic collapse in the 1990s, died here on Saturday. He was 83. His death was announced by Siriraj Hospital, where he had been admitted after an asthma attack. Mr. Banharn, a regional power broker and a master of money politics, enriched his home province, Suphanburi, as a political patron. But his 16-month tenure as prime minister, in 1995 and 1996, was marked by allegations of corruption and economic mismanagement. Thailand’s bubble economy of reckless and unchecked lending grew on his watch and burst one year later, touching off the Asian financial crisis. Throughout, Mr. Banharn remained a quintessential provincial overlord. He was elected 11 times to Parliament and gained the nickname Banharnburi for his home province. He was a familiar presence in national politics, serving as a minister in various governments over the years, and became known as “Mr. A.T.M.” for his methods of winning support and securing allies. In the pragmatic, nonideological politics that was once common in Thailand, he was also known as “the eel” for his ability to wriggle his party into coalitions, including the tenuous grouping of small parties that briefly kept him in power as prime minister. Mr. Banharn’s style of small-party coalitions has since been eclipsed by the ideological, nationally based politics introduced in the 2000s by former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, which has split the country along deep economic and social fault lines. Banharn Silpa-archa was born on Aug. 19, 1932, in Suphanburi, to a family of Chinese traders. He made a fortune in trade and construction, riding an infrastructure boom in the 1960s that was partly fueled by American investment during the Vietnam War. He became active in politics in 1974 when he joined the Chart Thai party. He was elected to Parliament for the first time in 1976 and re-elected repeatedly by huge margins, as he used his power to help make Suphanburi one of Thailand’s most prosperous provinces. After stepping down as prime minister in the face of corruption scandals, Mr. Banharn did not serve as a minister again, but he remained politically active. In 2008, two years after a coup ousted Mr. Thaksin, he formed a coalition with the People Power Party, a successor to Mr. Thaksin’s Thai Rak Thai party. When the Constitutional Court dissolved the governing party later that year, Mr. Banharn was barred from politics, along with other party leaders, for five years. In the years since then, he remained a marginal, though colorful, player on the political stage. He was not a major factor in the demonstrations and violence that roiled the country in the last years of his life. He is survived by his wife, Khunying Jamsai Silpa-archa, and three grown children, The Bangkok Post reported. His children are active in his Chart Thai Pattana party. But the party has been so entwined with his personality and leadership that its future is uncertain. |