 Welcome back to New Mandala's live coverage of Thailand's 2011 election. It's been a big night already and here at the Australian National University's College of Asia and the Pacific in Canberra, I'm joined once again by my colleague Dr Andrew Walker. Andrew, very good to see you. It's been a long evening Nick. I've read a lot of tweets tonight. And so what have you made of Twitter as an innovation when it comes to type political analysis? Do you think it's been a good thing? Well, I think it's perfect when you're trying to track things that are happening in real time where things are developing very quickly. Twitter's been a great resource tonight to keep track of what's happening in Thailand. And so what do we know at this particular moment about the results and about how the type political landscape perhaps will be reshaped by the events of this evening? Well, let's just look at some of the numbers. I, Tuxin himself was just interviewed on Voice TV and he's predicting 250 seats for Puay Thai. That's exactly half of the parliament. So it's just about, not quite an absolute majority in the Thai parliament. It seems that the most likely coalition partner is Charthai Patanar who have another 20 or so seats. So that would give the government at least 270. I think the result seems a fair bit closer than it was looking early on in the night. Early in the night with the exit polls coming out was suggesting Puay Thai might win as many as 300 seats. I remember you predicted, Nick, 287. I did indeed. I think you were a bit over ambitious there. I predicted 272, which was a lot closer than you. But I still think a bit over ambitious. It looks like Puay Thai is going to get about 250 seats. But they've comfortably won this election. They're 80 or 90 seats ahead of the Democrats. And there's no doubt that they'll be able to form a coalition government with Ying Lak Shinawat as Thailand's first female Prime Minister. So with Ying Lak as Thailand's first female Prime Minister, do you think she's going to be in for an easy ride? I think it's going to be a tough ride. There's obviously still very significant political opposition to her in Thailand. I think it would have been a lot easier for her obviously if she'd got a real landslide. But it is clear the Puay Thai vote has fallen a little bit under 50% of the national vote. And in terms of her claiming any clear electoral mandate, there's always going to be some questioning of that purely on mathematical grounds. I think a real challenge for her government is how she's going to handle her brother. Obviously it's on the agenda to bring him back to Thailand and to perhaps give him some role in the government, to perhaps rehabilitate him in some sense politically. So Andrew, what kind of role do you think former Prime Minister Taksin might take on under the auspices of a new Ying Lak Shinawat government? Well I think it remains to be seen. I think the possibilities range from some sort of behind the scenes advisory role to the government, perhaps even with him still living overseas. I think at the other extreme and perhaps in the medium to longer term, there might be a full return to politics and perhaps even the Prime Minister ship for Taksin himself. I don't think we can rule that out. I think that's a little unlikely but anything's possible in Thai politics. Whatever the role is, this is going to have to be handled very carefully by Ying Lak's government. She may well claim some mandate for this. Her party campaigned under the slogan that Taksin thinks Puay Thai acts. That's a clear signal that he's going to have a role in the government. They may claim some electoral endorsement for his rehabilitation, but obviously bringing him back to Thailand would galvanise a lot of opposition, a lot of very vigorous opposition and I think they'd be wise to move very slowly on that. So Andrew, it's been a historic result. How do you think the Thai elite's going to react? Well, to be frank I think it depends a bit on how silly they are. I'm sure there'll be some within the palace network or within the military or even the judiciary who will be already starting to think about ways they could legally challenge this result. We've got to remember that in the Post-Ku 2007 constitution there's a few little booby traps carefully planted in that constitution that could bring a government or bring a winning party undone. And there'll be some who'll already be looking through the conduct of the election to find some way in which they could undo this result. Frankly I think that would be an act of national lunacy. Last year we saw what can happen in April and May in Bangkok when certain sections of Thai society are unwilling to accept election results. And I think if they go down that path again after this very strong vote for Ying Lak Shinawa let's remember that if she does get over 250 it'll only be the second time in Thailand's modern political history that a party has achieved that. This is a very strong electoral endorsement and I think attempts to subvert it would be very, very hazardous for Thailand's democratic future. Thanks very much Andrew. That's all we have time for this evening. It's been wonderful as always to get your thoughts on the amazing dynamism that tends to swirl around Thai political action. So thank you again. That's right. I think there's going to be need for a lot of commentary in the weeks and months to come. I think it's going to be a very interesting period in Thai politics. Absolutely. And we're looking forward to it already. Thank you all for taking the time this evening to tune in to this special broadcast brought to you from the Australian National University's College of Asia and the Pacific in Canberra. My name is Nicholas Farrelly and it's been wonderful that you've taken the time. Thank you. Thanks Nick.