Paetongtarn Shinawatra, the 37-year-old scion of one of Thailand’s top political families, will serve as prime minister after a majority of MPs voted her in on Friday to succeed Srettha Thavisin, who was forced from office by a Constitutional Court ruling earlier this week.

Paetongtarn, the leader of the Pheu Thai Party whose nickname is “Ung Ing,” sailed through in Friday’s parliamentary vote by securing 319 votes of support from MPs versus 145 votes against her, 27 abstentions.

She becomes the country’s 31st prime minister and the fourth member of the influential Shinawatra family to take the reins as PM.

“I and my team will work to the best of our abilities, whatever task we are assigned. We are all ready to work hard for the Thai people,” Paetongtarn said during a post-vote press conference at Voice TV, a media channel owned by the Shinawatras.                                            

The vote in Bangkok was expected as the Pheu Thai-led coalition has 312 members of parliament – far more than the required number to take office. On the eve of the vote, member parties in the ruling bloc agreed to select Paetongtarn as the PM nominee among a list of various potential candidates.           

Following the vote in the lower house of Parliament, House Speaker Wan Muhamad Noor was expected to present Paetongtarn’s name as prime minister to the king. 

Besides her father, Thaksin Shinawatra, a divisive figure in Thai politics and a populist leader who was forced from office by a military coup in 2006, her aunt, Yingluck Shinawatra, also served as prime minister and was forced out by a similar coup in 2014. In addition, Thaksin’s brother-in-law, Somchai Wongsawat, served as prime minister in 2008 before a Constitutional Court ruling.

The MPs’ vote on Friday was necessary because the Constitutional Court removed Srettha, a fellow Pheu Thai Party member, from the prime minister’s office on Wednesday because of a gross ethical violation.

In a 5-4 verdict the court dissolved Srettha’s 11-month government after ruling he was responsible for vetting his cabinet nominations and for appointing a minister to his cabinet who had been jailed in 2008 on charges of bribing a court.

Paetongtarn graduated with a bachelor’s degree in sociology and anthropology from Chulalongkorn University and received a master’s degree in international hotel management from Surrey University, England. She began working in the Pheu Thai Party as chief adviser on participation and innovation and head of the Pheu Thai Family Foundation in October 2021 and was nominated as a candidate for prime minister ahead of the 2023 election.

Just two weeks before the 2023 vote, Paetongtarn gave birth to a son on May 1 – she announced her second child’s arrival in a Facebook post. 

Srettha, a former real estate tycoon who had not held previous political office, was Thailand’s first civilian prime minister after almost a decade of military rule. 

He was elected prime minister in August 2023 after the Pheu Thai Party formed a coalition government despite finishing second in the election. The Move Forward Party, which won the most seats, was unable to form a government because of opposition from military-appointed senators over its stance on reforming lèse-majesté, the strict law against royal defamation. 

BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news organization.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By BenarNews Staff.

This post was originally published on Radio Free.