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Influential Thais Push To Build $28Bn Kra Canal


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lobby group of Thai generals, politicians, academics and business people have joined with Chinese interests to persuade Bangkok to revive the plan to build a $28bn, 140-km canal across Thailand’s Kra isthmus, allowing ships to avoid the congested Straits of Malacca.

 

According to the Nikkei Asian Review, the group includes some of the country’s “most influential figuresâ€.

 

Thailand is presently led by military junta headed by General Prayuth Chan-ocha, whose regime ruled out building the canal in the immediate future owing to its projected cost and the symbolic effect of dividing the country.

 

However, the lobby group is arguing that if a feasibility study were to be approved, the canal could be funded by Chinese banks as part of China’s grand One Belt, One Road vision.

 

The campaign to dig the channel is being spearheaded by a group of retired generals who have formed the Thai Canal Association. The group is working with researchers from Peking University and the Thai–Chinese Trade Association to survey the proposed route and drum up popular support for its implementation.

 

The group has set up public meetings to promote the project in Thai provinces it could run through, including Trang, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Phatthalung, and Songkhla.

 

One meeting in May was told that the project would consist of two canals, each 140km long, 400m wide and 30m deep. Development projects would also be undertaken on both sides and deepwater ports would be built at either end. The budget was estimated at around 1.68 trillion baht, or $50.5bn, and the projected income for Thailand would be around $3.6bn a year.

 

Nicholas Farrelly, a regional expert at the Australian National University, told the Nikkei Asian Review that he did not rule out the possibility of the retired generals winning their campaign, especially as the junta needed to boost the Thai economy and stabilise the country’s precarious political situation.

 

“These old warhorses are indicating to their protegés that this is something that needs putting on the agenda,†Farrelly said. “Although they are somewhat estranged from direct executive authority, they are serious players. At some stage, I think it is likely to happen.â€

 

The goal of the Kra canal would be to bypass the Straits of Malacca, which lie between the island of Sumatra and the Malay peninsula. These are 890km in length, 2.5km wide at their narrowest point and 25m deep at their shallowest. More than 94,000 vessels pass through the straits each year, making them the busiest in world. Altogether it is estimated that about a quarter of the world's traded goods pass through, including 80% of the oil and gas imports of China, Japan and South Korea.

 

[more]

 

 

http://www.globalconstructionreview.com/news/influential-thais-push-build-28bn-kra-canal/

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This idea has been around for at least a century. Singapore has always been dead set against it (and the Brits certainly were). It could also have an effect on the Islamic nutters in the deep south, giving them a fine new target to attack and possibly a reason to claim even more of the south, Muslim or not.

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Try over 3 Centuries, and the Brits were not as opposed to it as you may think

 

First proposed 1677 by King Natraim asked French Engineer da Lamar to carry out what we call today a feasibility study.

 

Came up again in 1793 the brother of Rama I and again in 1863 when the Brits stuck their (our hehe) noses in after making Burma part of the Colony.

 

1882 Ferdinand de Lesseps, of Suez fame, visited the area but was refused permission to survey.

 

1897 Thailand and the British Empire agreed not to build it and the dominance of Singapore would be maintained

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thai_Canal

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I remember it coming up here in the late 1970s or early '80s. Nothing came of it, and rumors were that Singapore paid the politicians to drop the idea. ;)

 

p.s. The Thais in the 1880s didn't want anything to do with the French, since that was the time the Froggies were building their Indo-China colony. I can just see them occupying southern Thailand to defend "their" canal. King Chulalongkorn tried to tried to choose citizens of "non-threatening" countries to work in Thailand - Danes (the police), Germans (the railway and army) etc. Even today the Royal Thai Army uses Imperial German Army drill and ceremony styles.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5eQD7ulvt8

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  • 4 years later...

The Thai canal project is unlikely to be put to rest, despite the House of Representatives last week rejecting a study into the proposal, says an activist working on environmental issues.

Somboon Khamhaeng, member of the NGO Coordinating Committee on Development, said the House's rejection of the report caught him by surprise, but he believed something went wrong in the lobbying process.

The project was likely to resurface in future administrations as the project involved massive investments. He said about 10 billion baht was earmarked alone for the project's feasibility study, which made it highly attractive.

Previously known as the Kra Canal project, the Thai canal project was brought up under almost every government, but has never come to fruition due to high investment costs, the likely impacts on environment and people's livelihoods.

The latest push for the study into the Thai canal project took place in January 2020 when the House accepted a motion to set up an a committee to study the plan along with the proposed Southern Economic Corridor.

The report was submitted to the House for a debate and put up for a vote last Friday. A total of 144 MPs voted against it, while 121 voted in favour with 53 abstentions.

Move Forward Party list-MP Surachet Praweewongwut said the MFP rejected the report not because it was opposed to the project, but it wanted a more thorough and objective study. Mr Surachet said the report was very suggestive with partial views.

The House's rejection also caused an uproar by the main opposition Pheu Thai Party which insisted the meeting was not authorised to vote on the report.

Deputy House speaker Supachai Phosu, who presided over the session, asked MPs to vote after members expressed mixed views.

However, Dr Cholnan Srikaew, leader of Pheu Thai and the opposition, argued the MPs were allowed a vote on the committee's observations only, not the report.

"It isn't for the House to decide if the Thai canal project will go ahead. It isn't for the House to decide on the 5G rollout. Legislators shouldn't interfere with the executive branch, and that's why they are called 'observations',
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It's a great source of corruption to not be built

 

A certain very tiny island state for decades gave incentives to stop Swampy airport.  It would take away from their position as an important airport hub.

 

The canal the same, the same tiny island state doesn't want this to happen, so I am sure, cough cough, there are incentives for it to keep stalling.

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