Thailand: Reformers agree on several issues

[webfact]

Reformers agree on several issues
THE NATION

BANGKOK: -- Prasarn Marukpitak, a National Reform Council (NRC) member, said yesterday that the NRC subcommittee on political reform had agreed on many issues, though opinion was still divided on whether they should continue to punish political parties by dissolving them, as past experience showed that this did not solve problems.

The NRC subcommittee on politics is scheduled to submit their decision to the NRC on December 15, before the council submits its final proposal on 11 areas of national reform to the Constitutional Drafting Committee (CDC) on December 19. Prasarn said the decisions made at yesterday's meeting were:

l Political parties need to be strengthened and a system set where party members can participate and regulate party affairs, in order to curb the influence of capitalism;

l Each political party's key duty should be to protect national interest;

l On the dissolution of political parties - opinion was divided, with some members saying it should only be used when the party poses a threat to the monarch, tries to abolish democracy or threatens national security or interests. However, some said that this system did not solve problems.

l Political parties can be supported by the public sector, through financial means or other operative assistance.

l Agencies should be established to regulate the morals of politicians and public officers;

l Members of Parliament should not be members of political parties.

Prasarn added that in the proposal related to reconciliation, the sub-panel said there should be three important points included in the charter.

First, all citizens should have equal rights to political education and there should be organisations responsible to ensure political responsibilities and engagement. The panel said the Education Ministry should be responsible for this task.

Second, the government should ensure there are mechanisms that promote national unity and reconciliation even at times of peace to ensure no political parties and networks create conflicts.

Finally, a citizen's council should be established to promote people's engagement, regulate government affairs and allocate natural resources.

Prasarn told reporters the panel also discussed the issue of an amnesty, but it would not announce its proposal on the topic yet because it is a sensitive subject, especially after CDC member Anek Laothamathas voiced his views on the subject last week.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/politics/Reformers-agree-on-several-issues-30248973.html


-- The Nation 2014-12-02

[noitom]

The Thais don't seem to have a clue on the "reform" issue. They should start first with being able to articulate what it is? What it means? Is it law and order , justice for all regardless of social class? What do they mean by "reform?" All they talk about is forming more organizations, and more committees and sub committees. Do they have a clue?

[smutcakes]

They should ban those responsible for life, and their direct family members. siblings, spouse etc.

The issue with this and with any reform which gives power for a body or group to take action is, who will have that power, how they have acquired it and most importantly will they use that power fair and equitably in punishing all wrong doers.

[webfact]

NRC's political reform council is yet to conclude on political party dissolution

BANGKOK, 2 December 2014 (NNT) - The National Reform Council’s committee in charge of political reform is yet to draw any conclusion on how to dissolve political parties under the new charter.

The NRC committee on political reform spokesman Prasarn Marukpitak said on Monday that the committee’s latest meeting has resolved to agree that certain points related to political reform should be included in the new Constitution.

Mr. Prasarn elaborated that such points are the conditions for political parties to field their candidates in any election and the dissolution of party or parties that are guilty of any punishable wrongful acts.

He admitted that the committee has not come to a conclusion on the reasons and the details of behind any party dissolution, particularly when party leader or executives are guilty of violation of any act stipulated in the 2007 Constitution.

However, the committee agreed that the issues of reconciliation and public participation in politics should be incorporated into the new charter draft.

-- NNT 2014-12-02

[rickirs]

"Agencies should be established to regulate the morals of politicians and public officers"

What an irony for a country that is unable to peacefully integrate its Islamic population into a Buddhist society wants to essentially use an Islamic religious police to control people. Will the NCPO create a new government ministry ... Minister of Moral Integrity ... to be headed by Phra Issara and create new laws to regulate people's behavior? The NCPO may have created a political frankenstein with the NCR whose largely perverse viewpoints of politics and democracy may be even too uncomfortable for the NCPO to tolerate. Maybe for once Prayuth's "They do not understand" actualy has some application.

[Anthony5]

Oh that's an easy one. Just detain them in an Army camp, like is going on for the past 5 months.

[scorecard]

There should also be laws which:

- Strongly prevent individuals or families 'owning' political parties.

- Strongly prevent political parties paying a salary to party members / elected members, etc etc.

- Require that every party have a registered specific manifesto which must provide benefits for all members of society and cannot provide benefits only to specific groups (e.g. taxi drivers) unless there is a need in terms of national security etc etc.

- Require that in the run up to elections each party must conduct public meetings to explain, debate, and answer questions on their manifesto and such meeting must be moderated by a person respected by the public and not a member of the party.

- Require that every party in their registered manifesto have clear policies aimed directly at gaining a much better spread of wealth and opportunity for all citizens.

- Plus there should be a public body which is required by law to report direct to the public perhaps six monthly whether parties are sticking to their manifesto.

- Fast deregistration with punishments for parties not confirming to all of the above.

Edited December 2, 2014 by scorecard

[scorecard]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

"Agencies should be established to regulate the morals of politicians and public officers"

What an irony for a country that is unable to peacefully integrate its Islamic population into a Buddhist society wants to essentially use an Islamic religious police to control people. Will the NCPO create a new government ministry ... Minister of Moral Integrity ... to be headed by Phra Issara and create new laws to regulate people's behavior? The NCPO may have created a political frankenstein with the NCR whose largely perverse viewpoints of politics and democracy may be even too uncomfortable for the NCPO to tolerate. Maybe for once Prayuth's "They do not understand" actualy has some application.

your deliberately mixing religion with morals for your own purposes.

[candide]

There should also be laws which:

- Strongly prevent individuals or families 'owning' political parties.

- Strongly prevent political parties paying a salary to party members / elected members, etc etc.

- Require that every party have a registered specific manifesto which must provide benefits for all members of society and cannot provide benefits only to specific groups (e.g. taxi drivers) unless there is a need in terms of national security etc etc.

- Require that in the run up to elections each party must conduct public meetings to explain, debate, and answer questions on their manifesto and such meeting must be moderated by a person respected by the public and not a member of the party.

- Require that every party in their registered manifesto have clear policies aimed directly at gaining a much better spread of wealth and opportunity for all citizens.

- Plus there should be a public body which is required by law to report direct to the public perhaps six monthly whether parties are sticking to their manifesto.

- Fast deregistration with punishments for parties not confirming to all of the above.

Interesting. But who will set the standards of what is beneficial, fair etc... Who will be in charge of checking and eventually refusing. Who will choose these people?

[MaxYakov]

"Agencies should be established to regulate the morals of politicians and public officers"

What an irony for a country that is unable to peacefully integrate its Islamic population into a Buddhist society wants to essentially use an Islamic religious police to control people. Will the NCPO create a new government ministry ... Minister of Moral Integrity ... to be headed by Phra Issara and create new laws to regulate people's behavior? The NCPO may have created a political frankenstein with the NCR whose largely perverse viewpoints of politics and democracy may be even too uncomfortable for the NCPO to tolerate. Maybe for once Prayuth's "They do not understand" actualy has some application.

I believe his "They do not understand" has always had application and will continue to. It's a convenient, open-ended justification for any action, wouldn't you say? Then there are always those awaiting "Understanding Centers", yes?

[jayboy]

There should also be laws which:

- Strongly prevent individuals or families 'owning' political parties.

- Strongly prevent political parties paying a salary to party members / elected members, etc etc.

- Require that every party have a registered specific manifesto which must provide benefits for all members of society and cannot provide benefits only to specific groups (e.g. taxi drivers) unless there is a need in terms of national security etc etc.

- Require that in the run up to elections each party must conduct public meetings to explain, debate, and answer questions on their manifesto and such meeting must be moderated by a person respected by the public and not a member of the party.

- Require that every party in their registered manifesto have clear policies aimed directly at gaining a much better spread of wealth and opportunity for all citizens.

- Plus there should be a public body which is required by law to report direct to the public perhaps six monthly whether parties are sticking to their manifesto.

- Fast deregistration with punishments for parties not confirming to all of the above.

Commenting on each point

1.Needs clarification.Impossible to ensure a party is not dominated by its leader

2.OK though party HQ would presumably have salaried employees.

3.Nonsense.It is not for officials to determine what is in party manifestos.It is entirely a matter for the political parties concerned.In any case it is in the nature of party manifestos in every democracy to give emphasis to supporters views.If the policies have no appeal they don't get elected.

4.It's up to the parties not some external organisation.Certainly there's room to encourage responsible media coverage, debates between candidates etc.

5.Don't be ridiculous.Once again if the political parties can't produce policies with broad national appeal they don't get elected.

6.Don't have an issue in principle with this but surely you mean an elected Government (not political parties) producing reports on progress.

7.Don't be stupid.The penalty for political parties/governments failing to perform lies with the Thai electorate - ie by removing the bums from office.

Overall a fatuous and impractical set of proposals.

[scorecard]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

There should also be laws which:

- Strongly prevent individuals or families 'owning' political parties.

- Strongly prevent political parties paying a salary to party members / elected members, etc etc.

- Require that every party have a registered specific manifesto which must provide benefits for all members of society and cannot provide benefits only to specific groups (e.g. taxi drivers) unless there is a need in terms of national security etc etc.

- Require that in the run up to elections each party must conduct public meetings to explain, debate, and answer questions on their manifesto and such meeting must be moderated by a person respected by the public and not a member of the party.

- Require that every party in their registered manifesto have clear policies aimed directly at gaining a much better spread of wealth and opportunity for all citizens.

- Plus there should be a public body which is required by law to report direct to the public perhaps six monthly whether parties are sticking to their manifesto.

- Fast deregistration with punishments for parties not confirming to all of the above.

Interesting. But who will set the standards of what is beneficial, fair etc... Who will be in charge of checking and eventually refusing. Who will choose these people?

I didn't say who would select 'these' people.

IMHO given the past and even more so the past recent history of politics in Thailand all or at least some of these points are needed otherwise the reforms will just be a move the chairs around the table exercise. That's not OK.

If the people cannot see real change and if the changes are not locked into place then there is no reform.

The details of who will select these people can be worked out and above all there must be involvement and transparency.

People tend to conveniently forget that there are many respected, highly intelligent, highly capable, very honest and very sincere Thais who want to contribute but in the past they have avoided any involvement with the recent past like the plaque, they don't want to be associated with the scaly people who ran raped the country without conscience.

Set the right circumstances and hopefully these people will step up.

[scorecard]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

There should also be laws which:

- Strongly prevent individuals or families 'owning' political parties.

- Strongly prevent political parties paying a salary to party members / elected members, etc etc.

- Require that every party have a registered specific manifesto which must provide benefits for all members of society and cannot provide benefits only to specific groups (e.g. taxi drivers) unless there is a need in terms of national security etc etc.

- Require that in the run up to elections each party must conduct public meetings to explain, debate, and answer questions on their manifesto and such meeting must be moderated by a person respected by the public and not a member of the party.

- Require that every party in their registered manifesto have clear policies aimed directly at gaining a much better spread of wealth and opportunity for all citizens.

- Plus there should be a public body which is required by law to report direct to the public perhaps six monthly whether parties are sticking to their manifesto.

- Fast deregistration with punishments for parties not confirming to all of the above.

Commenting on each point

1.Needs clarification.Impossible to ensure a party is not dominated by its leader

2.OK though party HQ would presumably have salaried employees.

3.Nonsense.It is not for officials to determine what is in party manifestos.It is entirely a matter for the political parties concerned.In any case it is in the nature of party manifestos in every democracy to give emphasis to supporters views.If the policies have no appeal they don't get elected.

4.It's up to the parties not some external organisation.Certainly there's room to encourage responsible media coverage, debates between candidates etc.

5.Don't be ridiculous.Once again if the political parties can't produce policies with broad national appeal they don't get elected.

6.Don't have an issue in principle with this but surely you mean an elected Government (not political parties) producing reports on progress.

7.Don't be stupid.The penalty for political parties/governments failing to perform lies with the Thai electorate - ie by removing the bums from office.

Overall a fatuous and impractical set of proposals.

Well I wouldn't expect any other comment from you jayboy. No further comment needed.

Edited December 2, 2014 by scorecard

[mikemac]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

"Agencies should be established to regulate the morals of politicians and public officers"

What an irony for a country that is unable to peacefully integrate its Islamic population into a Buddhist society wants to essentially use an Islamic religious police to control people. Will the NCPO create a new government ministry ... Minister of Moral Integrity ... to be headed by Phra Issara and create new laws to regulate people's behavior? The NCPO may have created a political frankenstein with the NCR whose largely perverse viewpoints of politics and democracy may be even too uncomfortable for the NCPO to tolerate. Maybe for once Prayuth's "They do not understand" actualy has some application.

your deliberately mixing religion with morals for your own purposes.

......................"for a country that is unable to peacefully integrate its Islamic population into a Buddhist society"..........................

Ridiculous statement, but to be expected from this poster.

What makes you think the Islamic population wants to be integrated into a Buddhist society ? From what I have seen and heard in the past 57 years they would probably want the opposite, or be the only religion there is.

[Neeranam]

The Thais don't seem to have a clue on the "reform" issue. They should start first with being able to articulate what it is? What it means? Is it law and order , justice for all regardless of social class? What do they mean by "reform?" All they talk about is forming more organizations, and more committees and sub committees. Do they have a clue?

Just because you don't know doesn't mean they don't know.

[Robby nz]

Political parties must have accounts audited annually and submit audited accounts to the audit office with all donations and payments detailed.

Donations to political parties over say 1000b are subject to tax, if the person or organization which donates does not pay this tax the party becomes liable for the tax.

Scrub the out of date reg that says all donations must be paid by cash or check, electronic means is fine but receipts must be issued for all donations over 1000b.

Anyone who has a criminal record is banned from politics for life

Any would be politician on bail or awaiting serious charges to be heard against them is suspended from politics until such time as they have been through the court, if guilty they are banned for life, if found innocent they are free to enter into politics.

There would have to be clarification of what constituted a criminal record and serious charges. Parking or speeding tickets would not count.

No parliamentary immunity.

[taony]

They need to all agree to ban themselves.

[Wilsonandson]

A few suggestions, more to follow we hope. Come on people of Thailand get involved and have yoir say in the reforms. The more input the better for the nation and its future.