Trying To Understand The Thai Legislature

[ChiefBEM]

I am trying to understand the Thai Legislature Branch of government.

The way I understand is that Thailand has a legislature composed of two houses.

The lower house that is referred to as the House of Representatives.

The upper house that is referred to as the Senate.

Now here is where I need some help.

What are MPs?

If someone holds the office of Democratic MP for Chumphon, does that mean that they are a member of the House of Representatives?

Are they a member of the Senate?

Are they a Govenor of the Chumphon district?

Appreciate any help in understanding the what the MPs are.

[steveromagnino]

I am trying to understand the Thai Legislature Branch of government.

The way I understand is that Thailand has a legislature composed of two houses.

The lower house that is referred to as the House of Representatives.

The upper house that is referred to as the Senate.

Now here is where I need some help.

What are MPs?

If someone holds the office of Democratic MP for Chumphon, does that mean that they are a member of the House of Representatives?

Are they a member of the Senate?

Are they a Govenor of the Chumphon district?

Appreciate any help in understanding the what the MPs are.

AFAIK Thailand operates under an MMP system... this means in voting for the house of representatives, a voter casts two votes; one for the party and one for their local MP.

The MPs on the list by area are then forming part of the house of representatives. For the list seats, these are allocated in some sort of formula to all parties with more than 5% of the list vote OR with an MP elected; and all up there are around about 500 MPs.

From the MPs, the parties then get together and negotiate a coalition, as is usually the case in MMP. TRT have been able in the last election to avoid this, because they had an outright majority. MP = Sor Sor. 400 constituents; 100 party list.

The Senate is supposedly a non-partisan group and are elected on name value only without party assocation. However in practise, they are also partisan, primarily TRT and prominent Senators like K. Meechai feel that the Senate is a total waste of time (which it is). 100 senators (sor wor). Of these, 70 are felt to be directly or indirectly under the control of TRT; theoretically they have a lot of power to remove the cabinet; to turn down signing laws (which they have done) or refuse to appoint certain positions. Knowing that the public are swinging away from TRT it is possible the senate might start to flex muscles and grind things to a halt in law processing.

Governors are in some cases appointed positions, and are like civil service type position. For BKK the Governor is actually like a Mayor and is elected. Pattaya and Phuket are the same; the rest are a civil service position and they rotate around. For Governor of the BMA, the person has the power to control rubbish collecting and allocate some budget for buses and a few other minor things, most control is from the government. Phoo Wah = Governor.

Therefore, I suspect your friend holding the MP position for Chumporn was elected by the people of that voting area, and theoretically represents them.

In some cases, like say MP Newin TRT in Buriram, he has given a lot to the villagers in that area, so he gets their vote, even though he is IMHO a corrupt mobster buffoon. In other cases, the MPs are as helpful as tits on a bull, and end up doing nothing for their area. Sometimes they are big time suck ups and move onto the list seats, and sometimes they get ousted.

For anyone wanting to vote, but not for TRT, they will be electing MPs this weekend, so they need to vote 'no party'; abstaining by not showing up to vote will cause them many problems.

Hope this clarifies :-)

[sbk]

Just a quick note: MP stands for member of Parliament.

Thanks for the party list explanation, I find the whole party list thing odd but my husband says that regular MP's representing their areas cannot be in the Cabinet and Cabinet members must be party list.

[steveromagnino]

Just a quick note: MP stands for member of Parliament.

Thanks for the party list explanation, I find the whole party list thing odd but my husband says that regular MP's representing their areas cannot be in the Cabinet and Cabinet members must be party list.

ah yes, forgot about that!

Actually, in NZ we went from a system of just seats to MMP, and much of the world is MMP. They claimed it would get rid of the two party system and devolve power... in fact it has made the two parties slightly less powerful in some ways, but also given a lot of power to tiny crack pot minority parties who now control the coalitions. There is a VERY unpleasant anti Asian guy called Winston Peters who has been the deal maker in NZ since MMP.... he is the Ba Sanoh character....

I am not sure about the Cabinet thing... possible, but anyway the advisors and so on like Newin Chidchob is elected and also is in the office of the PM (and therefore has power).....hmmm I;ll have to think about that... interesting point!

[Ajarn]

Governors are in some cases appointed positions, and are like civil service type position. For BKK the Governor is actually like a Mayor and is elected. Pattaya and Phuket are the same; the rest are a civil service position and they rotate around.

Well, they don't actually rotate around, they go through the system.... For example, first you are the assistant governor in Satun, where your term will be typically 2 years. From there, assuming political winds are stable, you might be moved to governnor of some equally poor province. Then, on the average of every two years, you move up the 'social ladder' of provinces. After being governnor, there isn't really any path to follow, so something like 'Head Judge' of a province might be a preferable move, career-wise.

[Nilapat]

As far as I know constituency MPs can become ministers but usually don't. They are generally taken from the party list. Those headed for cabinet positions are placed nice and high on the party list so as to ensure their seat. Also, once MPs become cabinet members they are no longer MPs and those further down on the party list will take their seats.

Does what I write make any sense?

Edited March 27, 2006 by Nilapat

[ChiefBEM]

I thank everyone for the clarifications on what is a MP.

The system sounds rather convoluted.

A point that was not specifically addressed:

Are members of the upper house or Senate also called MPs or are they called senators?

If they are called MPs, how do you determine if an MP is a member of Senate vs a member of the House of Representatives?

Am I correct is saying that some one with the title MP is a very important person in Thailand?

Thanks to everyone again,

Regards,

ChiefBEM

[steveromagnino]

I thank everyone for the clarifications on what is a MP.

The system sounds rather convoluted.

A point that was not specifically addressed:

Are members of the upper house or Senate also called MPs or are they called senators?

If they are called MPs, how do you determine if an MP is a member of Senate vs a member of the House of Representatives?

Am I correct is saying that some one with the title MP is a very important person in Thailand?

Thanks to everyone again,

Regards,

ChiefBEM

Well in Thai they are different

Senator = Sor Wor and in English, Senator, not MP

Member of Parliament = Sor Sor

Yes, MPs are pretty important, but not as important as a Senator for the most part, or a Privy Councillor or a governor or a Deputy PM or PM. We would refer to a cabinet minister or whip or whatever by their title, rather than just MP same as the western system.

System is not really any more convuluted than most MMP systems around the world, why the idiots in NZ voted for MMP I am unsure; I know I didn't! The whole vote counting and so on is really inefficient, plus it means you need more MPs, bigger parliament etc. Ditto for the senators who are 70% proxies for TRT.

[ChiefBEM]

I thank everyone for the clarifications on what is a MP.

The system sounds rather convoluted.

A point that was not specifically addressed:

Are members of the upper house or Senate also called MPs or are they called senators?

If they are called MPs, how do you determine if an MP is a member of Senate vs a member of the House of Representatives?

Am I correct is saying that some one with the title MP is a very important person in Thailand?

Thanks to everyone again,

Regards,

ChiefBEM

Well in Thai they are different

Senator = Sor Wor and in English, Senator, not MP

Member of Parliament = Sor Sor

Yes, MPs are pretty important, but not as important as a Senator for the most part, or a Privy Councillor or a governor or a Deputy PM or PM. We would refer to a cabinet minister or whip or whatever by their title, rather than just MP same as the western system.

System is not really any more convuluted than most MMP systems around the world, why the idiots in NZ voted for MMP I am unsure; I know I didn't! The whole vote counting and so on is really inefficient, plus it means you need more MPs, bigger parliament etc. Ditto for the senators who are 70% proxies for TRT.

Thanks for the clarifications.

Regards,

ChiefBEM