Former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra showed his continuing popularity on Tuesday night with an appearance on the social media application Clubhouse.
Using the handle Tony Woodsome, Thaksin made an appearance with the Care Group to talk about the challenges facing the SME sector in Thailand.
Over 30,000 people listened to the talk with multiple channels mirroring the main stream due to an 8,000 person limit on Clubhouse.
In contrast, a talk held by Minister of Public Health Autin Charnvirakul the day prior drew only a few thousand at its peak.
The talk on Tuesday was more tightly controlled than Thaksin’s first appearance on Clubhouse where the prime minister stumbled and refused to answer questions on Thailand lese-majeste laws and appeared to have problems remembering the Tak Bai incident.
By contrast, Tuesday’s talk focused on Thaksin’s start in businesses and the problems he faced getting his business empire of the ground in the 1980s and 1990s.
The moderated panel also focused on inadequate response by the current administration to foster a nurturing environment for start-ups and businesses – especially during and after the coronavirus pandemic.
Thaksin was ousted by a military coup in 2006 and has spent the majority of the last two decades in self-imposed exile. His sister’s Yingluck’s government was similarly deposed in a 2014 military coup – with the generals from that coup continuing to govern the country.