BANGKOK (AFP) – Thailand’s new king has chosen who will be the country’s top monk, the leader of the ruling junta said Tuesday (Feb 7), ending a lengthy power struggle over the venerated post.<\/p>\n
The post of Supreme Patriarch has been left open for more than three years as Thailand’s various Buddhist factions tussle over a successor.<\/p>\n
Critics of the ecclesiastical hierarchy said the squabble was both unedifying and tainted by temporal politics.<\/p>\n
Last month coup leader turned Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha said power to make the appointment had been granted to King Maha Vajiralongkorn.<\/p>\n
That move bypassed the group of 19 senior monks – known as the Sangha – who traditionally chose the top religious leader from among their ranks.<\/p>\n
The junta’s decision also makes debate over the appointment impossible since the king is protected from any criticism by a powerful lese majeste law.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday the new Supreme Patriarch was named as Somdet Phra Maha Muniwong.<\/p>\n
“I learned today that the king has endorsed (the new Supreme Patriarch),” Prayut told reporters, adding a ceremony would be held inside Bangkok’s Grand Palace on Sunday.<\/p>\n
Phra Muniwong is the 89-year-old abbot of Bangkok’s Wat Ratbophit temple and was the third most senior member on the Sangha.<\/p>\n
The most senior member, 91-year-old Somdet Phra Maha Ratchamangkhlacharn, had drawn criticism from some circles for his perceived links to the scandal-hit Dhammakaya sect.<\/p>\n
Critics say the breakaway sect overly emphasised materialism and was close to the governments of Thaksin and Yingluck Shinawatra, who led two civilian administrations toppled by ultra-royalist generals in the last decade.<\/p>\n
Phra Ratchamangkhlacharn was also facing a probe for alleged tax evasion on a luxury car.<\/p>\n
The rancorous battle over the patriarch post is only the latest controversy to dog the clergy in a country where 95 percent of the population are Buddhist.<\/p>\n
Monks routinely make headlines for their lavish lifestyles, sex scandals and gambling.<\/p>\n
The ultra-rich Dhammakaya temple in particular has become engulfed in legal scandals, with its own elderly abbott accused of money laundering and land encroachment.<\/p>\n
The temple denies wrongdoing and has portrayed the investigations against it as politically motivated.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
BANGKOK (AFP) – Thailand’s new king has chosen who will be the country’s top monk, the leader of the ruling junta said Tuesday (Feb 7), ending a lengthy power struggle over the venerated post. The post of Supreme Patriarch has been left open for more than three years as Thailand’s various Buddhist factions tussle over a successor. Critics of the… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-487","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-analysis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=487"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":491,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487\/revisions\/491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/eastasiaandoceaniablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}