Stop Disbanding Parties, Thai Chart Drafter Says

[webfact]

Stop disbanding parties: Kaewsan

By The Nation

Former senator says amnesty for banned MPs also necessary to end

Kaewsan Atipodi, a former charter drafter, has suggested the judicial power to disband political parties and remove politicians' electoral rights should be curbed so politics can return to normal.

Speaking at a seminar held by the Right Livelihood Foundation, Kaewsan said judicial powers could not be used indiscriminately to solve political problems.

A former member of now-defunct Asset Examination Committee, which investigated former premier Thaksin Shinawatra's wrongdoings while in office, Kaewsan said he only agreed with dissolution of the Thai Rak Thai Party, which illegally hired small parties to stand in a 2005 election.

Kaewsan, also a former Bangkok senator, said the Constitution and political party law should be amended to make it more difficult to dissolve parties and remove politicians' electoral rights.

"We should dissolve political parties and ban politicians from standing in the polls only after a court hands down a guilty verdict and wrongdoers are put in jail," he said.

"In addition, there should be interim clauses granting amnesty to those currently banned from politics.

"This could lead the opposition Pheu Thai Party to bring all the red-shirt protesters into the proper political arena [rather than having a protest movement on the streets]," he said.

The colour-coded political fight led to protracted protests and riots in April and May this year, in which about 90 people were killed and 1,900 injured after a crackdown by troops following days of riots.

Besides the Thai Rak Thai Party, three other major parties, namely, People's Power, Chart Thai and Matchima Thipatai, were also disbanded by the Constitution Court.

A total of 220 politicians were banned from politics for a period of five years, including 111 politicians belonging to Thai Rak Thai.

Kaewsan said political fights must return to Parliament and justice must be served for all wrongdoers, regardless of their political colour. Otherwise, the ongoing reforms were unlikely to bear fruit.

Speaking at the same seminar, Nakarin Mektrairat of Thammasat University, said Thailand had weathered tougher political conflicts in the past. He cited the reigns of reformist King Rama V and King Rama VII as times when political rifts were deeper and lasted longer.

There was also worrying political rifts when Pridi Pranomyong and Field Marshal Pibulsongkram were prime ministers, so it would just take time to resolve the current conflict, he said.

Meanwhile, Election Commission (EC) chairman Apichart Sukhagganond had reassuring words yesterday for participants at the EC's political and election development institute, saying the election watchdog was completely neutral.

"The colour-coded politics has stressed me. There've been rumours that I belong to this or that camp, but I repeat that I'm impartial." He added that previous participants in EC programmes also came from diverse political parties.

However, he expressed concern that it was difficult to eradicate vote-buying, largely because politicians and voters had done it for a long time.

The problem was severe in the Northeast, he said, adding: "On the morning of election day, a voter might get hundreds of baht, but as the ballot-box closing time gets nearer, a voter can get up to Bt3,000 to 4,000, which is about Bt20,000 per family."

He said it was important to cultivate new values for the new generation of voters by educating them on the value of not selling their votes.

-- The Nation 2010-08-22

[TallForeigner]

I hope he does NOT mean that the Democrat party should NOT be dissolved for its massive illegal donation scandals and its criminal leadership should NOT be thrown in jail.

[jonclark]

With regard to the comment in the OP about vote buying. Can anyone enlighten me if there is a specific law which prohibits an individual selling their vote??

A law which strictly prohibits vote selling is needed and those found guilty of selling their votes will a) lose the right to vote in the next two general elections and also get hit with a minimum fine of say B20'000.

It shouldn't be too hard to find most 'sellers' as the EC has in the past used the money trail to kick out / barr politicians who've bought votes in elections, and i'm sure these 'buyers 'keep records (ID card numbers etc) of who they bought votes from to ensure they do what they were paid to do.

This law then needs to be applied to sellers equally irrespective of political persuasion .

But as the OP stated disbanding parties doesn't work as the next day they re-form with a new name and new faces who are instructed behind closed doors by those who have been banned. Old Newin springs to mind as a prime example.

[jonclark]

I hope he does NOT mean that the Democrat party should NOT be dissolved for its massive illegal donation scandals and its criminal leadership should NOT be thrown in jail.

None of that has yet been proven....i think massive suspicious donation is more apt...but i know where you're coming from

[whybother]

I hope he does NOT mean that the Democrat party should NOT be dissolved for its massive illegal donation scandals and its criminal leadership should NOT be thrown in jail.

Have ANY politicians that have been banned in the last decade also been thrown in jail?

[massein]

I hope he does NOT mean that the Democrat party should NOT be dissolved for its massive illegal donation scandals and its criminal leadership should NOT be thrown in jail.

None of that has yet been proven....i think massive suspicious donation is more apt...but i know where you're coming from

The ideal of dissolving a political party because of official corruption at the top,really makes no sense, How ever the fact that a political party is privately own chattel also makes no sense. This whole issue is like throwing the baby out with the bath water. The TRT was one of the best marking ploy I had every observed in politics. Punish those convicted of wrong doing, let the rest serve the people as they should.

Edited August 22, 2010 by massein

[Buchholz]

"We should dissolve political parties and ban politicians from standing in the polls only after a court hands down a guilty verdict and wrongdoers are put in jail," he said.

Agreed that Thaksin-buddy and People Power Party's Deputy Leader Yongyuth should be put in jail for his blatant attempts of bribing local officials to manipulate voters that led to the dissolution of the People Power Party. He should also be put in jail for a longer period for attempting to murder an elderly couple by leading a charge on their home shooting at them hundreds of times.

[massein]

Good point , no rich and powerful politician is ever punish after conviction

[virtualtraveller]

As is often the case in Thailand, even the policy makers at the very top come out with impractical but well intentioned remedies or rules that don't work, in this case by dissolving a cheating party you achieve little since they all just regroup again under a different name using the same logo as previous party and come back again, as we saw with the PPP and PT. It's a case of using a sledge hammer to drive in pin.

Rather, vote fraud should be tackled like this: When a candidate is red carded he is disqualified and the guy who came in second wins the seat simple. No re-run, no proxy candidates, if a PT candidate wins but was proven to be cheating he is disqualified and barred from running for a set time. PT loses the seat to the party that came in second, simple.

If vote fraud occurs at an executive level, whereby it's clear that the party leadership were aware of the cheating and failed to remove their candidate then they lose their share of the party list seats in that zone (which would be max. 8). So, rather than banning the PPP in the last election because of one crooked executive, they would have lost all their party list seats in the North, and they would have had the 15 yellow and red carded candidates disqualified and lost those seat too, a total of 23. This would have had significant bearing on their coalition.

[ianf]

I hope he does NOT mean that the Democrat party should NOT be dissolved for its massive illegal donation scandals and its criminal leadership should NOT be thrown in jail.

Good Lord! I think you are a red shirt supporter! I don't think the courts have ruled on this one yet so you must have some inside information! So clever, so wise ...................

[badgerbailey]

I hope he does NOT mean that the Democrat party should NOT be dissolved for its massive illegal donation scandals and its criminal leadership should NOT be thrown in jail.

Good Lord! I think you are a red shirt supporter! I don't think the courts have ruled on this one yet so you must have some inside information! So clever, so wise ...................

Why would you need to be a red shirt supporter to bring up the fact that the Democrats received illegal donations? That to me sounds like a typical Yellow shirt supporters comment. When will you realise, you're all idiots.

[yellow1red1]

Thing is, all political parties should be banned, outlawed, dissolved, not just in Thailand; democracy would, then, take a step in the direction of viability.

[whybother]

The ideal of dissolving a political party because of official corruption at the top,really makes no sense, How ever the fact that a political party is privately own chattel also makes no sense. This whole issue is like throwing the baby out with the bath water. The TRT was one of the best marking ploy I had every observed in politics. Punish those convicted of wrong doing, let the rest serve the people as they should.

The party is dissolved, but only the executive ("officials at the top") are banned. The other members get to form or join another party and continue to serve the people (or often the case, themselves).