Thai prime minister Samak Sundaravej, the 73-year-old veteran conservative battling to cling to power, has characterised himself as fighting to protect democracy against those now seeking to reduce the power of Thailand’s mainly poor, rural electorate.

But the role of defender of democracy is a strange turn for Mr Samak, a veteran of turbulent 1970s political battles over the extent of the coup-prone military’s position in governing Thailand, a period punctuated by several massacres of pro-democracy student protesters.