Thaksin arrives in Cambodia : Thai FM

[Coss]

Fugitive ex-PM Thaksin Shinawatra left Dubai and arrived in Cambodia on Friday as red shirts started gathering to join the mass rallies on Sunday.

 

PM's secretary Chavanon Indharakomansut said Thaksin travelled to Siem Reap province of Cambodia by his private jet.

 

Thai foreign ministry has already contacted its embassy in Phnom Penh to monitor Thaksin's activities in Cambodia, Chavanont said.

 

Thaksin has been appointed as an economic adviser to Cambodia's PM Hun Sen and the Khmer government. The appointment has led to protests by the Thai government.

Link

 

Must be readying the golden chariot to ride on to victory...

 

[Bangkoktraveler]

Mr. T is looking forward to regaining his position as Prime Minister so he can fuck the people some more. According to him, the people liked being fucked by him.

 

Nice guy.

[Julian2]

I suppose it's because he used a little Vaseline. The current government is back to the old "dry hole" fucking technique.

[Flashermac]

Okay, I'll bite. So what has the current govmt done to the people?

 

 

[Torneyboy]

Or..off into the sunset...

[Wallenda]

So in other words, all of this just really down to who they prefer to pack their fudge.

 

Was looking at one story, a red shirt quoted about how all this was about restoring power to the people. I'd say it's really all about restoring power the person. Funny, the stupid things people will say while in a trance.

[gobbledonk]

We all get screwed by our governments - the Thais dont have a monopoly on that.

[Flashermac]

Latest from the Post:

 

 

FM confirms: UAE expelled Thaksin

 

Convicted former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra has been asked to leave Dubai by the government of the United Arab Emirates, a Thai foreign affairs spokesman confirmed on Saturday.

 

[color:red]“A high ranking government official of the UAE has confirmed that the fugitive ex-premier has been asked to leave the UAE for having violated an agreement that he would not use the country as base for his political activities,†said Panich Vikitsreth,assistant to Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya.[/color]

 

The UAE has sent a signal to Thaksin to stop using it as his political base and causing problems for Thailand and to leave the country, Mr Phanich said.

 

He had no idea when Thaksin would leave the UAE or where he would go. But if his ministry learns his whereabouts and if Thaksin uses that particular country as political base, the government of that country will be asked to follow the decision made by the United Arab Emirates.

 

Thaksin had early this morning denied via his Twitter page that he was being expelled by the UAE, as was reported by the media. He said he was leaving today to meet his two daughters in Europe.

 

 

[Julian2]

Okay, I'll bite. So what has the current govmt done to the people?

 

Lot of internet stuff seems to have disappeared.

 

Ghost of Thaksin's past visits Abhisit

By Seth Kane

 

WASHINGTON and BANGKOK - Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva recently returned from meetings in the United States where he assured investors and diplomats that recent protests and unrest were in fact a sign that Thailand's democracy is vibrant and on the right track.

 

While he may have impressed certain foreign audiences with his polished presentations, his inability to impose his will on an increasingly unwieldy and seemingly corrupt coalition has raised questions domestically about his government's credibility and legitimacy.

 

Abhisit rose to power late last year through a controversial constitutional court decision that dissolved the People's Power

 

 

 

Party (PPP) and the coalition government it led. The PPP was aligned to former and now exiled prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was toppled in a 2006 military coup justified partially on allegations of massive corruption for which he was later on one count criminally charged and convicted.

 

Now similar corruption allegations are taking the shine off Abhisit's coalition government. The Oxford-educated Abhisit has successfully portrayed himself as a squeaky clean politician who lacks the perceived commercial conflicts of interest that hounded Thaksin's governments. That can't be said, however, for the rest of his party and coalition members. Media attention has focused on the Bhum Jai Thai, an upstart party made up of former Thaksin allies that broke away from the PPP to join Abhisit's Democrat party.

 

Most damning, perhaps, has been the corruption controversy surrounding the government's Community Self-Sufficiency Project, which draws philosophical inspiration from King Bhumibol Adulyadej's self-sufficiency economy, or sethakit por piang, concept.

 

Allegations of irregularities in related projects have included overpriced equipment, transfer of funds to politically connected villages before project approval and a lack of consultation with participating communities. Deputy Prime Minister Korbsak Sabhavasu resigned as chairman of the project and his younger brother Prapoj Sabhavasu resigned as deputy director of the office officially "to allow the government a free hand to investigate the alleged irregularities".

 

Another scandal surrounded the government's plan to lease, for a suspiciously high price, natural gas-fired buses for mass transport in Bangkok. Once alleged irregularities surrounding the lease agreement were leaked to the press, Abhisit put the brakes on the deal which was to be funneled through the Bhum Jai Thai-controlled Transport Ministry. In a seeming about turn, on September 29, the cabinet approved the 64 billion baht (US$1.9 billion) deal with 40 senators promising to set up a watchdog group to monitor project implementation. Similar controversy is now brewing over plans to expand one of Bangkok's airports.

 

These controversies have coincided with the recent acquittal of banned politician and de facto Bhum Jai Thai head Newin Chidchob and 43 other defendants of corruption in a long-awaited verdict on a rubber saplings procurement project. The verdict has already led to a war of words with the Office of the Attorney General accusing the now disbanded Assets Scrutiny Committee of bungling the case. The allegations date back to Newin's ministerial role in one of Thaksin's former governments, but the not guilty decision has been handed down in the context of his de facto leadership of a key party in Abhisit's coalition.

 

Scandals have also hit Abhisit's own Democrat Party. In July, the Election Commission disqualified 13 Democrat members of parliament (MPs) out of a group of 28 investigated for holding stakes in private companies, which is barred for politicians and senior officials by the 2007 constitution to avoid conflicts of interest.

 

Among those ruled guilty was Democrat power-broker and Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban, who agreed to give up his parliamentary seat but through a legal loophole maintained his ministerial positions. In early September, the Election Commission found 16 more MPs guilty under the same constitutional clause. Half are from the Thaksin-aligned opposition Peua Thai party while the others are members of four coalition parties, including three incumbent deputy ministers. Final rulings by the constitutional court in both cases are pending.

 

The Democrats have also faced allegations, still being considered by the Election Commission, that the party illegally received 258 million baht for the 2005 general election from publicly listed company TPI Polene through a nominee advertising outfit. The party is also being investigated for misusing 29 million baht given to a political party development fund by the Election Commission.

Culture of corruption

The National Anti-Corruption Commission recently found that government corruption is on the rise over the past five years with "tea money to politicians estimated at 314,050 baht per case in 2009, up from 143,389 baht in 2003. The average bribe per case to the Customs Department in 2009 is estimated at 111,948 baht, up from 33,583 baht in 2003". The University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce indicated in their recent business survey that corruption was at its highest levels under the Thaksin administration.

 

One justification for the People's Alliance for Democracy's (PAD) street protests and ultimately the 2006 military coup was that Thaksin's and his aligned administrations were attended by extraordinary corruption. The PAD and other anti-Thaksin elements accused him, his party, and coalition members of scores of cases of abusing their government authority for private monetary gain.

 

The most high-profile conflict of interest case for which Thaksin was found guilty, and which spurred his flight into exile, was his former wife's 2003 purchase of a chunk of downtown Bangkok real estate from one of his government's agencies. Several close Thaksin allies have also recently been formally convicted on corruption charges, including his former spokesman Yongyuth Tiyapairat, for submitting a false asset declaration.

 

To be sure, corruption allegations in Thailand have become highly politicized. Any honest assessment of the situation should take into account that corruption is rampant, top to bottom, in all segments of Thai society. It is telling that the recent corruption allegations have touched upon all of Abhisit's coalition partners, including elements of his own Democrat Party.

 

Yet the number of corruption cases exposed and criminally pursued by Abhisit's government could paradoxically indicate a move towards better governance. Empowering and depoliticizing the judiciary to carry out its mandate in investigating and prosecuting corruption, whoever the culprit may be, would shore up Abhisit's reform credentials while simultaneously tarnishing his coalition government's public image.

 

A late June ABAC poll conducted in 17 provinces showed that over half of the Thai population feels that corruption among politicians is acceptable if they are also able administrators, while 85% thought that business corruption was acceptable. Those public perceptions, if accurate, raise questions about the political gains Abhisit would likely accrue from aggressively fighting graft, as, for example, Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has enjoyed in his anti-corruption campaign.

 

Newspaper columnist and commentator Chang Noi distinguishes between genuine reform and what he calls the "Chuan effect", a reference to former Democrat prime minister Chuan Leekpai. "He of course is clean as a whistle, but he has to keep his coalition afloat. Whenever a scandal breaks, he says in his soft voice that everything will be taken care of by the law. His own halo serves as an umbrella for his less angelic colleagues," he wrote.

 

Chuan's anti-corruption legacy is conflicted. His first government was famously brought down in the mid-1990s by the Suthep-led Phuket land scandal. His second administration in the late 1990s notably tackled the military's private interests and deposed then party power broker and interior minister Sanan Kachornprasart on a petty corruption scandal that made his government appear to be imbued with the 1997 constitution reform spirit.

 

Sanan, under the Chart Pattana Party banner, is tellingly now a deputy prime minister in Abhisit's current coalition. Thus far, Abhisit has arguably not done enough to prove his administration's ways and means are decidedly different than that of his now key advisor, Chuan. In the short term, Abhisit will face pressure from powerful political forces to keep the coalition intact while over 700 billion baht worth of extra fiscal spending is distributed over the next calendar year.

 

Some analysts believe that the distribution of those government funds will be crucial to both the Democrat's and Bhum Jai Thai's prospects at the next general elections, which likely will be held coincident with an expected economic upturn in the middle of next year. Whether Abhisit can maintain his personal clean hands image while in league with coalition partners and Democrat party members that seem increasingly bent on self enrichment will determine his reform legacy.

 

But his government appears increasingly conflicted as the inherent contradiction of fighting corruption within a graft-prone coalition he must keep afloat for political purposes, plays itself out.

 

Seth Kane.

 

(Copyright 2009 Asia Times Online)

[Wallenda]

We all get screwed by our governments - the Thais dont have a monopoly on that.

 

So in your country, if the son of a top politician was seen by a whole crowd execute a plain clothes policeman in a disco with a gunshot in the head, the kid would get off scot free and the dad none the worse for it?

 

In your country, when a real estate developer decides they want to build a highrise but there's the inconvenience of a lot of leases to shopowners to get around, does the army come in and destroy all the shops? Or do bombs get set off? Real estate developers do that in your country?

 

No, man. Cmon. It ain't like Thailand in our countries.