BANGKOK, July 4 (UPI) -- Yingluck Shinawatra, who will become Thailand's first woman prime minister, Monday said there will be coalition rule although her party won a majority.
The 44-year-old U.S. educated businesswoman and sister of exiled former Thai Prime Minister and billionaire Thaksin Shinawatra stepped into politics only recently before steering her Pheu Thai (For Thais) party to a majority win in Sunday's election.
She told a news conference in Bangkok four other parties will join her to form the new government.
While unofficial results showed her party won 265 seats in the 500-seat parliament, Yingluck said the coalition arrangement would raise the total to 299 seats, which would help her to work toward national reconciliation after year-long turmoil and deadly protests, the Thai News Agency reported.
Yingluck expressed the new government's loyalty to Thai King Bhumibol, whose 84th birthday will be celebrated Dec. 5.
The new leader stressed her government's top priority will be to revive the economy by controlling price rises and the cost of living, fighting corruption, strengthening ties will neighboring countries and boosting public morale.
Outgoing Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, whose Democratic Party won 159 seats, or less than in the 2007 election, resigned as party leader and congratulated Yingluck's party, TNA reported. He will remain a member of parliament.
The 2010 protests against the Abhisit government, in which more than 90 people died, ended only after a military crackdown. Political problems have continued since then.
TNA said the voter turnout Sunday was more than 71 percent.
Congratulating his sister's victory, Thaksin, who has lived in exile since being ousted in a 2006 military coup, told reporters in Dubai: "I'm proud of her and I trust her," CNN reported.
After leaving the country, Thaksin was convicted at home of conflict of interest charges, which he has always denied.
"Going back home is not a major concern. It's not a top priority. The priority is to bring back reconciliation," Thaksin said.
