Bangkok - Thailand's Election Commission on Tuesday concluded that the ruling People's Power Party (PPP) should be dissolved for vote-buying in December's polls, ratcheting up the country's political crisis.

The decision came the same day that Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej declared emergency law after a violent clash between pro-government and anti-government groups in Bangkok left one person dead and 44 injured.

Samak put Bangkok under emergency law after failing to oust thousands of followers of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), which is calling for his resignation, from Government House, the seat of government, which they have occupied for the past week.

A forceful eviction of the PAD protestors, most of whom are middle-class Thais devoted to the monarchy and contemptuous of Thailand's recent history of money politics, is likely to further undermine Samak's already unpopular rule and that of the PPP, political analysts said.

Election Commission Secretary General Sutthipol Thaweechaikarn said the PPP case would be forwarded to the attorney general, who may decide whether to forward it to the Constitution Court.

In July, the Constitution Court ruled that Yongyuth Tiyapairat, former PPP deputy leader, had engaged in vote-buying in the December 23 polls and terminated his status as a member of parliament, barring him from politics for five years.

Under Thailand's constitution of 2007, drafted by a military-appointed committee, a political party may be disbanded if it is proven that it was complicit in vote-buying or any form of election fraud committed by a party executive.

It is deemed a foregone conclusion that if the Constitution Court takes on the PPP case, the party, which leads the current government, would be disbanded and its executives, including Samak, would be banned from politics for five years.

The dissolution would leave Thailand without a strong party to lead the government. The PPP won 223 of 480 contested seats in the last election.

"I am afraid that in the future, there may not be any strong parties left to support the people," said Chaturon Chaisaeng, a former deputy leader of the Thai Rak Thai party, which was dissolved by a Constitutional Tribunal in May last year for committing fraud in 2006 elections.

The Thai Rak Thai was the party of former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, a billionaire telecommunications tycoon who used populist policies to win the premiership from 
2001 to 2006.

Thaksin was ousted in a bloodless coup on September 19, 2006, on charges of corruption, dividing the nation, and undermining democracy and the monarchy.

Thaksin, whether he intended to or not, has come to personify a new trend in Thai democracy of empowering the urban and rural poor through elections.

Thaksin's antagonists, such as the PAD, view the majority of elected politicians as corrupt and bent on reaping personal gain once brought to power by vote-buying.

The PAD is advocating a shared role between elected members of parliament and bureaucrats and other appointed officials.

"In Thailand, throughout our history, one side is always trying to stay in power though appointed people," said Chaturon, who has been barred from politics for five years along with 110 other former Thai Rak Thai executives.

"People vote for political parties so they can use them to get what they want," Chaturon said. "That's democracy. Voting for parties is not about voting for good guys but about voting for benefits." (dpa)