By Al Jazeera

Bangkok, Thailand – Thailand’s Constitutional Court has removed suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra from office after finding her guilty of ethical misconduct over a controversial phone call with Cambodia’s former leader, Hun Sen.

The ruling on Friday makes Paetongtarn the fifth prime minister to be stripped of office by Thai judges since 2008, and plunges the kingdom into political uncertainty and potentially a snap election.

The nine-judge panel, seen as allies of Thailand’s royalist military establishment, ruled that the 39-year-old politician had “seriously violated” the ethical standards required of a prime minister when she spoke to Hun Sen during an escalating border conflict between the two countries.

In the leaked conversation, Paetongtarn was heard pandering to Hun Sen and calling him “uncle”, while criticising a senior Thai army commander as an “opponent”.

The border dispute later spiralled into armed clashes that left dozens dead and tens of thousands displaced on both sides.

The court – which had previously suspended Paetongtarn – said on Friday that the politician had put her personal interests over those of the nation during her conversation with Hun Sen, fuelling a loss of public trust and confidence in her leadership.

Therefore, the court by “a majority vote (6 to 3) rules that [Paetongtarn’s] ministership has individually terminated,” effective immediately, it said.

Speaking to reporters after the verdict, Paetongtarn insisted that she had tried to safeguard the country’s interests and called for political unity.

“My intentions were for the benefit of the country, not for personal gain, but for the lives of the people, including civilians and soldiers,” she said.

“In a time like this, everyone must come together to contribute to our nation’s stability.”

Friday’s ruling makes Paetongtarn the second prime minister to be toppled by the court in a year. Her predecessor, Srettha Thavisin, was also sacked over alleged ethical violations in August last year.

Napon Jatusripitak, visiting fellow and acting coordinator of the Thailand Studies Programme at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore, said the verdict marked the latest instance of judicial overreach.

“It affirms a troubling pattern in which an unelected panel of judges gets to decide on the country’s political future, overriding any semblance of democratic mandate or accountability to the electorate,” he said.

The ruling is also the second in three high-stakes court cases against Paetongtarn and her father, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

The 76-year-old billionaire, who was ousted in a military coup in 2006, was cleared of a charge of insulting the country’s powerful monarchy last week. But he faces another court case over his stay in a hospital suite instead of prison when he returned to Thailand in 2023 to serve a reduced sentence over corruption charges.

Thaksin came back home after 16 years of self-imposed exile when his Pheu Thai Party won a third of seats in the parliament during a general election and entered into a power-sharing agreement with several conservative parties.

These include parties backed by the military, which had toppled Thaksin in 2006 as well as his sister, Yingluck, in 2008.

One Pheu Thai supporter described Friday’s ruling as a bid by the conservative establishment to end the Shinawatra dynasty.

“There’s no coincidence this is a movement to wipe the Shinawatra family off the map in order for them [conservatives] to be in power,” said Paisarn Janpen, 52.

“I still have faith in the Pheu Thai Party no matter who is in charge. The silver lining is that the whole world now knows these nine people [the judges] have the power to topple our leaders.”

Meanwhile, analysts say Thailand’s conservative establishment could use the remaining case against Thaksin as leverage to force Pheu Thai into a new coalition arrangement, where it is relegated to a junior partner under conservative leadership.

“Pheu Thai, it could accept that kind of arrangement given that Thaksin still has a pending case pertaining to his hospital stay,” said Napon of the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore.

But “the future is far from clear,” he added.

“There is no obvious successor to Paetongtarn, and no clear coalition configuration that appears stable enough to govern effectively in the face of mounting challenges — not least the economic uncertainty tied to Thailand’s recent trade deal with the United States and the unresolved border conflict with Cambodia.”

Under Thailand’s constitution, drafted under military supervision, only politicians who have been nominated for prime minister by their parties before the 2023 elections can form a government.

Pheu Thai has one more eligible candidate, 77-year-old Chaikasem Nitisiri, a Thaksin loyalist and former justice minister.

Other candidates come from the conservative parties, including Anutin Charnvirakul of the Bhumjaithai Party and Prayuth Chan-ocha, formerly of the United Thai Nation (UTN) Party, who led the 2014 coup and then ruled Thailand for nine years. Prayuth is currently a member of the Privy Council, and he would need to step down to return to politics.

Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a professor and senior fellow of the Institute of Security and International Studies at Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Political Science, said Anutin of Bhumjaithai appears to be the most viable candidate.

“Bhumjaithai has fewer MPs and is half the size of Pheu Thai. But Bhumjaithai has what appears to be palace backing and the support of the Senate,” he said.

“Anutin can make deals whereby Pheu Thai can still be in government and control key choice cabinet portfolios that they want, and Bhumjaithai under Anutin, a coalition government with Pheu Thai can run out the clock into the next election, possibly.”

If legislators are not able to agree on a new government, a snap election may have to be called.

Thitinan, however, said a new election would not solve Thailand’s political limbo.

He described Thai politics as in a “straitjacket, whereby elected governments get overthrown, through manipulation, subversion, while the autocratic forces that do the overthrowing cannot get elected”.

“It’s been around for two decades, and you know, the question to me today is not about Paetongtarn being removed, but why is it that Thailand keeps having its prime ministers suspended and being removed? And the answer is that the conservative forces do not want reform and progress,” he said.