Political Development Council: A prime minister should be freely elected by the people

BANGKOK, 10 May 2015 (NNT) - The Political Development Council believes that a prime minister should be freely elected by the people.

PDC President Theerapat Sereerangsan said that while the debate over the origin of the prime minister under the draft charter continued, he believed that it should be the people who directly elect a PM.

According to Mr. Theerapat, a direct election can prevent corruption and vote-buying while promoting the decentralisation of power as well as enabling the people to have more say in the administration of local affairs, such as the environmental policy.

He also suggested that PM Gen. Prayut Chan-o-cha may agree to hold a public referendum on the draft charter, but could opt to use the power of Article 44 of the interim Constitution to cancel the process if he feels it will end with the disapproval of the draft, so that the government can save around than three billion baht.

However, Mr. Theerapat said he did not think his suggestion would be accepted.

-- NNT 2015-05-10

I think they meant 'the President'!

The Prime Minister of Thailand had always been elected by MPs.

What a sad charade - it's pretty clear that whatever decisions are made about elections or public referendums, the end result will be a mockery of true democracy with the military forever waiting in the wings to "guide" any future Thai governments...............

Remember the military is not for defence of the country, It is a business,with 3,000 plus directors!

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

I think they meant 'the President'!

The Prime Minister of Thailand had always been elected by MPs.

There is no president, the same process applies in the Westminster system the political arm elect the leader and the people then vote for the leader and party, red necks vote for the party even if Stalin was head of it , and , if they don't like the leader , you go for independents or the green's , they soon get the message.

How many messages need to be sent to the lunatics running the asylum that no amount of posturing , happiness clubs or attitude adjustment will alter the course, the people want an elected P.M. with the party of their choice, not an outsider stepping into the top job un elected , not to mention the amount of corruption this will cause , to appoint an unelected outsider is not Democratic and will in the long term when the Thainess runs out of steam ( Thai's wake up ) cause problems, big problems.

I come from a country where the PM and all ministers are freely elected by the parliament and the parliament is free to elect the best man/woman for the job, and they are not restricted in their choice by the necessity of the candidate to be a member of the parliament. Nobody ever objected to this on the grounds that this is not democratic. In the contrary. This system gives the parliament as the representatives of the people the supreme power over the executive.

I come from a country where the PM and all ministers are freely elected by the parliament and the parliament is free to elect the best man/woman for the job, and they are not restricted in their choice by the necessity of the candidate to be a member of the parliament. Nobody ever objected to this on the grounds that this is not democratic. In the contrary. This system gives the parliament as the representatives of the people the supreme power over the executive.

And over here, the MPs are mere rubber stamps - and they call it "Democracy".

In the US the President is not directly elected. There is an Electoral College where representatives vote for the President.

Further,the electoral college has voted contrary to the popular vote twice.

Ah , but this is Thailand .

In this case we should remember that Prayuth is a person so he's half way there already. Suthep is also a person ( sort of ) . So two persons make a 'people' therefore nobody has anything to moan about since he was elected by people.

Remember the military is not for defence of the country, It is a business,with 3,000 plus directors!

Think your figure is a bit low they just ordained another 1100 or so.

"so that the government can save around than three billion baht."

The cost of those Russian/Chinese new submaines has to come from somewhere! And the military needs to pay the bigger salaries for 1,043 new generals added in 2014 and 2015.