Thai Prime Minister Gen. Prayut Chan-o-cha's latest "mobile cabinet" meeting, held in a stronghold of ousted former leader Thaksin Shinawatra, has focused public attention on whether he is trying to garner political support ahead of next year's general election.

After chairing the Cabinet meeting in Ubon Ratchathani Province last Tuesday, the junta leader played down the speculation that he went there to encourage former parliamentarians to join a political party set up to support him continuing on as premier after the election, tentatively set for early next year.

"A mobile cabinet is aimed at following up government work and meeting with local people, not with any particular person," Prayut told a press conference. "Don't bring me into a (political conflict)."

(Thai Prime Minister Gen. Prayut Chan-o-cha)

The practice of holding Cabinet meetings outside Bangkok to win support from rural voters was also engaged in by previous Thai governments, but the level of public attention this time is especially high as the long-delayed election nears.

Thailand remains under military rule after Prayut's coup toppled a Thaksin-linked civilian government more than four years ago after a period of political instability.

His government is taking pains to suggest that the Ubon Ratchathani, where the Thaksin-linked Pheu Thai Party won seven of the province's 11 constituencies in the last election in 2014, was not picked on purpose, as the meeting had been originally planned in Chiang Rai Province in northern Thailand.

The venue was changed after 12 youth soccer members and their coach got trapped in a flooded cave in Chiang Rai in late June and were finally rescued earlier this month. The huge search and rescue operation had captivated the nation and much of the world for weeks on end.

A government source, in explaining the venue change, said Prayut did not want the public to criticize him for trying to use the cave rescue for political gain ahead of the election.

The economically disadvantaged Isan area of northeastern Thailand, including Ubon Ratchathani, is widely regarded as a key stronghold of the populist movement associated with Thaksin that has won every election since 2001 under different party names.

Thaksin was prime minister from 2001 to 2006 when he was ousted in military coup. He faces arrest if he returns home, after being convicted of various charges.

His younger sister Yingluck served as Thailand's leader from 2011 to 2014 when she was ousted by the country's Constitutional Court, also lives abroad after fleeing the country.

Their Pheu Thai Party, still reeling from the coup's aftermath, has become the main target of Prayut's military government, which has been quietly plucking former lawmakers away from existing parties.

Before the Cabinet meeting in Ubon Ratchathani, at least three former Pheu Thai lawmakers signaled their departure from the party and traveled to meet Prayut with a number of development proposals for Isan in their hands.

A political source said that one of them, Supon Fong-ngam, intends to lead others in switching to Palang Pracharat, a party set up as the political vehicle of Prayut if he returns as prime minister after the election.

Since forming the military government in 2014, Prayut has held Cabinet meetings in 11 provinces, including in the restive south, a stronghold of the Democrat Party, which is the Pheu Thai Party's main political rival.

But the government appears to have had little success in wooing politicians away from the Democrat Party, the kingdom's oldest continuously operating party which was last in power between 2008 and 2011.

In Ubon Ratchathani, Boonsong Nathika, a 60-year-old local who came to meet with Prayut, said that while he still misses Thaksin, he would not mind seeing Prayut continue as premier after the election.

"I will give him a chance as I believe each prime minister has different goodness," he said.