Tensions high as Yingluck verdict due today

In a Facebook post on Thursday Yingluck asked her followers to stay home to avoid any incidents stoked by people with “ill-intention against the country and us”.

Her previous court appearances over an 18 month trial have seen crowds gather outside the court, showering her with roses and chanting support — a rare sight in a nation where political meetings remain outlawed.

The Shinawatra family emerged as a political force in 2001 when billionaire family patriarch, Thaksin, swept to power.

He jump-started the economy and provided the most extensive pro-poor welfare schemes in Thai history.

But critics accused him of using political power to further his business interests.

He remains loathed by the Bangkok royalist elite but cherished by the rural poor.

A coup toppled him in 2006 and he fled overseas following a graft conviction.

Protests and court cases have hacked at their governments and finances, followed by the 2014 coup.

To many supporters Yingluck is finally emerging from her elder brother’s shadow, drawing on a star quality absent amongst the gloomy cast of aging generals who rule Thailand.

She has pleaded innocent to the charges, saying she is the victim of a “subtle political game.”

But her enemies say a conviction is merited for a dynasty accused of graft and nepotism.

Historically the Shinawatras have been able to mass huge crowds of supporters — known as the “Red Shirts” — to take to the streets when the family’s political fortunes have waned.

But three years of repressive junta rule has successfully quashed any widespread opposition to the military for now.

Paul Chambers, a Thai politics expert at Naresuan University, said a guilty verdict might reinvigorate the Red Shirts.

“Such a ruling would draw Shinawatra supporters increasingly together against the junta,” he told AFP.