Former Thai prime minister Samak dies

• Last Updated: November 24. 2009 10:39AM UAE / November 24. 2009 6:39AM GMT

Samak Sundaravej, centre, led the People Power Party to victory in 2007 – the first poll since a military coup ousted Thaksin Shinawatra. Apichart Weerawong / AP

The former Thai prime minister Samak Sundaravej, who was forced from office in 2008 for starring in television cooking shows, died of liver cancer today at the age of 74.

A close ally of the ousted ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra, Mr Samak led the People Power Party (PPP) to victory in elections in December 2007 – the first polls since a military coup that ousted Thaksin a year earlier.

The fiery-tongued right-winger spent nine months as prime minister, beset by mass street campaigns against his government, before a court ruling on his television appearances brought about his downfall.

He had been battling liver cancer for more than a year.

“His condition worsened to critical on Monday evening and he was taken to intensive care, where he died this morning,” his former secretary Teeraphon Noprampa told reporters.

A spokesman for the private Bumrungrad Hospital in Bangkok confirmed that Samak died this morning. Thaksin, who is living in exile to avoid a jail term for corruption, offered his condolences.

“My family and I express profound sorrow for the passing away of HE (His Excellency) Samak but I will not be able to attend his funeral,” he said in a posting on Twitter.

The silver-haired Mr Samak was a leading figure on Thailand’s political scene for more than three decades, with earlier stints as deputy prime minister, interior minister and governor of Bangkok.

His family also had close ties to Thailand’s deeply revered palace.

Before his time as premier, Mr Samak had been taking a break from politics and featuring on two television shows, where he scoured markets advising viewers on selecting quality goods and whipping up Thai treats in the kitchen.

His gruff manner and colourful way with words may not have endeared him to the urban elite who had long dominated Thai politics, but he was personally backed by the populist Thaksin for the 2007 post-coup elections.

With the support of the rural poor who had also loved Thaksin for providing universal health care and microcredit schemes, he and the pro-Thaksin PPP stormed to victory in the December 2007 polls.

But he faced growing protests by the so-called “Yellow Shirt” movement, which helped topple Thaksin in 2006, on the grounds that he was a proxy for the billionaire tycoon Thaksin.

He was forced from office when the constitutional court said the payments from two programmes were illegal.

The PPP leadership moved quickly to restore him to power but it proved unpopular with both coalition partners and the party rank-and-file, with nearly one-third of the PPP’s own lawmakers refusing to back his re-election.

*AFP