Bangkok on high alert for violence

[Mobi]

Democrat not guilty of using "Thaksin Regime" in campaign

The Constitutional Tribunal rules as groundless that allegations against Democrat Party's party leader and executive members that they used a clause, "Thaksin Regime" in their campaigns to convince people not to join in the April 2 election.

The tribunal said Democrat Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva did not create the clause, "Thaksin Regime," but it has been used by academicians and media for long time.

Ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra had actually created his unique style of administration and caused divisions among the public.

Therefore, Democrat party did not wrongly accuse Thai Rak Thai and Thaksin by using the clause. The tribunal delivered the verdict on the first accusation after reading the verdict since 2pm.

The Nation

[A_Traveller]

The tribunal delivered the verdict on the first accusation after reading the verdict since 2pm.

I thought this was 2 of 4, but I'm getting a headache now......

Regards

[Losangels]

Did any of the elephants manage to get into Bangkok?

Nah, they all fell asleep listening to the reading of the constitutional court

[hammered]

Democrat not guilty of using "Thaksin Regime" in campaign

The Constitutional Tribunal rules as groundless that allegations against Democrat Party's party leader and executive members that they used a clause, "Thaksin Regime" in their campaigns to convince people not to join in the April 2 election.

The tribunal said Democrat Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva did not create the clause, "Thaksin Regime," but it has been used by academicians and media for long time.

Ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra had actually created his unique style of administration and caused divisions among the public.

Therefore, Democrat party did not wrongly accuse Thai Rak Thai and Thaksin by using the clause. The tribunal delivered the verdict on the first accusation after reading the verdict since 2pm.

The Nation

A good decision based on law.

[hammered]

The tribunal delivered the verdict on the first accusation after reading the verdict since 2pm.

I thought this was 2 of 4, but I'm getting a headache now......

Regards

The Dems won one and lost three of the legal considerations related to the cases. That was the four.

Now we are hearing the verdicts on the 6 charges. One down. Five to go.I think.

[quiksilva]

Yup that tallies with this

Democrat not guilty of framing Thai Rak Thai by attacking Thaksin regime

The Constitution Tribunal acquitted the Democrat of framing the Thai Rak Thai during election campaigns.

The tribunal ruled that it was not wrong for the Democrat to attack the Thaksin regime during the period of election campaigns.

The ruling was the first in six rulings being read by the tribunal.

The Nation

[Stephen Cleary]

Latest News Just In:

Initially only supposedly to last for no longer than an hour, Thailand’s ruling on the Democrat and TRT parties has surpassed all new records on wasting monstrous amount of time. There are reports coming in that The Guinness Book of Records team will be soon boarding the first Bangkok bound flight.

Besides storming past the new record for complete waste of beer-drinking time, it has been reported that half the TRT supporters driven from the farms to the capital to protest any dubious decision, have either fallen asleep or drunk themselves crazy. Doctors on the scene have declared that the symptoms are due to ........sheer-boredom.

Source: International Truffled Tribune

Edited May 30, 2007 by stevesuphan

[Old Man River]

Latest News Just In:

Initially only supposedly to last for no longer than an hour, Thailand’s ruling on the Democrat and TRT parties has surpassed all new records on wasting monstrous amount of time. There are reports coming in that The Guinness Book of Records team will be soon boarding the first Bangkok bound flight.

Besides storming past the new record for complete waste of beer-drinking time, it has been reported that half the TRT supporters driven from the farms to the capital to protest any dubious decision, have either fallen asleep or drunk themselves crazy. Doctors on the scene have declared that the symptoms are due to ........sheer-boredom.

Source: International Truffled Tribune

What should be of more interest to the people at the Guinness Book of Records is that these people have not got up and gone to the bathroom yet.

[Mobi]

I'm off to take the dog for a walk.

Can someone else do the cutting and pasting for the next hour or so, please?

[pyrolover2000]

Yup that tallies with this

Democrat not guilty of framing Thai Rak Thai by attacking Thaksin regime

The Constitution Tribunal acquitted the Democrat of framing the Thai Rak Thai during election campaigns.

The tribunal ruled that it was not wrong for the Democrat to attack the Thaksin regime during the period of election campaigns.

The ruling was the first in six rulings being read by the tribunal.

The Nation

I'm waiting for the members of the tribunal to say, Screw this! I need a beer...

[chanchao]

I think the whole thing is ridiculous. "The Constitutional Court" : Hello, the military threw out the constitution, for the specidic purpose of making it impossible to face legal charges.. Yet now the constitutional court will judge the actions of two parties under the constitution that was thrown out..

Come on. Don't take any of this too seriously, it's just the usual shenenigans. Case in point, the latest:

"Democrat not guilty of using "Thaksin Regime" in campaign" i.e. the word 'regime'.. Come *ON* this is about completely nothing. On a side note however, I wonder how those Democrats who felt so clever over the word 'regime' feel now, now that they have an actual full blown military junta running the country. I hope they're happy with what their boycott caused.

Anyway, regardless, none of todays' shenanigans will have any impact on where this country is heading the next couple of months. And years.

Edited May 30, 2007 by chanchao

[kratindaeng]

sensational historical day for Thailand today dont you think? The suspense is killing me..........

[quiksilva]

Anyway, regardless, none of todays' shenanigans will have any impact on where this country is heading the next couple of months.

Perhaps not but it would be heartening to see a step being taken in the right direction, for a change...

Edit as for the years bit.. lets hope not.

Edited May 30, 2007 by quiksilva

[A_Traveller]

The Constitutional Tribunal cleared two senior Democrat members of accusations that they involved in hiring smaller parties to contest in the April 2 election.

They were party spokesman Sathit Wongnongtoey and party's secretary general Suthep Thueksubhan.

Attorney General office had accused both of involving in the hiring of Prachathippatai Kaona party to run in Phuket in the April election.

However the Tribunal said that after examining the evidence, they found that both did not involve in the accused acts. Both also did not pay money to the smaller party to contest in the election

Additional

The Tribunal also said Taikorn Palasuwan, did not hire Wattawit Tantipirom, leader of Better Life Party to wrongly accuse Thai Rak Thai. What Taikorn did was merely seeking evidence.

From The Nation

/edit additional//

Edited May 30, 2007 by A_Traveller

[A_Traveller]

The 'regime' point was tied to the serious charge of negative campaigning, so it's not as minor a point as some might think.

Regards

[richard10365]

I'm not sure if this has been posted yet but you can watch the procedings live over the internet with English commentary from Thailands only English News Channel (so they say). There's about a 30 second delay from what I see on the satellite and what I see over the internet with the satellite being faster.

They don't comment much. That might be because this is taking longer than expected and they are falling asleep.

http://www.thailandoutlook.tv/

[monty]

Looks like the Democrats are largely of the hook.

The hiring of the smaller parties was their biggest worry!

[monty]

http://www.thailandoutlook.tv/

Blocked on TT&T Maxnet, or the site is overloaded!. Pagetitle comes through, then I get a page cannot be found error

[jdinasia]

http://www.thailandoutlook.tv/

Blocked on TT&T Maxnet, or the site is overloaded!. Pagetitle comes through, then I get a page cannot be found error

I am getting the page on TT&T ... but didn't get the stream before just now

[hammered]

Looks like the Democrats are largely of the hook.

The hiring of the smaller parties was their biggest worry!

Legally they had anything to worry about as the evidence against them was so weak. Their worry was always politics. The evidence against TRT was always much stronger. It will be interesting to see how that goes. It may be telling that Suthep the main Dem potential fall guy was in court. Will Thammarak the main figure in the TRT allegations be sitting there. He was last heard fo froma safe house.

It is good to see the court judging the issues on legal points and not bending to political issues.

[Old Man River]

Looks like the Democrats are largely of the hook.

The hiring of the smaller parties was their biggest worry!

Legally they had anything to worry about as the evidence against them was so weak. Their worry was always politics. The evidence against TRT was always much stronger. It will be interesting to see how that goes. It may be telling that Suthep the main Dem potential fall guy was in court. Will Thammarak the main figure in the TRT allegations be sitting there. He was last heard fo froma safe house.

It is good to see the court judging the issues on legal points and not bending to political issues.

It is also good to see that the all issues are being presented transparently, hence the length.

[A_Traveller]

The Constitution Tribunal acquitted the Democrat Party of trying to prevent candidates from small parties from entering the race.

The tribunal ruled that witnesses of Thai Rak Thai gave conflicting statements.

From The Nation

[quiksilva]

Blog from the Nation's Editor

5 pm: Please be patient, folks. Now the Tribunal is getting to the point if Suthep is guilty of hiring small-time candidates to frame Thai Rak Thai. The verdict on Suthep will be the biggest tell-tale sign of Thailand's political future. The judge has been reading a lot of details of activities of Suthep and another Democrat executive, Sathit Wongnong-toei and their interaction with the small parties.

5:10 pm: Suthep and Sathit have been cleared of hiring the small party candidates to frame Thai Rak Thai. The Democrat Party now looks very likely to be off the hook now.

5:20 pm: Urgent. . The Democrats have been cleared of the last charges _ that they tried to obstruct the October election.

This practically means the party is ruled innocent.

[quiksilva]

The Tribunal clears Democrat and Taikorn from hiring small party and wrongly accusing TRT

The Constitutional Tribunal cleared Democrat's deputy secretary general Thavorn Senniem of obstructing candidates of smaller parties from running in the April election. Trairong Suvannakhiri, party deputy leader, is also found not guilty of involving in the alleged blocking.

The Tribunal ruled that there were no evidence to justify the accusation that Thavorn tried to block Koe Plod Nee Party from running the April election.

The Tribunal also found no evidence to support accusation that Trairong involved in the blockade of candidate registration in Songkla.

Earlier the Tribunal cleared two senior Democrat members of accusations that they involved in hiring smaller parties to contest in the April 2 election.

They were party spokesman Sathit Wongnongtoey and party's secretary general Suthep Thueksubhan.

Attorney General office had accused both of involving in the hiring of Prachathippatai Kaona party to run in Phuket in the April election.

However the Tribunal said that after examining the evidence, they found that both did not involve in the accused acts. Both also did not pay money to the smaller party to contest in the election

The Tribunal also said Taikorn Palasuwan, did not hire Wattawit Tantipirom, leader of Better Life Party to wrongly accuse Thai Rak Thai. What Taikorn did was merely seeking evidence.

The Nation

[hammered]

Looks like the Democrats are largely of the hook.

The hiring of the smaller parties was their biggest worry!

Legally they had anything to worry about as the evidence against them was so weak. Their worry was always politics. The evidence against TRT was always much stronger. It will be interesting to see how that goes. It may be telling that Suthep the main Dem potential fall guy was in court. Will Thammarak the main figure in the TRT allegations be sitting there. He was last heard fo froma safe house.

It is good to see the court judging the issues on legal points and not bending to political issues.

It is also good to see that the all issues are being presented transparently, hence the length.

The way the tribunal are handling themselves today and the way they are making and explaining their verdicts is very very impressive.

[A_Traveller]

The Democrat Party escapes dissolution when the Constitution Tribunal found it not guilty in the electoral fraud case.

From The Nation

[gust]

The news on channel 5 says: Democrat party not guilty of breaching the Election Act as the Act is considered void after the coup. So how, then, can anybody (incl. TRT) guilty of anything?? The old constitution is also void. So of which laws are we talking then? Anybody can explain?

[quiksilva]

Looks like the Democrats are largely of the hook.

The hiring of the smaller parties was their biggest worry!

Legally they had anything to worry about as the evidence against them was so weak. Their worry was always politics. The evidence against TRT was always much stronger. It will be interesting to see how that goes. It may be telling that Suthep the main Dem potential fall guy was in court. Will Thammarak the main figure in the TRT allegations be sitting there. He was last heard fo froma safe house.

It is good to see the court judging the issues on legal points and not bending to political issues.

It is also good to see that the all issues are being presented transparently, hence the length.

The way the tribunal are handling themselves today and the way they are making and explaining their verdicts is very very impressive.

Now if they can handle the TRT verdict with a degree of impartiality that would be truly impressive.

[Kan Win]

Democrat escapes party dissolution

The Constitutional Tribunal rules on Wednesday that Democrat Party is not guilty of violating the election laws, so it is not subject to party dissolution.

The Tribunal delivered the sentence after reading the verdict since 2pm.

Senior Democrat party members who sit in the court room seemed to be relieved after the Tribunal read the final verdict.

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/2007/05/30...es_30035592.php

[gust]

The news on channel 5 says: Democrat party not guilty of breaching the Election Act as the Act is considered void after the coup. So how, then, can anybody (incl. TRT) be guilty of anything?? The old constitution is also void. So of which laws are we talking then? Anybody can explain?