Pita Limjaroenrat, the front-runner, marched in Bangkok’s Pride parade on Sunday and promised to support same-sex marriage and gender identity rights legislation if elected.
Thousands of LGBTQ+ people, their allies, and political leaders marched through the center of Bangkok in the second official Pride parade to be organized in the country to commemorate Pride month and advance gender equality.
Participants in the march carried signs that said “freedom to choose gender” and “love is love” in rainbow-colored font. According to Bangkok governor Chadchart Sittipunt, more than 50,000 people, or more than twice as many as during the event last year, took part in this year’s Pride march.
Pita Limjaroenrat, the head of the liberal Move Forward party, marched in the parade among the elected officials. Voters in the general election held on May 14 made it plain they wanted to put an end to the nearly ten years of control by the military and military-backed governments by giving Move Forward the most seats.
“These few things will turn the Pride Month celebration of diversity into pride always,” he proclaimed.
The coalition, which was made up of eight political parties, has pledged to adopt legislation, including the Marriage Equality Act, to ensure equal rights for all couples, regardless of gender, after the passage of the draft law and related legislations were stalled in parliament under the previous administration.
Despite having one of Asia’s most visible and vocal LGBT communities, Thailand, according to many political activists, still discriminates against LGBT people and same-sex couples through its laws and traditional institutions.
“Once the government is formed, we would support Marriage Equality (Act), Gender Identity (Act), and various other things, including welfare,” Limjaroenrat told reporters at the procession.
