‘Normal Guy’ Challenges Thai Leader : Protest: Support swells for hunger striker and his lone vigil in Bangkok.

Seated on a sidewalk next to an electric fan, Chalad Vorachat seems an unlikely choice for the martyr of Thai politics.

A 49-year-old proprietor of provincial cable television networks, Chalad has been on a hunger strike since Suchinda Kraprayoon was appointed prime minister last month. Chalad vividly recalls his last meal, at 2 a.m. on April 8.

“Fighting for democracy is more important than a life,” he says matter-of-factly.

Chalad’s lone vigil outside the Parliament building was virtually ignored at first, but it began attracting popular support in late April. Last Sunday, the crowd of protesters demanding Suchinda’s resignation reached 200,000, the largest political demonstration in the country since 1973.

It was after that rally that violence broke out for the first time, with army troops firing into the crowds. The bloodshed finally ended Wednesday, leaving at least 40 people dead and hundreds hurt.

“When a person surrenders, you are not supposed to shoot him,” Chalad says, recalling that he had heard the volleys of army rifle fire from his corner of the sidewalk.

Through it all, Chalad has maintained his lonely vigil, seated on a reed mat under two striped beach umbrellas. He is attended by adoring acolytes, who refill his silver cup with water and glucose.

“I’ve known since the beginning the military wouldn’t listen,” Chalad says of his fast. “I just want to be the person who sparked the idea that the military would destroy this country.”

Chalad says he has nothing against Suchinda personally but that the military has become a dictatorship that can no longer be tolerated. Before his appointment, Suchinda was the commander in chief of the armed forces and is widely regarded as the mastermind behind the February, 1991, coup that ousted the country’s last civilian government.

“The military has been interfering in politics for 60 years. . . ,” Chalad says. “They use the power of the army the wrong way. The army is supposed to be the ‘fence’ of the country, but they use the army to suppress the people.”

The gaunt and bearded Chalad receives a gift of flowers from a woman admirer who reaches over the yellow police barricades to leave her offering.

A large red ledger lies by his feet, where he receives messages of support. “I admire your courage,” wrote a woman from Canada.

Chalad’s hunger strike was taken up briefly by Chamlong Srimuang, a former Bangkok governor who has become leader of the pro-democracy movement in the country. But Chamlong gave up his fast after a week, and many Thais say they consider Chalad the more righteous of the two.

Chalad has escalated his challenge to Suchinda by warning that he will stop drinking water Monday. He reckons that in Bangkok’s heat, he will die by Thursday.

Chalad served two terms in Parliament but quit in disgust in 1987. He also has used the hunger-strike weapon before--in 1979 to protest an increase in oil prices, and in 1983 to block a constitutional amendment permitting civil servants to become government ministers.

But the father of three regards his current protest as his most important.

“I have no hidden intention other than to sacrifice my life for the resurrection of democracy in our country,” he says. “I am just a normal guy. But if you sacrifice, you can lead to victory.”