Strong opposition in NRC to direct election of Thai PM

[webfact]

CHARTER WRITING
Strong opposition in NRC to direct election of PM
KRS BHROMSUTHI,
PRAVIT ROJANAPHRUK
The Nation

Members fear it could worsen corruption; sub-panel deputy says no guarantee proposals would be included in charter

BANGKOK: -- The proposal for direct election of the prime minister and cabinet members yesterday encountered strong opposition during the National Reform Council debate, with most members arguing that the idea was not better than the current one of parliament making the choice.

The criticism came after NRC political reform panel chairman Sombat Thamrongthanyawong declared the panel's consensus on the proposals covering the topic of political system and independent organisations, political parties and electoral system.

However, it was obvious the key debate revolved around the issue of the top powers of the executive branch.

"I have not agreed with this idea [direct election of PM and cabinet] from the beginning; it makes my hair stand on end," said NRC member Chai Chidchob.

Electoral fraud cannot be solved, but if we have direct election for PM, there will be more incentive to invest heavily in vote buying, said the veteran Buri Ram politician.

"People will love it; instead of getting Bt100-500 in the past, the new proposal could fetch Bt1,000 to Bt5,000. This will worsen corruption and electoral fraud", he argued.

The premier and cabinet members will be indebted to, and therefore will be under the control of party financial backers who may also be billionaires, he said.

Another NRC member, Direk Thungfang, said: "I can't see how it is in any way better than the current system [of picking from the lower house] and it will never solve electoral fraud, never!"

"If no one can prove that it will be better than the current system, then we should stick with the same one," he said.

Many of the proponents of the direct PM election proposal pointed out that two of the most important political issues that urgently needed to be resolved are the failing checks and balances system and electoral fraud.

'Culture of patronage'

NRC member Prasarn Marukapitak said "the direct election of PM doesn't remove the culture of patronage; such a culture had been instilled in society for a long time."

Hence electoral fraud will turn into "direct sales" targeted only at the people, vote-buying money will be enormous, with amounts of up to or more than Bt10 billion, he claimed.

How to elect the prime minister and cabinet members is among issues and proposals debated in the NRC to write them into the new constitution.

There are no guarantees that all the key proposals made by the NRC to the Constitution Drafting Committee (CDC) will eventually be reflected in the new charter, said a vice chairman of a subcommittee of the CDC.

Surapong Kongchantuk, vice chairman of the Constitution Drafting Committee's subcommittee on rights, citizen liberty, political participation and scrutiny, said if the military junta found some proposals unacceptable they may simply veto it.

"There are no guarantees. What I am concerned about most is that the junta would simply bang the table. That's the end," he told The Nation, on the last of the three-day submission of reform proposals and debate by the NRC.

On contentious and divisive issues like whether the prime minister should be directly elected or not, Surapong said the public should be allowed to deliberate about it at public hearings.

Another caveat offered by Surapong was that the CDC would actually let the Office of the Council of State draft the next charter in detail, based on principles laid down by the CDC. This, he said, would differ from the previous junta-sponsored charter drafting process after the coup in 2006 where charter drafters wrote it themselves.

CDC chairman Borwornsak Uwanno will call a meeting today to consider proposals from all 18 committees of the National Reform Council and some of the National Legislative Assembly to see how the proposals could be incorporated in the text of the constitution, according to CDC spokesman Lertrat Ratanavanich.

The drafters have begun writing the first chapter of the charter on the monarchy and the CDC will proceed chapter by chapter, he said.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/politics/Strong-opposition-in-NRC-to-direct-election-of-PM-30250090.html


-- The Nation 2014-12-18

[Suriya4]

Direct PM is good. There will be no vote buying by the political parties. Also a strong erected PM like Prayuth can stamp out all corrupted politicians like Thaksin, Yingluck, etc.

[Roadman]

Many of the proponents of the direct PM election proposal pointed out that two of the most important political issues that urgently needed to be resolved are the failing checks and balances system and electoral fraud.

'Culture of patronage'

Finally a good majority are getting right to the heart of Thailand's problem - patronage.

Resolve how to de power patronage within not only the politicial and governace frame works, but also right across the board of all governement departments (including education, police and Army etc.) then the rest of the reforms will fall into line.

And pleasing to see the strong debate also within the NRC against changing away from the current election methods...leave the damn things as they were. The issue is not the election of scumbags like the Shinawatra's but their expectations of what they are entitled to and the control and threat to checks and balances that the patronage system they then abuse brings. This is all looking very promising. And as opposed to 2006 this time around the time is being taken to debate the issues. Well done to the Junta and the teams for taking the time for debate to try and get it right.

[smutcakes]

I love the irony of Chai Chidchob being on a political reform panel and talking about vote buying etc On the minuscule chance he is not their to feather his and his families corrupt nest they would do well to heed his advice!

God knows what an 86+ year old man is doing on the NRC i will never know. So much for progression. Who thought someone whose whole being and power comes from the patronage, vote buying system would be a good NRC member on eradicating/improving it should be taken to the asylum.

[FangFerang]

Now I know why the village heads protested in Ubon a couple days ago, protesting the pending shake up of their power base. The government wants to change their positions from being first voted and then appointed positions to simply elected ones. This creates two problems for the current village heads One, from their past behavior I do not imagine the villagers would let them remain as the un-elected junior barons they have been for decades. There are no term limits to being village chief. The word is that anything a villager needs from the headman must involve tea money. It is unlikely previously stressed families would forget this at the ballot box. The second problem was stated in the article above. "vote buying will turn into "direct sales" targeted only at the people, vote-buying money will be enormous". Please note that he explicitly implied "indirect sales" are the norm now, and that would be payments to the village headmen, which they undoubtedly distribute by whimsy.

Curious way to get rid of corruption, by stating the current system is corrupt but a new one might benefit people directly with corruption, rather than indirectly benefit them as is now the norm.

7,255 thumbs down (one for each tambon)

[retarius]

I am wondering why there are a huge number of column inches in newspapers devoted to this issue. It seems like a smokescreen to me...create a minor and meaningless controversy and then slip in something really bad that doesn't get reported, like abandoning one man, one vote because the issue in Thailand is that there are huge numbers of poor people and hardly any rich, meaning that a party that represents the interests of the rich will never get elected unless one man one vote is abandoned or there is severe gerrymandering of districts.

[andrewrooney]

So if the current system encourages vote-buying, and a directly elected PM encourages more vote-buying, what's the logical conclusion here? That in order to stamp out vote buying for good, all future PMs need to be directly appointed by the military?