Removing intervention is the way to Thai police reform

[webfact]

BURNING ISSUE
Removing intervention is the way to police reform
ATTAYUTH BOOTSRIPOOM

BANGKOK: -- DURING several political crises in the past, the police have often been accused of allowing themselves to be influenced by politicians. So, the police force has become a target for reform.

The National Reform Council committee on a reform plan for police affairs is responsible for suggesting how changes should come about - and it has come up with a report that calls for a force that is free from political intervention.

The goal is to restructure the Police Commission and the National Police Policy Commission, as well as the system of appointing a national police chief.

A simple way would be to allow as much police involvement as possible in those panels and processes, while cutting down involvement of politicians.

The first thing would be to restructure the National Police Policy Commission, with the panel being deprived of the authority to appoint the national police chief. Critics say politicians often focus on this power rather than paying attention to formulating policies beneficial to the police force.

Under the proposed reform plan, members of the Police Commission would come from various organisations, in addition to the Royal Thai Police and security agencies. These would include representatives from the Office of the Attorney-General, the Lawyers Council of Thailand and the National Human Rights Commission.

Next, the police reform plan calls for a national police chief to be elected by superintendents with the rank of police colonel.

Under the current system, the incumbent national police chief nominates his successor for the National Police Policy Commission to approve.

Under the proposed reform plan, the National Police Policy Commission would nominate three candidates who were deputy national police chiefs or senior police inspectors (with a full general’s rank). Then, police superintendents all over the country would vote to select from them a new national police chief. The Police Commission would suggest to the prime minister that Royal endorsement be sought for the winner to take up the new chief's post.

The Police Commission would no longer have politicians or their appointed "specialists". Under the reform plan, the commission's chairman would select its members from retired deputy police chiefs - with rank of a full general - elected by superintendents from all over the country.

Other members of the commission also would be elected - six from deputy national chiefs or senior inspectors, three from retired police commissioners, incumbent police chief, secretary-general of the Civil Service Commission, representatives from the Cabinet and Parliament, as well as two specialists.

The question is whether election of the national police chief, the Police Commission chairman and other members would help solve the problem of transparency and fairness that the current system of police personnel transfers lacks.

However, there is no guarantee that election would ensure transparency. Some candidates may have a larger network than others, giving them an edge over their competitors. Also, there is concern such a new system could even worsen the practice of patronage and pulling strings in the police force.

Moreover, it is not a good idea to allow the police to exclusively run their organisation without sufficient scrutiny from outside.

Politicians are representatives of the voters, but if we do not trust politicians, maybe representatives from other groups should be allowed membership of the police supervisory panels.

Any attempt to reform the police force should not lead to more problems. It has many headaches already.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/politics/Removing-intervention-is-the-way-to-police-reform-30266456.html


-- The Nation 2015-08-13

[bangkokfrog]

WRONG !!! Intervention is a part of the problem but removing it is NOT the key to police reform. The key to police reform is removing CORRUPTION.

[oneday]

I would concentrate on making a professional and effective police force; one that actually investigates with modern CSI tools and integrity.

There I go, dreaming again.

[BSJ]

555 They just don't seem to get the big picture!

[bamnutsak]

DURING several political crises in the past, the police have often been accused of allowing themselves to be influenced by politicians

Yes, this is by far the biggest problem with the RTP. Not.

Every effort at "reform" these days seems aimed at removing all elected-body responsibilities and replacing it with a board of some sort of selected "Good People".

They're going to go too far trying to re-jigger complete control back to a small group of "Good People".

[tracker1]

Not to many Police Forces around the world that arn't influenced by Political Intervention at some time or for some reason !!!

[halloween]

Not to many Police Forces around the world that arn't influenced by Political Intervention at some time or for some reason !!!

Not too many Police Forces around the world that are as influenced by Political Intervention as here. Where politician's relatives get rocket promotion to the top, and high ranking police are openly sycophants of a fugitive criminal.

[phoenixdoglover]

This might be a reform of how the top police leadership is selected, but it is not a reform of the RTP.

Reform begins with recognizing and admitting the scope of the problem.

It seems that virtually everyone knows that the RTP is riddled top to bottom with bribery, graft, and patronage.

The way to eliminate bribery, graft and patronage is to catch people doing it and prosecute them swiftly. Simultaneously, some of the motivations should be removed. Raising egregiously low salaries would be a start.

I believe the RTP is too large. About 80% of the RTP should be spun off into regional forces that operate autonomously. The remaining central RTP should have a primary mission of fighting corruption in the regional forces, along with a focus on national scale crimes, providing specialized services, etc.

The focus should be on busting the corrupt supervisors. These are the guys who make the corrupt systems work.

Edited August 13, 2015 by phoenixdoglover

[PatOngo]

The problem is not the police system alone, it is the whole political, educational and juditial systems and will take generations of new breeding and global awareness to right the wrongs..............I for one won't be holding my breath waiting for that to happen.

[FangFerang]

Not to many Police Forces around the world that arn't influenced by Political Intervention at some time or for some reason !!!

Not too many Police Forces around the world that are as influenced by Political Intervention as here. Where politician's relatives get rocket promotion to the top, and high ranking police are openly sycophants of a fugitive criminal.

No -?- how about the US National Guard working for George W Bush -- who can't go to Ireland because he was tried as a war criminal. ? Worse, Thaksin is not the only criminal with police in their pockets (do you really think the Army down south got away with human trafficking without payoffs, and what about Prayuth's relatives getting accelerated promotions).

Your arguments are very selective where they point their angry fingers, because they seem like someone else's fingers -- maybe Suthep's? That would seem about right, monks have scratchy bums from pre-meditating so much.

[halloween]

Not to many Police Forces around the world that arn't influenced by Political Intervention at some time or for some reason !!!

Not too many Police Forces around the world that are as influenced by Political Intervention as here. Where politician's relatives get rocket promotion to the top, and high ranking police are openly sycophants of a fugitive criminal.

No -?- how about the US National Guard working for George W Bush -- who can't go to Ireland because he was tried as a war criminal. ? Worse, Thaksin is not the only criminal with police in their pockets (do you really think the Army down south got away with human trafficking without payoffs, and what about Prayuth's relatives getting accelerated promotions).

Your arguments are very selective where they point their angry fingers, because they seem like someone else's fingers -- maybe Suthep's? That would seem about right, monks have scratchy bums from pre-meditating so much.

This might come as a shock to you, so brace yourself. The US National Guard is NOT a police force. Even more shocking, the reason they work for GWB is because he is their CIC. Which has nothing at all to do with the topic at hand.

[Srikcir]

Under the proposed reform plan, the floodgates of corruption will be opened to even more opportunity.

The whole plan needs to be scrapped.