DHAKA: vernment protesters in Thailand are to stage mass rallies in coming days to try to get a new prime minister installed, but their leader said if this final push in a six-month fight did not succeed, he would surrender to the authorities on May 27.

‘It’s time. This show has been going on for so long,’ Suthep Thaugsuban told a meeting of supporters from around the country on Saturday, reports The Straits Times.

‘It must come to an end. Whether it will be a happy ending depends on the great mass of people in this country and our state officials.’

Thailand has been in turmoil since the protests flared up in November, the latest phase in nearly a decade of antagonism between the Bangkok-based establishment and supporters of former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who won huge support among the rural and urban poor but was ousted by the army in 2006.

BDST: 1744 HRS, MAY 17, 2014