Yingluck Must Decide; This Is Her Biggest Test So Far

[webfact]

STOPPAGE TIME

Yingluck must decide; this is her biggest test so far

Tulsathit Taptim

Gun-toting soldiers guarding flood barriers are a scary scene.

A news blackout is certainly bad. Handing absolute decision-making power to a certain group of people is risky, if not downright dangerous. These scenes, and more, are what we may get if Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra decides to invoke an emergency decree to fight the unfolding flood disaster.

But talking about those nasty scenarios at this particular moment is like telling a near-dead patient that surgery he badly needs requires slicing open his chest, removing his heart from his body and his chance of survival will depend largely on the steadiness of the doctor's hands. Does he deserve to know all that? Probably. Does he deserve the most effective, albeit painful, treatment? Definitely.

Thailand is that patient. The first thing Yingluck has to admit is that the patient is now in a coma. Six industrial estates submerged and millions affected, a large portion of whom are displaced, cannot tell her otherwise. Her choice is simple now: either the patient must get an operation immediately or the conventional treatment continues despite the increasingly slim hope that he will bounce back.

It's a dilemma that comes with the job. However, even the Democrats are suggesting she exercise her mandate to declare an emergency decree. That takes away one key political element that might make her hesitate. The media are split, of course, but at the end of the day, this is what Yingluck is supposed to do after her party won the July 3 election. Her job description since she became Thailand's prime minister is to make tough decisions for the country's best interests.

To say that an emergency decree is undemocratic is a luxury only the critics have. To Yingluck, anything that is within her power is democratic. Or, to put it another way, democracy gives her the right to be undemocratic when the situation warrants. And this is not about anti-government protesters occupying downtown intersections; it's about the real suffering of millions, about the risk of that figure being doubled or even tripled, and about using a stringent law to prevent a really bad thing from getting worse.

That leaves the question whether a state of emergency can really help. That is an emergency question in itself. So far, the handling of the crisis has been largely misguided and influenced by vested interests big and small. Local conflicts have stalled huge volumes of water or made them flow unnatural paths. The government and the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration are not singing the same tune on what to do for the capital and where and when to do it. Relief efforts for the still-inundated rural areas have been insufficient.

If Yingluck is afraid of political consequences of invoking an emergency decree, she is already suffering from a major backlash for apparently being too soft. More importantly perhaps, this is no time to think of what will politically come next. Her "success" as Thailand's leader will not be measured by how long she stays in power, but how many lives she can save from now on, even if few or nobody will ever know about it. There are times when governance and promotion have to part ways, and this is one of them.

The menacing water is still testing Thailand's character. But whether or not it can dilute the "colours", Yingluck is not in a position to think about it. She should not even think of herself as an elected leader, as that could politicise her thinking. This is truly a critical situation facing a leader, and it's not a political crisis. As far as Yingluck is concerned, whether or not she will invoke the emergency decree must not be based on political considerations. It should be based purely on how best to save the patient.

If she honestly thinks the conventional method still works, her mandate allows her to continue doing what she thinks is right. That is totally acceptable, as long as she and her government clearly understand the concept of "emergency" and their job requirement that they must not let politics and personal interests play any part in their action until the disaster is over.

The floodwater has put on hold many controversial or politically explosive agendas. It's hard to imagine that anyone in the government will revive the "amnesty" plan or charter amendment ideas over the next two months. Yingluck must find her political life now quite different from the first three or four weeks as prime minister. "I won't work for any particular group or person" was her inauguration-day pledge. That probably coincided with the beginning of the downpours in the North, which put her to the test immediately. Only the test proves relentless and is getting bigger.

-- The Nation 2011-10-19

[hellodolly]

Yes she must decide now is her brother more important than Thailand.

The title should have read Yingluck should have decided long ago.

If she decides now to put the well fare of Thailand first she will be able to help with the relief.

If she had decided long ago she could have helped to lesson the damage done.

The flood is a natural disaster and could not be stopped but early action could have lessened the damage done.

[virtualtraveller]

We have a real, natural crisis, which calls for a State of Emergency so that it can be dealt with effectively but 'State of Emergency' is a dirty phrase since it evokes memories of the army clearing out the red shirts, which of course was a contrived crisis. It's a times like this that the army are useful, and need powers to get on with the job but can't because Yingluck is averse to making the call.

[qualtrough]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

[Buchholz]

The Dems had years to address water management issues

The Thaksins ver. 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, and now 4.0 had three times as long to address water management issues as the Dems.

.

Edited October 19, 2011 by Buchholz

[MunterHunter]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

So did Thaksin, he had considerably longer than the Dems (and didnt have to deal with civil unrest during his tenure)

what did his government do to help prevent the possibility of flooding? Nowt.

Yingluck knew there was a risk of Central Thailand (and Ultimately Bangkok) getting hit by these floods when Chiang Mai and surrounding areas got hit... what preventative measures did she put in place? Nowt.Oh thats not true sorry, she focused her energies on getting her cronies into the positions of power and getting the red-shirts freed... now where are the red shirts? opening mini-states in the north, now where are her cronies? making a pigs-ear of managing this crisis

Convenient to blame the dems, but sadly its a Red government today and Yingluck is doing jack-sh*te except crying on TV and having photo ops with the opposition

[givenall]

Can someone tell her he has failed miserably

[Buchholz]

Can someone tell her he has failed miserably

They have...

79 per cent said the government's support was insufficient and not distributed efficiently; and 68.6 per cent said the flood relief supplies themselves did not sufficiently meet victims' needs.

AND

As much as 86.2 percent of the respondents still have no clear understanding as to whether their areas are flood-prone even after the updates, while 89.2 percent find the updates confusing. About 87 percent don’t trust the information from the FROC.

[scorecard]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

So did Thaksin, he had considerably longer than the Dems (and didnt have to deal with civil unrest during his tenure)

what did his government do to help prevent the possibility of flooding? Nowt.

Yingluck knew there was a risk of Central Thailand (and Ultimately Bangkok) getting hit by these floods when Chiang Mai and surrounding areas got hit... what preventative measures did she put in place? Nowt.Oh thats not true sorry, she focused her energies on getting her cronies into the positions of power and getting the red-shirts freed... now where are the red shirts? opening mini-states in the north, now where are her cronies? making a pigs-ear of managing this crisis

Convenient to blame the dems, but sadly its a Red government today and Yingluck is doing jack-sh*te except crying on TV and having photo ops with the opposition

And her brother (who is now out of politics, announced again just two days ago) surrounded his little sister with totally incapable people and when the test came, the floods, the whole bunch failed totally, the worst example being the science minister.

[animatic]

The Dems had years to address water management issues

The Thaksins ver. 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, and now 4.0 had three times as long to address water management issues as the Dems.

.

And if you add in the OTHER EX Pms in Thaksin current clique they have 20 years cumulatively in office compared to the 2.5 of Abhisit.

There is no way this can be laid at the Dems door because Thaksins crowd had much more time at the helm and didn't do anything past make money for their crowd at the expense of all others.

Edited October 19, 2011 by animatic

[animatic]

That leaves the question whether a state of emergency can really help.

That is an emergency question in itself. So far, the

handling of the crisis has been largely misguided

and influenced by vested interests big and small.

Local conflicts have stalled huge volumes of water

or made them flow unnatural paths.

This sums up well the case for calling an Emergency.

The Army need to go in and tell these 'vested interests'

to back off or or go to jail for trying to stop what needs to be done.

Much of the hesitation that has caused this big mess

was because underlings dared not go against 'influential figures'

like flooding a puyais business place rather than the

5,000 poor people on the other side of town.

And much of the problems have been caused by influencials building what they liked where they liked and to hell with mother natures natural functioning.

Suvarnabhumi is classic case in point Cobra Swamp watershed was just shoved aside... where has it gone?

[Cayenne]

Somebody forgot to read the job description of Thai PM to Yingluck before she took the job. Did she really think it would be a walk in the park? Did her brother assure her that his cronies, ahem, advisers would take care of all the day to day operations of running the country and that all she had to do was show up for photo ops, smile a lot, and end all talks with "na ka"?

The title of the article is wrong; it is Thaksin who must decide as Yingluck was never in a position to decide anything to begin with.

[animatic]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

So did Thaksin, he had considerably longer than the Dems (and didnt have to deal with civil unrest during his tenure)

what did his government do to help prevent the possibility of flooding? Nowt.

Yingluck knew there was a risk of Central Thailand (and Ultimately Bangkok) getting hit by these floods when Chiang Mai and surrounding areas got hit... what preventative measures did she put in place? Nowt.Oh thats not true sorry, she focused her energies on getting her cronies into the positions of power and getting the red-shirts freed... now where are the red shirts? opening mini-states in the north, now where are her cronies? making a pigs-ear of managing this crisis

Convenient to blame the dems, but sadly its a Red government today and Yingluck is doing jack-sh*te except crying on TV and having photo ops with the opposition

And her brother (who is now out of politics, announced again just two days ago) surrounded his little sister with totally incapable people and when the test came, the floods, the whole bunch failed totally, the worst example being the science minister.

Science minister... HA!

They should sit his wobble ass down and make him take A Levels,

and see how he fairs.

[hammered]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

In fairness all governments have to share responsibility for the policies of unbridalled and ill thought out growth and destruction of nature. However, there are things that could have been done to alleviate the current crisis that both this and the last government have to answer for.

Why are BKK canals being dredged now when it should have been done in the hot season? (That is down to Abhisit)

Why was water not released from behind dams earlier? (That is down to Yingluck and Abhisit too)

Why were the Suphanburi gates not opened as some claim this would have saved some or all of the industrial estates? (Down to Yingluck)

Why were the real experts not put in charge? (Down to Yingluck and the military)

Obviously answering all of these will get gobbled up in the political divide and no full answer will ever come. It is probably more important to learn the lessons and plan for next year and beyond now. One thing that is galringly obvious is a need for a national civilian department that oversees water management and has power over every province and town and dam and resevoir and a body that no regional polticians can mess with. After this is all over the anger betwen direct neighbours may decline as they have to live together but the anger towards the prvilieged saved places and their polticians that already exists isnt going away. And in some ways saving BKK may actually politically be Yinglucks biggest mistake as she will now find it hard to argue that she is not just another BKK centri poltician like Abhisit and those kind of polticians are not popular in rural areas north of BKK and after the floods will be a lot less so

[MrJohnson]

Time for State of Emergency. Regardless of 'colors'. The delivery of an effective relief effort and the maintenance of law and order demand it.

We can all argue over whose fault it is later, over a nice cup of tea, while we wait for the water to subside.

[BigBikeBKK]

We have a real, natural crisis, which calls for a State of Emergency so that it can be dealt with effectively but 'State of Emergency' is a dirty phrase since it evokes memories of the army clearing out the red shirts, which of course was a contrived crisis. It's a times like this that the army are useful, and need powers to get on with the job but can't because Yingluck is averse to making the call.

I don't think "State of Emergency" is a dirty phrase at all. The Army is far more effective and trustworthy than the government.

How was the occupation of Bangkok by armed Red Shirt insurgents a "contrived crisis"?

It's only a shame that the army wasn't given the order to clear out the red shirt terrorists earlier.

[phutoie2]

We have a real, natural crisis, which calls for a State of Emergency so that it can be dealt with effectively but 'State of Emergency' is a dirty phrase since it evokes memories of the army clearing out the red shirts, which of course was a contrived crisis. It's a times like this that the army are useful, and need powers to get on with the job but can't because Yingluck is averse to making the call.

I don't think "State of Emergency" is a dirty phrase at all. The Army is far more effective and trustworthy than the government.

How was the occupation of Bangkok by armed Red Shirt insurgents a "contrived crisis"?

It's only a shame that the army wasn't given the order to clear out the red shirt terrorists earlier.

I thought the Army were given the order?, Oh yes that was when the yellows were occupying Government House and the previous head of the armed forces said on TV "Its not my job to kill fellow Thais"

[phiphidon]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

In fairness all governments have to share responsibility for the policies of unbridalled and ill thought out growth and destruction of nature. However, there are things that could have been done to alleviate the current crisis that both this and the last government have to answer for.

Why are BKK canals being dredged now when it should have been done in the hot season? (That is down to Abhisit)

Why was water not released from behind dams earlier? (That is down to Yingluck and Abhisit too)

Why were the Suphanburi gates not opened as some claim this would have saved some or all of the industrial estates? (Down to Yingluck)

Why were the real experts not put in charge? (Down to Yingluck and the military)

Obviously answering all of these will get gobbled up in the political divide and no full answer will ever come. It is probably more important to learn the lessons and plan for next year and beyond now. One thing that is galringly obvious is a need for a national civilian department that oversees water management and has power over every province and town and dam and resevoir and a body that no regional polticians can mess with. After this is all over the anger betwen direct neighbours may decline as they have to live together but the anger towards the prvilieged saved places and their polticians that already exists isnt going away. And in some ways saving BKK may actually politically be Yinglucks biggest mistake as she will now find it hard to argue that she is not just another BKK centri poltician like Abhisit and those kind of polticians are not popular in rural areas north of BKK and after the floods will be a lot less so

Yes but Abhisit did have the advantage of a 1.43 TRILLION Baht Investment package, "Patibatkan Thai Khem Khaeng 2555" (http://thailand.prd....404&type=inside) mainly consisting of infrastructure development (read dust free roads) though they did declare that they would reduce the number of people suffering from floods from 400, 000 to 40, 000 on average through their "food and energy security" ideas - didn't seem to work though.

In fairness, they did pull 4 biilion baht from the 1.43 TRILLION baht package to help flood victims (http://reliefweb.int/node/373541).

Perhaps a bit more investment spent on flood prevention infrastructure would have been a better idea.

Edited October 19, 2011 by phiphidon

[h90]

Somebody forgot to read the job description of Thai PM to Yingluck before she took the job. Did she really think it would be a walk in the park? Did her brother assure her that his cronies, ahem, advisers would take care of all the day to day operations of running the country and that all she had to do was show up for photo ops, smile a lot, and end all talks with "na ka"?

The title of the article is wrong; it is Thaksin who must decide as Yingluck was never in a position to decide anything to begin with.

Why? Till now she didn't do anything wrong? No assets of her brother flooded. Some big budgets to repair everything, surely a lot corruption possible.

So everything fine for her family. Job well done. Who cares for these smelly poor people who don't have even 1 nice handbag.

[soundman]

Posts discussing board moderation have been removed from view.

[Who, me ?]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

Please add to this the 2001-2008 Thaksin , Samak, Somchai years....and you will have a more balanced opinion

[yumidesign]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

Oh please mr t had years too and did nothing

[h90]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

Please add to this the 2001-2008 Thaksin , Samak, Somchai years....and you will have a more balanced opinion

and at the 1997 crises also the same people were in power.

[OzMick]

We have a real, natural crisis, which calls for a State of Emergency so that it can be dealt with effectively but 'State of Emergency' is a dirty phrase since it evokes memories of the army clearing out the red shirts, which of course was a contrived crisis. It's a times like this that the army are useful, and need powers to get on with the job but can't because Yingluck is averse to making the call.

I don't think "State of Emergency" is a dirty phrase at all. The Army is far more effective and trustworthy than the government.

How was the occupation of Bangkok by armed Red Shirt insurgents a "contrived crisis"?

It's only a shame that the army wasn't given the order to clear out the red shirt terrorists earlier.

By iniating a violent confrontation and ensuring sufficient "peaceful protesters" were killed, the Democrat government could be labelled anti-democratic murderers.

[renaissanc]

I get the feeling that Jatuporn is creating more Red Shirt villages everywhere while all this flooding is going on as he and Thaksin think that Yingluck won't last long. When the opposition to her weakness arrives, they'll have a fighting force ready to oppose the anti-PT / Thaksin-ites.

[OzMick]

We have a real, natural crisis, which calls for a State of Emergency so that it can be dealt with effectively but 'State of Emergency' is a dirty phrase since it evokes memories of the army clearing out the red shirts, which of course was a contrived crisis. It's a times like this that the army are useful, and need powers to get on with the job but can't because Yingluck is averse to making the call.

I don't think "State of Emergency" is a dirty phrase at all. The Army is far more effective and trustworthy than the government.

How was the occupation of Bangkok by armed Red Shirt insurgents a "contrived crisis"?

It's only a shame that the army wasn't given the order to clear out the red shirt terrorists earlier.

I thought the Army were given the order?, Oh yes that was when the yellows were occupying Government House and the previous head of the armed forces said on TV "Its not my job to kill fellow Thais"

Quite rightly so, but the situation changes when his fellow Thais starting killing soldiers deployed for crowd control/dispersal. When you shoot at a soldier holding a riot shield and baton, don't be surprised if the next time you see him he is carrying a rifle.

[YellowFeverCAD]

The Dems had years to address water management issues, including the current crisis which began under their watch, and now we are now seeing the results.

Goodness, so the current gov't could have done nothing better than they have done and it's all the fault of the previous gov't that was in power for a couple of years with two major Red Shirt protests stuck right in the middle.. of course it can't possibly have been looked at during the what 5 or 6 years that the various Thaksin gov'ts were in power before that as well could it?

Your argument is actually quite insulting to anybody with an IQ above 80

[drdoom6996]

The Dems had years to address water management issues

The Thaksins ver. 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, and now 4.0 had three times as long to address water management issues as the Dems.

.

Agreed, the drains in Pattaya have been plugged up for ten years. The only time they are cleaned out is when it floods. If it is not raining then drains are of little consequence. If it ain't broke don't fix it.

[drdoom6996]

Somebody forgot to read the job description of Thai PM to Yingluck before she took the job. Did she really think it would be a walk in the park? Did her brother assure her that his cronies, ahem, advisers would take care of all the day to day operations of running the country and that all she had to do was show up for photo ops, smile a lot, and end all talks with "na ka"?

The title of the article is wrong; it is Thaksin who must decide as Yingluck was never in a position to decide anything to begin with.

Yes YL is inept at making any decisions that effect "The People". But don't let Taksin decide. He wanted Bangkok to burn. What's the difference, burnt down or washed away?

[drdoom6996]

We have a real, natural crisis, which calls for a State of Emergency so that it can be dealt with effectively but 'State of Emergency' is a dirty phrase since it evokes memories of the army clearing out the red shirts, which of course was a contrived crisis. It's a times like this that the army are useful, and need powers to get on with the job but can't because Yingluck is averse to making the call.

I don't think "State of Emergency" is a dirty phrase at all. The Army is far more effective and trustworthy than the government.

How was the occupation of Bangkok by armed Red Shirt insurgents a "contrived crisis"?

It's only a shame that the army wasn't given the order to clear out the red shirt terrorists earlier.

Boy do I agree with that statement.