Samak: Shut Up, Dissolve House

[sabaijai]

Commentary: Dissolve the House

By Atiya Achakulwisut, Editorial Pages Editor

Bangkok Post, 3 September 2009

If Prime Minister Samak cannot shut his mouth, he might as well shut down the House of Representatives.

The PM has had many chances to prove his mettle, to show that he could rise above the limits and demands of his banal "self'' to serve other people or fulfil a noble cause. He has failed consistently. He has failed to listen, as evident during the special joint session he himself convened for the specific purpose of giving him advice. He has failed to look beyond his ego to see the reality of what other people are feeling _ what conflicts are on their minds. He has failed to hold his tongue even though he knew that in raising his voice to try to protect his perceived stature, he ended up crowding out ideas and thoughts which he should have heard.

The more Prime Minister Samak speaks, the deeper the crisis seems to plunge. In parliament, he spoke of the need for him to stay put so that he can be seen as preserving the democratic system against mob rule. It sounded noble, but I couldn't help thinking whether it was too pompous for the premier to equate himself with the whole regime. Does he truly believe that he is so indispensable that were he to step down the whole democratic system would go down with him?

full story

[Pierrot]

Leave the poor guy alone ! I mean the writer of this "article".

Have you read the comments of Bangkok Post readers ?

"I do not think this author has any credibility, whatsoever", "The only one I think who should shut his mouth is the writer of this article." "Dear Bangkok Post chief executive, please fire the author of this outrageous article." ....

Edited September 3, 2008 by Pierrot

[Stephen Cleary]

Leave the poor guy alone ! I mean the writer of this "article".

Have you read the comments of Bangkok Post readers ?

"I do not think this author has any credibility, whatsoever", "The only one I think who should shut his mouth is the writer of this article." "Dear Bangkok Post chief executive, please fire the author of this outrageous article." ....

Wht should we leave the geezer alone?

Both Samak and the PAD are a joke.

But let's look at Samak.

What kind of prime minister is televised laughing and joking, the morning after bloody violence (yesterday 8am)? Yet again, it should come as no surprise, as it is was Samak who told the international community last year, live on American TV, only "one unlucky guy died" (in the massacre of Oct 1976). Then again, Samak played a mighty powerful role in October of that year. Ironic, that in those days, it was Samak who was on the side of the ultra right-wing 'royalist' mobs out to cleanse the country of fanatical left-winging 'communists'. And it was Samak, in 1976, who supported the return of dictator FM Thanom who had previously led the army to kill hundreds of students in 1973. Samak had no respect for the law in those days, and none during the super-corrupt era of the Thaksin govt, a govt whose leader flees the country with no respect for the law.

Yet, it is Samak, who i have seen on the TV over the past few days bellowing out loud in self-pity that the PAD have no respect for the law, and passing sarcastic marks at the capability of a military government. The guy completely contradicts himself. He has swung from being an ultra right-wing, dictator-loving, army fan into a Thaksin crony who is hel_l-belt in gutting out old remnants of military/elitist control in Thailand and turning it over to business-mongols who want to run the country (and their businesses of course) MBA-style.

I'd like to see the guy booted-out, but them again he was democratically voted into power.

And he himself enjoys reminding folk that, even though Samak was absolutely against democratic means during the 1970s.

Edited September 3, 2008 by Stephen Cleary

[Guest Reimar]

He can't shut up and he can't dissolve the house! It's against his nature!

And he didn't "produce" enough paper birds within parliament session's yet!

What a PM!

Cheers.

[Uros]

I heard Samak is holding a news conference this afternoon. Anyone know what time?

[dumball]

I heard Samak is holding a news conference this afternoon. Anyone know what time?

Yes please tell us , i have a serious 'Dump ' to take and i am prone to giving as apposed to recieving .

[bobzillauk]

Anyway, this is what happen's when you leave a TV chef in charge of the country, loves to stir things up.

It's the Bangkok Rich versus Rest of Thailand. And the poorer people will always vote for the people that care about them. So its just like going round the magic roundabout, whatever happen's the bangkok wealthiest will never be happy.

[Ricardo]

It is interesting to recall that, in this same situation with protesters on-the-street calling for his resignation and condemning corruption within the government, Samak's puppeteer-master Thaksin did indeed resign and call a new election.

And that was without the added inducement, of knowing that his party is targeted by the (Thaksin-appointed) Electoral Commission, to be dissolved for electoral-fraud.

So Samak could claim, if he were to follow this route to defuse the troubled situation, that he was merely following his leader's previous example.

But I doubt whether Thaksin would be quite so fast, to finance another TRT-lookalike, after his experience with PPP/Samak.

So perhaps Samak is correct, and his best chance to hang on to personal power and money-making opportunities, is to continue to string things along, which was also Thaksin's fall-back strategy, before the coup.

Which begs the question, why doesn't Thaksin instruct the PPP to install another nominee as party-leader & PM, one who won't suddenly develop ideas of his own independence, while there is still time ? Perhaps while Samak is visiting the U.N. in New York ?

Is Nopadope's long-awaited reward for loyalty soon to be delivered ?

[Journalist]

From this week's Economist.

Worse than a coup

Sep 4th 2008

From The Economist print edition

An authoritarian rabble should not be allowed to turf out a deeply flawed but popularly elected government

STANDING up for democracy sometimes entails standing up for some unappealing democrats. Thailand's pugnacious prime minister, Samak Sundaravej, is an especially hard man to defend. A ferocious rightist, Mr Samak was accused of inciting the policemen and vigilantes who slaughtered dozens of unarmed student protesters in Bangkok in 1976. On becoming prime minister following the election last December that restored democratic rule after a 2006 coup, Mr Samak chose for his cabinet some of the most unsavoury figures linked to the government of Thaksin Shinawatra, the prime minister deposed in the coup. But with the army on the streets of Bangkok again, Mr Samak is for once, if not in the right, then at least less wrong than those calling for his head.

His government is deeply flawed. But it would be wrong and dangerous if the authoritarian rabble who have seized Government House in Bangkok forced it out of office. After violent clashes between supporters and opponents of the government, Mr Samak this week declared a state of emergency in Bangkok (see article). The army chief backed his decision, but by mid-week was still ruling out the use of force to clear the squatters out. If the protesters, the woefully misnamed People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), do succeed, democracy in Thailand—not so long ago a beacon, by Asian standards, of pluralistic politics—will be in grave danger.

Some in the crowds at PAD rallies are liberals, appalled both at the abuses of power in Mr Thaksin's government and the sad signs that Mr Samak's is no better. The PAD's leaders, however, are neither liberals nor democrats. A gruesome bunch of reactionary businessmen, generals and aristocrats, they demand not fresh elections, which they would lose, but "new politics"—in fact a return to old-fashioned authoritarian rule, with a mostly appointed parliament and powers for the army to step in when it chooses. They argue that the rural masses who favour Mr Thaksin and Mr Samak are too "ill-educated" to use their votes sensibly. This overlooks an inconvenient electoral truth: the two prime ministers had genuinely popular policies, such as cheap health care and credit.

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The palace and a Burmese road to ruin

As in the build-up to the 2006 coup, PAD leaders are trying to oust a popular government on the bogus pretext of "saving" Thailand's revered King Bhumibol from a supposed republican plot. Some of the PAD protesters reportedly believe their sit-in has the crown's tacit backing. Almost anywhere else, the police would have removed them, forcibly if necessary, by now. But it is whispered that the PAD has protectors "on high"—hardline army generals and possibly figures in the royal palace (though not the king himself). This may be nonsense; but by preventing the discussion and hence refutation of such royal rumours, Thailand's harsh, much-abused lèse-majesté law has the ironic effect of helping them spread.

In the official version of modern Thai history, the king is the great defender of peace and democracy, who comes to the rescue at moments of crisis. Now would seem to be one such moment: some wise words from the king could do much to defuse tension. Thais like to believe they are good at seeking compromise to avoid conflict. But there has been little sign of compromise in the past three years, and there is now the risk of a bad one. The elected government might be forced out of office to pacify the PAD's demagogues, it might be made to share power with the undeserving opposition Democrat party, which has shown little leadership while waiting for power to be handed it on a plate, or, as in Bangladesh, a civilian front might provide a cloak for de facto military rule.

It is just possible to imagine a decent compromise in which Mr Samak gives way to a more emollient figure from the ruling coalition—and the PAD and its supporters in the army, the bureaucracy and (if they exist) the royal palace accept the verdict of the people. But the PAD's leaders may well not stop until they have imposed their own, undemocratic vision of Thailand. In this sense they are even more pernicious than the coupmakers of 2006, who at least promised to restore elected government and, under popular pressure, did so.

Prosperous, modern and open, Thailand has so far inhabited a different era from the dark ages in which its dismal neighbour, Myanmar, languishes under a thuggish, isolationist junta. Thailand's foreign friends should make clear to the Thai elite that toppling elected governments would be a step backwards. As Myanmar has found, it might also court sanctions. Foreign tourists, seeing the unchecked disorder on their television screens, including blockades of some airports, may soon be imposing a boycott of their own.