My two cents on ex-police chief Somyot

[webfact]

OPINION

My two cents on ex-police chief Somyot 

By Tulsathit Taptim 
The Nation

 

I have watched enough cop movies to know that a police chief can be such close buddies with a shady tycoon that huge sums of money pass between them. 

 

I have also said things I later regretted saying, so when a former police chief claimed at an emotional moment that his police job was just “a sideline” and that he had bigger business to tend to, I barely raised an eyebrow.

 

I have lived in Thailand my whole life, so a former top cop being appointed head of the national football association without being able to tell the difference between the 4-4-2 and 3-4-3 team formations was no surprise either.

 

And as a pragmatic Thai, a former police chief doing all three is nothing out of the ordinary for me.

 

To be fair to retired police chief Somyot Poompanmuang, his actions are the rule here in Thailand, not the exception. He may have “borrowed” a staggering sum of money from infamous tycoon Kampol Wirathepsuporn, but what law did he break in doing so? Kampol was a free man at the time, wasn’t he? He’s still a free man now, although under a lot more legal scrutiny.

 

Regarding the “sideline” uproar, show me a police chief who retired with only his pension and salary savings, who drives a cheap car without a chauffeur and lives in a cheap house, and I will pinch you out of your dream. All I’m saying is this: Just because Somyot is apologising for suggesting he had higher priorities than his duty to serve and protect, does not mean he and all other ex-police chiefs did not have “sideline” businesses they considered more important than police work.

 

Simply put, no former or incumbent police chief is ever poor. And since all of them are rich, they must have “sidelines”, right? All we can do is speculate about the types of those businesses. I, for one, don’t know for sure what they are, but I’m quite certain they are not coffee shops or music studios. Such investments are for people like you and me, who may have like a million baht or two to start a venture – but not Bt300 million.

 

And if you want to take Somyot to task for muscling in on the realm of football, all I’m asking for is consistency. In other words, you must also include other sport associations that are headed by similarly “unqualified” individuals.

 

As we can see, Somyot was a normal Thai police officer who then became an ordinary police chief, and who has ended up a typical high-level retiree. To those who frown at his association with Kampol, you also need to frown at what allowed such an association to happen in the first place, which was not his fault.

 

Critics say he crossed ethical lines. Somyot, as an enforcer of the law, should not have taken money from questionable sources, they point out. But what if Somyot had borrowed Bt300 million from a bank, which in turn benefited from deposits by people like Kampol? Would that have made the ultimate “problem” go away and make everything okay in our society?

 

Some say that, as police chief, Somyot was bound by a much stronger ethical code than are banks. That’s a good call, but it’s also a pipe dream. Men like him carry guns throughout their whole careers, so how can we expect gun carriers to have better morals and ethics than non-gun carriers?

 

We and Somyot may actually deserve each other after all. 

 

And now that I’m at it, scolding that high-flying construction mogul for alleged illegal hunting is more or less the same thing. We are barking up the wrong tree, a syndrome amplified the knee-jerk nature of our social media era. One bad guy cannot overpower a good system. A rotten system, on the other hand, can turn plenty of good guys into bribe-givers and takers.

 

One criticism however does make some sense, on the surface at least. Guys like Somyot and Premchai Karnasuta, the now infamous “hunter”, were in a position to set high standards, with or without help from society. They obviously failed to do that, the critics say.

 

Well, it takes two to tango. It takes a lot more than two to tango, in fact. In another society, would Somyot have borrowed the money from Kampol, and would rich people have even considered hunting in protected areas? We need both standard-setters and standard-keepers to form a good society. When the former are very hard to come by, the latter must guard against substandard folks.

 

Judging from the way things are, the standard-keepers have apparently not done a good job, and have themselves largely to blame.

 

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/opinion/30338784

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2018-02-14

  

[Fish Head Soup]

Blame shifting on behalf of the Black Leopard killer. Oh it's not really his fault!

 

Pathetic attempt yet again by the new owners of the Nation.

 

2/10  Tulsathit must try harder!

[CelticBhoy]

My two cents on ex-police chief Somyot 

By Tulsathit Taptim 

 

I'd say your opinion here isn't worth the two cents T.T.  

[davehowden]

J... W ...

[Odysseus123]

I think that the OP has been written with some degree of subtlety and has highlighted the problems...you just have to read between the lines.

[mikebell]

The Thai police force needs thoroughly investigating to discover; how they get to be police officers in the first place when having no brain; how they rise through the ranks to become chiefs; what sidelines they have that distracts them from their primary job; how they infiltrate hi-so society.

Until this is done, Thailand will continue to be third world.

[ramrod711]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

One bad guy cannot overpower a good system. A rotten system, on the other hand, can turn plenty of good guys into bribe-givers and takers.

Ain't it the truth. Just go along to get along, pad your pockets and make the right connections on the way. Every Thai knows it, it's a sad fact of life.

[tomaway]

In a country where pointing at people wrongdoing can lead you to be in jail faster than these wrongdoers, I do like the way things are said and not said in this text. A very subtle use of words. A sad but true vision of Thai society.

[smutcakes]

That is one of the worst articles i have ever seen and if the author cannot see the excuses he is making for Somyot are complete nonsense then Thailand is in real trouble, if this is a view of an educated Thai, then they are doomed.

 

Yes the system is at fault, but that is the system that people like Somyot and his predecessors across the bureaucracy, military, judiciary and police have created, and the attitude of the author foster and allow to develop bu excusing it.

 

You should not really expect much different from Tulsathit who is a well established, long term mouth piece for status quo in Thailand.

[wakeupplease]

Local FA and FIFA all have one thing in common and it is not nice.

[timewilltell]

The article needs a little more thought than the average kneejerk reaction.  Basically, if Thai people are silent about the corruption everywhere and have the attitude that 'I' cannot do anything', then the millions of 'I can't do anything' will ultimately do nothing.  When the average person has the guts to stand up and say 'I am just not having the politicians corrupt the country, I am not having the justice system corrupted, and I am not putting up with being told what to think, where I can meet or what I can say or like of Facebook - then millions of 'I can't do anything's' become a voice that those who are corrupt have to listen to and eventually along will come a leader to clean away some of the crap besetting the society.  And then another to follow up on what the first failed to achieve.  That is the progress of society and at the moment Thai society is not far along that road.

[spidermike007]

In the current political environment, you are not going to find a national newspaper, that comes right out and calls a dog a dog. But, he does a decent job of calling this former chief the super corrupt piece of crap that he is.

 

It is simply the way the police operate here. I am convinced that decades ago the Thai government entered into a quid pro quo with the police. We will not give you a living wage. We will start you at a salary that is less than a cashier at Tesco. A smaller precinct captain will only earn $500 a month. And we will ask you to pay for your own uniforms, guns, motorbikes, and much else. In exchange, we will offer you a very lucrative franchise, you are free to do as you please, and we will never, ever come after you. It works for you guys. And the government ends up saving trillions of baht a year. The only problem with this scenario, is the country ends up devoid of law enforcement, competent detectives, or even modestly qualified forensic technicians and labs.

 

Oh well. Who needs law enforcement? Who needs traffic safety? Why not be the number one nation on earth for traffic fatalities? Since the government does not care one iota for the common man, this whole thing sort of makes sense, in a twisted, nonsensical, bizarre, whole other planet sort of way.

[Colabamumbai]

He is being truthful and avoiding arrest at the sametime. Well written.

[smutcakes]

1 hour ago, Colabamumbai said:

He is being truthful and avoiding arrest at the sametime. Well written.

No he is not. It is pontificating excusing nonsense. There are editorials which call a spade a spade in the other paper and no one has been arrested.

[Kaoboi Bebobp]

1 hour ago, Colabamumbai said:

He is being truthful and avoiding arrest at the sametime. Well written.

 

Agreed. It was exceptionally well written. He put our toes under the curtain and, without opening it, tantalized us with a hint of how things work. It's up to the reader to interpret and extrapolate. And he avoids the attention of the authorities. One hopes. 

[maximillian]

11 hours ago, Odysseus123 said:

I think that the OP has been written with some degree of subtlety and has highlighted the problems...you just have to read between the lines.

 

You're asking too much...

[Odysseus123]

8 minutes ago, maximillian said:

 

You're asking too much...

Possibly...

 

But I am going to go out on a limb here and say it was a superbly written OP and one that I fully appreciate..

 

Otherwise it is up to the Red Queen.."Orf with his head..off with his head!"

[KBsinter]

I read between the lines, well written and subtle I think it keeps him safe from the 

lawmakers,..............

[Donotdisturb]

12 hours ago, CelticBhoy said:

My two cents on ex-police chief Somyot 

By Tulsathit Taptim 

 

I'd say your opinion here isn't worth the two cents T.T.  

thai coppers and thai journalists... not sure who is most pathetic

[Lungstib]

What an awful waste of a comment. An apology is needed for any young student who reads this and just says "whats the point in being honest"

[Dap]

A well written article simply stating when there is no 

rule of law, the blame lies long before the crime.

[spidermike007]

2 hours ago, Donotdisturb said:

thai coppers and thai journalists... not sure who is most pathetic

Most definitely the police. Without any doubt whatsoever. The police are the very definition of pathetic. The journalists at least make an effort. More than you can say about the toy police, who never, ever make an effort, unless there is some cash on the table.