Govt must explain why it let World Expo plan founder: Thai editorial

[iancnx]

So a few weeks ago the current government said everything was progressing nicely and even spent a budget of THB 400m to ensure Thai people were aware of this prestigious opportunity.

Suddenly they loose all interest, and let the opportunity go.

Nice to know why, if this is the correct decision based on investment and return, it wasn't made before the 400m was spent. Nice to know where and how the 400m has been spent.

Interesting that one of the contenders is Dubai, whose meglomaniac leader benevolently allows convicted fugitive criminals to reside. The world is just full of odd coincidences.

I totally missed that.... Dubai could win it instead...... Now there's a thing!

[geriatrickid]

I note the claim that 400million baht was spent on the bid.

This number was produced by Democrat Party spokesman Chavanond Intarakomalyasut.

Mr Chavanond claimed the government had spent more than Bt400 million of state funds on a feasibility study and public relations for the project.

Is it not true, that much of the expenditure came about because of spending decisions and contracts signed or initiated by the previous Democrat administration. Wasn't the government locked into the spending commitments? It is a stretch to hold a current government responsible for past spending decisions.

What is so difficult to accept? Thailand finally accepted the reality that it would have been unable to mount the exposition. It was a gamble to begin with. The government made the right decision and the Democrats and its supporters are scrambling to detract the attention away from the initial poor decision. The proposed site in and of itself was a mistake.

Edited June 16, 2013 by geriatrickid

[rixalex]

Is it not true, that much of the expenditure came about because of spending decisions and contracts signed or initiated by the previous Democrat administration. Wasn't the government locked into the spending commitments? It is a stretch to hold a current government responsible for past spending decisions.

Huh??? What happened to your claims that they hadn't spent millions of baht?:

The current government did not spend millions of baht on the exposition.

Slunk away from that blatant lie, and now u-turning and admitting that they did, but with the feeble and untruthful excuse that they were locked in to spending all that money. They weren't locked in at all. All they needed to do was to make the decision that they were retracting Thailand's bid. They could have done so at any time in the last two years that they have been in power. Instead they allowed the spending to continue. Money down the drain for nothing.

Harebrained idea you told us. A no-brainer to stop the bid. And yet this government never did. Why not? Why did it allow the bid to carry on until the point that Thailand was disqualified? And why, from that disqualification, do you applaud the government for having made the right decision, when they never did make a decision... at least not until it had been made for them?

[iancnx]

An opportunity missed!

“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”

― Winston Churchill