Pheu Thai issues statement in defence of Ms Yingluck over rice pledging scheme

[webfact]

Pheu Thai issues statement in defence of Ms Yingluck over rice pledging scheme

BANGKOK: -- The statement said, in essence, that the rice pledging scheme was the party’s flagship policy intended for the betterment of the livelihood of 3.7 million of farming households or 23 percent of the population.

The policy was presented to the people during the 2011 election and resulted to the party’s election victory. The rice pledging scheme is not a populist policy but a policy in line with basic state policy as prescribed in Section 84(8) of the 2007 Constitution.

The rice pledging scheme amounts to a social contract that the Pheu Thai party is obliged to implement, said the statement, adding that, in all countries where there is a basic state policy profit and loss are not taken into account in the implementation of such policy because the budget used to implement the policy is necessary spending meant to address national or people’s problems.

The party claimed in the statement that 870,018 million baht have been paid directly into the pockets of rice farmers “without any leaks or without any other people benefiting from the scheme.”

The unsold rice bought under the rice pledging scheme which are still held in storage belong to the state and can be sold in the world market bringing more revenue to the state, said the statement.

The statement referred to the National Anti-Corruption Commission which ruled “there are no evidences to prove Ms Yingluck Shinawatra was involved in corruption or in abetting corruption.”

The Pheu Thai party accused the government of rushing the civil litigation against Ms Yingluck while the criminal litigation against her is still pending with the Supreme Court’s criminal division for political office holders with hearing is yet to commence.

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/pheu-thai-issues-statement-in-defence-of-ms-yingluck-over-rice-pledging-scheme

-- Thai PBS 2015-10-22

[LannaGuy]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

[ALLSEEINGEYE]

pack of lies!!!!

[thaipod]

It's taken Pheu Thai this long to come up with a statement to say their leader was not involved.

[than]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

Yes and where is the money for farmers ?

YL was negligent, she is not investigated on corruption in the scheme, and non payment of farmers.... in 2013 during her regime no poor farmers receive payment from her corrupt government

In western country a PM is responsible for the actions of his cabinet, some member of her cabinet make false declaration or made false deal with some obscure contractor to sell rice, to hide the rice scheme scandal

[zaphod reborn]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

LOL, PTP doesn't get it. There was nothing illegal about the rice scheme legislation.

The party claimed in the statement that 870,018 million baht have been paid directly into the pockets of rice farmers “without any leaks or without any other people benefiting from the scheme.”

They have got to be kidding. No leaks? No other people benefiting from the scheme?

If they ever came back to reality, PTP would realize that the reason Yingluck is being prosecuted civilly and criminally, is that no one ever voted for or appropriated 600 billion baht to pay for the losses associated with the scheme. Those losses were the result of her failure to monitor and manage the scheme. The result was the scheme became unconstitutional because it exceeded the authority granted by the legislature. What legislature in their right minds would appropriate 600 billion to pay for rice stocks, and then only distribute less than 1 billion to the farmers?

Answer: PTP, because they were able to have their cronies suck up all the excess in the program.

[worgeordie]

If the farmers got all this money why are they still in debt,

If she ever goes to court,I think she will use the Manuel

off Fawlty Towers defense, "I know nothing,"repeted over

and over

regards worgeordie

[halloween]

Which one of Thaksin's lackeys delivered his opinion?

[klauskunkel]

The rice pledging scheme amounts to a social contract that the Pheu Thai party is obliged to implement

sure, you can look at that way, and you can also look at it this way:

The rice pledging scheme was a stupid piece of legislation implemented by an inept and clueless government who ran up gigantic losses without any oversight.

either way you look at it, it remains the Pheu Thai government's responsibility and no amount of wiggling will get you off the hook.

[Cuchulainn]

Which one of Thaksin's lackeys delivered his opinion?

The fattest pig who's missing the lucrative trough.

[Kasset Tak]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

You are right! This is not about the rice, this is about the graft and all irregularities in the scheme.

This rice pledging scheme payed more per ton for unmilled paddy rice than the world market price for 5% broken milled rice was!

So they payed out up to 3 times the world market price for paddy rice and not all of the money went to the farmers. The "official" subsidies here in Thailand became almost 10,000 Baht/ton compared to ruffly 1,400 Baht/ton in US.

But the problems doesn't end there...

[elviajero]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

Yes agricultural subsidies are legal when they are costed and budgeted for. The PTP rice scheme was to subsidise farmers, but sold as a self funding scheme. The PTP planned to fund it by inflating world rice prices. Of course they failed and the tax payer was left to pay the bill.

[NCC1701A]

i think they should divide the corruption up.

one person can't be responsible for it all.

[LannaGuy]

I was not suggesting the scheme was not mis-managed but the statement is based on facts and if every PM was hounded as Yingluck is (yesterday photographed by the Army going to the toilet for example) there would be uproar. The governments scheme was NOT illegal and no corruption by the cabinet has been proved or even suggested. She would win any election held today hands down which is why it cannot be allowed by the Junta.

Anyone who knows anything about Thailand and Thais knows this is NOT about rice! purely politics

[scorecard]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

Maybe.

But it's not normal for total criminal dereliction of the management of such a project.

Quote

The rice pledging scheme amounts to a social contract that the Pheu Thai party is obliged to implement, said the statement, adding that, in all countries where there is a basic state policy profit and loss are not taken into account in the implementation of such policy because the budget used to implement the policy is necessary spending meant to address national or people’s problems.

How many times are you going to trot this one out? Do you really believe that it's OK for a government to continue a policy which has been highly criticized by both respected international and domestic agencies, including serious criticism that the scheme is being criminally mismanaged?

Just how stupid do you think the good Thai people are? Do you think they should just accept the fact that madam (who claimed this was her flagship project) never even attended one meeting and never made any comment when her finance minister told lies, etc?

Edited October 22, 2015 by scorecard

[mikemac]

The policy was presented to the people during the 2011 election and resulted to the party’s election victory. The rice pledging scheme is not a populist policy but a policy in line with basic state policy as prescribed in Section 84(8) of the 2007 Constitution.

BS ! I entered "ptp rice pledging scheme + populist policy" into Google and there were 21,500 results !

There are a lot of people out there who do in fact regard the rice pledging scheme as just that, a populist policy.

The rice pledging scheme amounts to a social contract that the Pheu Thai party is obliged to implement, said the statement, adding that, in all countries where there is a basic state policy profit and loss are not taken into account in the implementation of such policy because the budget used to implement the policy is necessary spending meant to address national or people’s problems.

Profit and loss are not taken into account ! Obviously not by the PTP and look where that got them.

LannaGuy Post #2

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

any evidence? links? or are you just making it up???

You are right about one thing, it's not about rice. It could have been bananas or coconuts. It's about negligence in the handling of the scheme. Stop trying to divert attention away from that by carrying on about these distractions. It is annoying and it is not fooling anyone.

If you were in charge of Yingluck's defense team she would surely swing.

[scorecard]

It's taken Pheu Thai this long to come up with a statement to say their leader was not involved.

The dems are slow, but this mob are much slower, they just now make this statement, which their leaders should know will be shot to pieces in an instant.

Or maybe (as is their norm) they think the electorate is stupid enough to believe them.

What's their next revelation, 'Saturday follows Friday'?

[scorecard]

I was not suggesting the scheme was not mis-managed but the statement is based on facts and if every PM was hounded as Yingluck is (yesterday photographed by the Army going to the toilet for example) there would be uproar. The governments scheme was NOT illegal and no corruption by the cabinet has been proved or even suggested. She would win any election held today hands down which is why it cannot be allowed by the Junta.

Anyone who knows anything about Thailand and Thais knows this is NOT about rice! purely politics

Not true and you know it, but as always you try to deflect away from the real point.

Ask around, it might surprise you how many Thais are now realizing they were fooled by this scaly mob.

[Nickymaster]

Using the poor farmers as an excuse to steal hundreds of billions from the tax payers. It is a proven fact that the farmers only received a fraction of the total cost, if anything at all.

[robblok]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

Correct, however keeping it off the books and saying it did not cost money and not revising the budget and including it in the national budget is a crime.

Just think of it an amount equal to healthcare for all Thais 200 billion off the books(rice program lost more but just dividing it by years for comparison), that is not pocket money and real negligence. Knowing of cost equal to the health budget for a year but not accounting for it and hiding them.

Had she not done that i had agreed with you, but had she accounted for it she would have to stop other policies or cancel this one as it was too expensive. She just could not do that because of the fallback so it was intentional.

[ratcatcher]

".... the rice pledging scheme was the party’s flagship policy..." It hit a riceberg.

The Titanic was one of the White Star Line's flagships, she hit an iceberg.

[mikemac]

Congrats to LannaGuy, mission accomplished ! You jumped right on this topic, made the first comment which was sure to attract attention, and received no less than 7 responses to it so far, all of them shooting it/you down or criticizing it/you. Well done !

[elviajero]

I was not suggesting the scheme was not mis-managed but the statement is based on facts and if every PM was hounded as Yingluck is (yesterday photographed by the Army going to the toilet for example) there would be uproar. The governments scheme was NOT illegal and no corruption by the cabinet has been proved or even suggested. She would win any election held today hands down which is why it cannot be allowed by the Junta.

Anyone who knows anything about Thailand and Thais knows this is NOT about rice! purely politics

How do you possibly figure that she/PTP would win an election hands down.

They only managed a 16 seat majority when she was new, popular and the rice scheme a huge carrot. She/they let down many of the people that supported her as well as the floating voters that gave her the benefit of the doubt, the rice scheme is now bust and the Red vote shaky. So as they can't possibly be more popular there is no way they'd win hands down!

[LannaGuy]

I was not suggesting the scheme was not mis-managed but the statement is based on facts and if every PM was hounded as Yingluck is (yesterday photographed by the Army going to the toilet for example) there would be uproar. The governments scheme was NOT illegal and no corruption by the cabinet has been proved or even suggested. She would win any election held today hands down which is why it cannot be allowed by the Junta.

Anyone who knows anything about Thailand and Thais knows this is NOT about rice! purely politics

How do you possibly figure that she/PTP would win an election hands down.

They only managed a 16 seat majority when she was new, popular and the rice scheme a huge carrot. She/they let down many of the people that supported her as well as the floating voters that gave her the benefit of the doubt, the rice scheme is now bust and the Red vote shaky. So as they can't possibly be more popular there is no way they'd win hands down!

red vote 'shaky' how do you know this? elections are banned by the MILITARY are you proud to support the Junta? keep dreaming but they would win

[LannaGuy]

Congrats to LannaGuy, mission accomplished ! You jumped right on this topic, made the first comment which was sure to attract attention, and received no less than 7 responses to it so far, all of them shooting it/you down or criticizing it/you. Well done !

We know you're a Junta fan but i prefer to seek out the truth and not blindly believe the Army propaganda. You spin a nice story about the Junta but care not for the light of truth. One day it will all come out and you will look a complete fool for falling for it hook, line and sinker.

Edited October 22, 2015 by LannaGuy

[khunken]

The party claimed in the statement that 870,018 million baht have been paid directly into the pockets of rice farmers “without any leaks or without any other people benefiting from the scheme.”

Apart from the spin that it wasn't a populist scheme, the above is a blatant lie.

I'm not against subsidising agricultural products to benefit farmers when prices are low, but this scheme was a pack of lies from start to end.

Self funding? No it wasn't. Off budget? yes. Percentage that actually reached farmers? About 15%. No corruption? BS

I hope for Yingluck's sake that her defence doesn't use this rubbish.

[dru2]

Anyone who knows anything about Thailand and Thais....

Lanna Guy's continual and arrogant refrain.

Of course, none of the rest of us know anything about Thailand or Thais, and as usual his nonsensical and unsubstantiated opinions will set us all right.

[FritsSikkink]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

nothing illegal has occured, dream on

[LannaGuy]

Good statement as nothing illegal has occurred and it's perfectly normal to subsidize farmers. It's NOT about rice!

nothing illegal has occured, dream on

Links please? evidence please? sources please? that's it's "illegal"

anything? at all??? or do you just believe everything you read?

[LannaGuy]

Anyone who knows anything about Thailand and Thais....

Lanna Guy's continual and arrogant refrain.

Of course, none of the rest of us know anything about Thailand or Thais, and as usual his nonsensical and unsubstantiated opinions will set us all right.

I rest my case