Just over a week ago, Thailand’s army chief began trending on Twitter.

It started with an order, made by General Apirat Kongsompong that 160 radio stations across the country must play the 1970s anti-communist propaganda song Nuk Paen Din (Scum of the Earth), which glorifies the might of the armed forces, on a daily basis.

The social media backlash was almost instantaneous. The military was lambasted for being archaic, out of touch and trying to use cold war tactics to brainwash the Thai people and influence the outcome of the general election on 24 March. Less than three hours after Apirat, who is also secretary general of the ruling military government, became a trending topic, the order was rescinded.

The reversal – unprecedented in a system where criticism of the junta is usually met by prosecution, not compromise – was an indicator of the increasing power that social media is having in Thai politics.

In the five years since it took power in a coup, the junta has retained an iron grip on traditional media in Thailand, ensuring newspapers and television unfailingly promote its agenda. Those who dared to criticise were often prosecuted under the draconian computer crimes law. The narrative propagated in media was one of stability and prosperity; a world away from the reality of a stagnant economy and oppression that has defined military rule.

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‘Absolutely huge followings’

But recently, there has been a shift, accentuated by the upcoming election. The last official election in Thailand was in 2011 when social media use was not as widespread. Now, at least 74% of Thais are active on some form of social media and are among the heaviest internet users in the world.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Supporters of Thai tycoon Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, leader of the Future Forward party, take selfies in Bangkok. Photograph: Lillian Suwanrumpha/AFP/Getty Images

Thailand has more than 49 million Facebook users, making the country the eighth-biggest user of the platform in the world. It is here, not in the state-restricted media, that large sections of the population are getting their political news and analysis .

“It is a real source of hope to me that through social media, particularly Facebook but also Twitter and YouTube, ordinary citizens have built themselves up into influential political commentators, voicing ideas and criticisms of the junta that traditional media would never dare, and they have absolutely huge followings,” said Pravit Rojanaphruk, a renowned Thai journalist who was detained by the junta in 2015 for an online post.

Pravit said that increasing number of dissenting political voices on social media had even emboldened traditional media to be more critical of the military government, encouraging them, he said, “to push the limits of press freedom, which we are seeing play out in real time in this election”.

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It was a similar case with the vehemently anti-military rap song, Which Is My Country, which confronted the corruption, nepotism, violence and the suppression of free speech in Thailand under the junta. The government threatened the group, Rap Against Dictatorship, with prosecution under the computer crimes law but after the song went viral, racking up 58m views, it proved impossible to stop it being shared and the authorities backed down.

The military, which set up its own pro-junta party, is aiming to hold on to power after the election but “social media has the potential to sway this election out of the military’s control,” said Pravit.

‘The junta are losing control’

This election will see 7.4 million first-time voters eligible to go to the polls, accounting for over 10% of the electorate. They are not so heavily polarised down the lines of pro-democracy red shirts and pro-monarchy yellow shirts which have defined Thai politics over the past decade and could prove crucial to the result. According to a recent survey of potential first-time voters by Bangkok University, 79% said they would vote and 86% said they were using social media as their source of election information.

Social media plays a complicated role in Thai politics, serving as both a democratising platform to elevate the voices of the oppressed and opposition figures, but is also increasingly responsible for the spread of fake news and smear campaigns against political figures on all sides.

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The party that has best harnessed social media, and is targeting those first-time voters, is the newly formed Future Forward party, led by millionaire businessman Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit. While Future Forward is small compared with the political heavyweights and has a much more radical agenda, it has the fastest-growing momentum. Thanathorn, one of the most outspoken junta critics, has also become something of a social media phenomenon. Having earned the nickname “daddy”, after a handsome businessman character in popular Thai soap Dok Som Sithong, the hashtag #skylovesdaddy – the character’s signature line used to seduce his love interest – has repeatedly trended on Twitter over the past month as an affectionate reference to the Future Forward leader and he now has more than 400,000 Facebook followers.

“This upcoming election will be the first time in this country that social media shows its potential,” said Thanathorn. “Look at our party, social media has been a big part of our momentum because we can gain access to millions of people with very little cost.”

Certainly the military government has done its best to exercise heavy control over social media ahead of the election. The election commission introduced draconian restrictions on its use in campaigning and established a so called “e-war room” to monitor candidates’ behaviour online. Thanathorn has also been directly targeted by the commission for social media posts, and is facing possible prosecution or disqualification from the election for a post criticising the junta, which he told the Guardian was simply an “obvious attempt to discredit our party”.

Now, his deputy, Pongsakorn Rodchompoo, faces a policy inquiry after briefly sharing a fake news article that accused a top junta official of buying cups of coffee for 12,000 baht ($377) each. He took it down on further investigation.

Last week also saw the junta push through a stringent new cyber security law, which gives the government unprecedented powers to access online data and arrest people without a warrant for computer crimes, and further censor content online, seen as an indicator of their increasing paranoia over online dissent.

Nonetheless, Thanathorn believes the schism brought about by social media is here to stay.

“Previous political calculus cannot be used in this election because we are talking about millions of people gaining information from sources out of government control, gaining a voice to be critical and entering the ballot more informed,” he added. “The junta are losing the battle to control social media and it could change everything.”