Phuket Land Corruption Scandal Continues

[george]

Phuket land corruption scandal continues

Phuket land developer Boonkeng Srisansuchart answering questions

at Phuket City Police Station in 2003. Photo: Gazette file

PHUKET: -- The National Counter Corruption Commission (NCCC) has ruled to pursue criminal charges against the Phuket Land Office registrar and a well-known local businessman over an encroachment case dating back to 1997.

NCCC Secretary-General Apinan Issarangkul Na Ayudhaya made the announcement on Tuesday following a meeting in Bangkok.

The commission ruled that former Phuket Land Office Registrar Thawatchai Anukul was in gross dereliction of duty in issuing three Chanote title deeds based on applications submitted by well-known Phuket land developer Boonkeng Srisansuchart.

Mr Boonkeng had applied for eight Chanote titles based on a single SorKor 1 title deed covering over 362 rai of land.

The NCCC ruled that a survey of the land specified in the document revealed it to be state forest land.

The NCCC ruled Mr Thawatchai was at fault of gross dereliction of duty, criminal misuse of power and document forgery in issuing three Chanote deeds to Mr Boonkeng: two in March 2001 and another the following month.

The first two were annulled in November 2005 and the third was ruled invalid on Tuesday.

Mr Boonkeng was ruled as an accomplice in the case.

The NCCC will forward the case to the Attorney General with the recommendation that he be charged in the Criminal Court, Mr Apinan said.

Thawatchai has been a fugitive since 2003, when the Land Department requested police pursue his arrest over Chanote titles for a 65-rai plot in Karon and other parcels of land in Phang Nga allegedly being falsified and issued by the former Phuket Land Office Registrar.

At the press conference the NCCC also ordered the dismissal of all other Chanote application requests lodged based on the fraudulent SorKor 1 document.

Mr Boonkeng also had four land plots ruled to have been fraudulently obtained seized by the state in June, 2004.

Four plots issued to him under SorPorKor 1 land use deeds were returned to the state in September that year following a ruling by the Anti Money Laundering Office.

The Agricultural Land Reform Office (ALRO) ruled that Mr Boonkeng could not occupy the land because he was not a landless farmer, the intended recipients of land under the SorPorKor scheme.

For the original report click here.

Mr Boonkeng’s past projects included the Srisansuchart Grandville housing estate on the bypass road in Rassada.

-- Phuket Gazette 2010-12-30

[Colabamumbai]

Yeah sure...13 years later. Dating back to 1997. If you were involved in a crime in Thailand they would be on your ass tomorrow. Were Special were foreigners.

[geriatrickid]

At least they did something about him. And justice does move slowly in Thailand. very slowly. He must have been very arrogant to have gotten caught.

[mccw]

Had any of this land been sold on or built on?

If chanort could be withdrawn and seized at such a later date the apparent safety of owning chanort land is not so sure.

Also it says "since he was not a landless farmer he was not intitled to hold land under the sor por kor scheem"; so setting a precendent; I know of sum falang live on land like this. They're family might well not be considered peasants. What is the legal definition of 'peasant' ?

[asiawatcher]

Either way it would seem the land developer was gaining large tracts of land at only the cost of a bribe. Standards procedure here. Let's see if they actually prosecute and inter him. Or will he buy his way out as so many do?