Teflon Thaksin?

The Bangkok Post reports that the “attorney-general has postponed the decision on whether to indict former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra for alleged lese majeste until May 29, pending an additional interrogation report from police.”

Credit: Kahosod

While a decision had been expected on Wednesday, a spokesperson “on Wednesday morning attorney-general Amnat Chetcharoenrak postponed it because police interrogators had not sent a complete report to the Office of the Attorney-General.”

The attorney-general apparently “ordered additional questioning, saying he needed more information, and Thaksin also requested it in a petition for fair treatment.”

No one else accused of 112 seems to get “fair treatment.”

“Justice” delayed

Prachatai has reported on another ugly turn in the 2017 military’s murder of Chaiyapoom Pasae.

It turns out that the Office of the Attorney General ruled, three years ago, “against indicting military officers accused of killing indigenous Lahu activist Chaiyaphum Pasae.”

The murdered youth’s mother “received a letter from Nawai Provincial Police Station on 4 March saying that the Office of the Attorney General has decided not to indict military officers charged with Chaiyaphum’s murder.” That letter was dated 11 October 2021.

We realize that the police is riddled with corruption and is probably more interested in making money than dealing with a family. We also know that the Attorney General’s office has been caught up in corrupt activities, including the Red Bull murder case, and is probably uninterested in yet another military murder of a civilian.

Chaiyapoom, just 17, was shot and killed by military officers at Ban Rin Luang checkpoint in Chiang Dao District, Chiang Mai, on 17 March 2017. The claims made by  the officers were absurd and the military has withheld and probably destroyed evidence.

At one time, the judicial system seemed to be moving on the case. In a “June 2018 inquest by the Chiang Mai Provincial Court [it was] found that Chaiyaphum was killed by an army bullet…”. The court could not access the CCTV footage of the murder, which the military has kept hidden and may have destroyed.

Then, in “November 2023, the Supreme Court ordered the army to pay a compensation of over two million baht to Chaiyaphum’s family.” That court found the army was “inconsistent” and noted that it was “suspicious” that the army provided a hard drive from the CCTV with “no footage of Chaiyaphum’s murder was found, even though there was a record of a file from around the date of the murder being copied.”

The Attorney General’s “delayed” letter is just another example of the impunity the military has in murdering civilians.

With 3 updates: Needling Thaksin on 112

As Al Jazeera and the Bangkok Post report, anti-Thaksinism has not yet been squelched by the Puea Thai deal done with military parties and the higher ups.

According to the a spokesperson for the Office of the Attorney General, Thaksin Shinawatra is to face a lese majeste charge that has been hanging around since 2015. The OAG is proceeding with a case it received on 16 February 2016, from police at the Technology Crime Suppression Division, alleging Thaksin “defamed the monarchy in comments made in Seoul, South Korea, on May 21, 2015.”

Credit: Kahosod

This is a buffalo manure case as Thaksin did not refer to the monarchy, but the Privy Council (read this for more details). Nevertheless, the royalist courts can concoct a conviction from out of thin air and ignoring Article 112’s actual words, so Thaksin could be in deep trouble if his party can’t wrangle another deal.

According to and OAG spokesman “on Sept 19, 2016, then attorney-general Pongniwat Yuthapanboripan decided to indict Thaksin. At the time, Thaksin was a fugitive and the former attorney-general told police to seek an arrest warrant from the Criminal Court. The court issued the warrant.”

The police then presented the arrest warrant to the Department of Corrections and sought Thaksin’s detention in the event he was released from prison/hospital. Further, on 17 January 2024, “public prosecutors and police informed Thaksin of the lese majeste charge and a related computer crime charge.” Thaksin has repeatedly denied the charges and has “filed a written petition for fair treatment. The present attorney-general had yet to decide if Thaksin should be indicted…”.

The latter may be a way out for Thaksin and his party. But, the double standards would be huge. We can’t help wonder if Puea Thai prefers backdoor deals to a proper, legal, and parliamentary approach to reform.

Update 1: A reader suggests to us that the “deal” done for Thaksin may have been a trick by his enemies. That does not seem possible to us. Rather, we think anti-Thaksinites are seeking to rally their comrades to make the best of a deal they can’t really oppose as it is assumed to have been palace brokered. The reader is right to point out that part of the residual hatred of Thailand is because he was popular for introducing policies that actually made life better for many people.

Update 2: The deal on Thaksin’s return continues to meander along despite the opposition to him and his very special treatment. The Bangkok Post reports that the Department of Corrections, ever pliable on Thaksin but never so for other political prisoners, has reportedly listed Thaksin as eligible for special parole. If he is paroled, political temperatures will rise.

Update 3: Puea Thai has now declared its “opposition to incorporating lese majeste offences into an amnesty plan, despite the potential indictment of jailed former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra for insulting the monarchy.” Looking for a back door deal? A now inglorious figure, Phumtham Wechayachai, made the outrageous claim that “Thaksin’s return from self-imposed exile in August last year serves as an indication that the ex premier is ready to enter the justice administration process.” People are rolling in the aisles guffawing, while others are rotting in jail as political prisoners. Puea Thai and its leaders have put their moral compass in the military’s back pocket.

The hierarchy of (in)justice

Thai Enquirer has an op-ed titled “Impunity for the rich and powerful undermines Thailand’s democracy.” We guess that, prompted by Thaksin Shinawatra’s grand deal for a conservative regime for his freedom, the focus is on “unequal justice.”

While the article focuses on individual cases like the infamous case of Vorayuth “Boss” Yoovidhya, the Red Bull scion accused of an array of crimes from a fatal 2012 hit-and-run incident,* The article also points out that:

Nowhere is this impunity more glaring than in the lack of justice for those who have overturned Thailand’s democratic institutions. Over the years, Thailand has witnessed multiple coups, with the military taking power and overthrowing elected governments. Figures, like General Prayuth Chan-o-cha who led the 2014 coup and later became the Prime Minister, have not only escaped repercussions but have been rewarded. When coup-makers walk free, it sends a message that the ultimate crime against a democratic society goes unpunished. This devalues the very concept of democracy and makes a mockery of the rule of law.

It is a good point.

On the double standards that skewer rule of law, consider the surprise when an arrest warrant was issued for former culture minister Itthiphol Khunpluem for “failing to appear in court to defend himself against accusations of malfeasance from when he was the mayor of Pattaya’ in 2008.”

He’s rumored to have “flown to a neighbouring country.” He reportedly flew to Phnom Penh on the day of the court’s order.

Now we learn what’s going on. It took the the National Anti-Corruption Commission and the Office of the Attorney-General years and years to pursue the case. Why? Probably because the case “has 15 years statute of limitations, the case will expire on 10 September.”

Yes, that’s Sunday. It is claimed that “Itthiphol intended to delay the case until it expired so that he would not face any legal proceedings.”

He’ll return and remain even freer than Thaksin.

In a piece of better legal news on the Red Bull killer case, while the perpetrator stays on the run, those who worked for his impunity may face some sanction:

National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) has found 15 individuals, including former national police chief Somyot Poompanmuang and former deputy attorney-general Nate Naksuk, guilty of involvement in changing the speed of the car driven by Red Bull heir Vorayuth Yoovidhya, to help him avoid speeding charges in the infamous hit-and-run incident in 2012.

Yet there are still ways for these former senior officials to escape justice….

Ruling class pawns are moving

Some time ago, Eugénie Mérieau wrote about the role of the courts as a kind of “deep state” and “surrogate king.”

It seems to PPT that, despite its corruption, the courts have indeed become the institution that patrols the boundaries of the monarch and monarchy, ensuring the maintenance of ruling class power with the monarchy at its apogee. They are the ruling class’s pawns and they are being played.

Events since the 2014 military coup have seen the various courts front and center in punishing those who transgress the boundaries, discursive and otherwise. Recent events suggest that the results of the 2023 election have disturbed the judiciary and have caused a flurry of action by these boundary riders. A rush to push through lese majeste cases are one aspect of this, but also important are the judiciary’s political posturing as it prepares to deal a death blow to the popular election result.

From Ji Ungpakorn’s blog

A few days ago, the Constitutional Court was said to have “prodded” the “attorney-general for an update on a petition lodged against the Move Forward Party (MFP) and its leader Pita Limjaroenrat over their policy to amend the lese majeste law.” This is a petition filed by royalist lawyer Theerayut Suwankesorn back in late May, which “seeks to compel the court to order the MFP and Mr Pita … to block the move as it may contravene the charter.” That is, Theerayut argues that amending Article 112 contravenes the constitution.

Of course, that is abject nonsense, but the Constitutional Court has come up with plenty of ridiculous rulings in the recent past. By asking about the petition, the judges are indicating their desire to get in on this act to roll back the popular vote.

Wissanu

That the legal tutor for royalists and regime Wissanu Krea-ngam sought to play down the Constitutional Court’s request as ” standard procedure” suggests that it is anything but standard. It is a warning to any on their side of politics that they must not waver on defeating the threat posed by Move Forward and Pita.

A second warning from the judiciary came when the Criminal Court “dismissed a defamation lawsuit brought by the Move Forward Party against Thai Pakdee Party leader Warong Dechgitvigrom,” one of the loudest of ultra-royalists. Move Forward claimed that Warong made false allegations against the Party when he accused “certain groups of ill-intentioned people of causing problems for the country” by insulting the monarchy, accusing the “Progressive Movement and the MFP of being behind moves by some protest groups allegedly aimed at overthrowing the …[monarchy].”

The court “the defendant had made honest criticism allowed under the constitution.” In other words, for royalists, the court has effectively endorsed claims that the Move Forward Party is seeking to bring down the monarchy. This decision reinforces a perspective that the Party is dangerous, seditious, and must be defeated.

Interestingly, at the elections, Warong’s Thai Phakdee Party received only a handful of votes, and was rejected by voters across the country.

And it’s not just the legal pawn that is being moved. So are the senators, all appointed by the military junta’s government. In effect, they are being told by the courts not to waver in doing their “duty” to defeat Move Forward and Pita. Some of these unelected senator-pawns are increasingly active in seeking to have the Election Commission and the Constitutional Court work faster to be rid of the “devils.”

Kittisak Rattanawaraha, a deputy chairman of the Senate Political Development and Public Participation Committee, predicted Pita’s defeat while also saying “the Senate has a clear stance that it will not interfere with ongoing efforts to form a new government.” Speaking out of both sides of the mouth is common among the outspoken in the Senate. Kittisak is quite a thug. In addition to beating up monks and others, the day after the election, he spoke of a coup.

After saying how the Senate’s unelected were not interfering, Kittisak and his boss at the Senate committee, Seri Suwanpanon, met with Election Commission chairman Ittiporn Boonpracong “to hand over the evidences related to the allegations that Mr. Pita holds shares in iTV while applying for office, which is in violation of the Constitution.” Seri demanded that the “Election Commission to use its authority and discretion to complete the ruling as fast as possible in order to solve the political arguments. He wanted the issue to be quickly concluded.” Kittisak also made it clear that pushing Move Forward aside may be destabilizing and lead to protest, but that his lot expected this. Indeed, they are preparing for it.

Even the conservative Bangkok Post has noticed the Senate’s pungent politics. It mentions another senator, and old soldier, Gen Akanit Muensawad who has spoken against the vote, “attest[ing] to the view that winning by majority does not mean a thing.” Other senators “insist that winning the biggest number of votes, such as 14 million in the case of the MFP, does not necessarily give the party a mandate to run the country.” That includes Seri.

The Post concludes: “Such a self-assuming view goes against the spirit of democracy, which champions government of the people, by the people and for the people. It is not only wrong, but it could also result in a political stalemate, if not a confrontation.”

And, as Pita has noticed, the senators [and plenty of others] are using the monarchy for political purposes. The pawns may well leave the king exposed. The confrontation the Post mentions, may be between the monarchy and the people.

Burning down the house

According to Prachatai, a teenager, known only as K., has been indicted for lese majeste “after a prosecutor in the Office of the Attorney General ruled that burning a portrait of the King is the same as burning the King himself.”

Read more on burning portraits of the king here.

Clipped from Asia Democracy Chronicles

The teenager was arrested on 8 September 2021, when just 17 years old. Thai Lawyers for Human Rights said K. and another person were “arrested without a warrant and were detained for around 20 hours, during which their clothes, mobile phones, and motorcycles were confiscated.” They were questioned about protests in the Din Daeng area. The police “requested an arrest warrant after searching their residences and confiscating their belongings.”

K. was charged with lese majeste, violation of a curfew imposed under the Emergency Decree, arson, participating in a gathering of more than 10 people, and being disorderly in public. Additional charges included “allegedly shooting a slingshot and setting fire to a royal ceremonial arch near the Din Daeng intersection during a protest on 6 September 2021.”

K. was indicted on 26 May 2023.

TLHR reported that “Somsawat Thepnamsomanay, a public prosecutor at the Office of the Attorney General’s Family and Juvenile Case Division, ruled that setting fire to a ceremonial arch containing a portrait of King Vajiralongkorn is an offence under the royal defamation law because a portrait of the King is a representation of the King himself, and therefore burning the portrait is the same as burning the King himself and shows that the protesters involved wanted to destroy the monarchy.”

The prosecutor also accused K. of “throwing explosives and using a slingshot to shoot marbles at crowd control police during the protest and setting a fire on a public road, as well as tearing down the King’s portrait and stepping on it before setting fire to it.”

K. was granted bail on a security of 10,000-baht, and is scheduled to appear in court on 24 July 2023.

Silencing reformists and media

Activists Somyos Prueksakasemsuk and Attapon Buapat of the Ratsadorn Group for Abolition of Section 112 have submitted a petition to the Office of Attorney-General calling on it to “consider taking steps to rescind the Constitutional Court’s ruling that the sustained calls for monarchical reform, specifically pertaining to the sought-after abolition to the Criminal Code Section 112, better known as the lese majeste law, were allegedly designed to ‘undermine democratic rule with the monarch as head of state’.”

Attapol observed that the Court’s “ruling would be merely used as a legal, political tool against any opponents to those who may have been supportive of the lese majeste law, which, he said, has obviously stifled the people’s freedom of expression and violated the human rights for them to take part in peaceful gatherings and demands for an end to it.”

He’s right, but it does far more than that.

Former Constitutional Court president has recently stated that:

… the media can be considered as an accomplice in crime if they published messages about the monarchy that are outlawed. However, t[h]e question of intent would also be taken into account when considering the case.

So he suggested that the media avoid reporting what may be regarded as illegal. The ten demands for monarchy reform can be reported with care. The parts that infringe the monarchy will have to be censored.

The mainstream media is likely to be tamed and silenced even further, with the regime relying on self-censorship by journalists, editors, and media companies. It is already happening.

Reflecting the regime V

The Bangkok Post has an editorial that begins:

The National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) has no reason to stall the Administrative Court’s order for it to release details about its probe into the luxury watches case involving Deputy Prime Minister Gen Prawit Wongsuwon.

The NACC suffered a setback already when the court agreed with an online media outlet that requested the information.

It goes on to say that if the hopeless NACC “makes a further attempt to keep under wraps information about the probe which led to its decision to dismiss accusations that Gen Prawit gave a false wealth declaration by failing to include 22 luxury watches and rings,” then it “will risk losing [its]… credibility in performing their duties as graftbusters.”

We think the Post editors have lost their marbles. No one thinks the NACC has any credibility. It is a puppet organization. It is a sham anti-corruption organization.

Gen Prayuth and the NACC boss

The Post does list the feeble mumblings of senior NACC officials trying to avoid the court order. As usual, the regime and its puppets show no respect for the law.

Meanwhile, the reports of corruption and impunity are so common that no one seems to be flabbergasted any more. It is normal that the pigs feast.

How’s the “former Pol Col Thitisan “Joe Ferrari” Utthanaphon” coming along? Recall that Joe murdered a man. We were told that he was immediately a “former” cop after the killing. But, then, the “Police Serious Disciplinary Review Board has filed a complaint against …[Joe] and six subordinates…”. Deputy Inspector General Sarawut Kanpanich described them as “the seven police officers,” saying they “had committed serious disciplinary offences. ” His Board is about to “consider the evidence plus clarifications before presenting it to police chief Suwat Chaengyodsuk for a final decision on whether the accused should be discharged from office or fired.” The cover-up continues. Where’s the NACC?

And how about the long streak of stinking buffalo manure that is the case involving Red Bull heir Vorayuth Yoovidhya? He killed a policeman and fled the scene.

After years of cover-ups, delays, and deliberate incompetence, Nate Naksuk, a former deputy attorney general, decided “to drop charges against the Red Bull scion in the infamous 2012 hit-and-run case.” Rather than being investigated by the NACC, he’s “being probed for severe disciplinary wrongdoings…”.

This a a bit of a turnaround after an earlier committee “ruled … that Mr Nate did not commit serious disciplinary violations over his decision not to indict the Red Bull heir…”. The Public Prosecutor Commission … meeting chaired by former attorney-general Pachara Yuttidhammadamrong” changed this decision. But only ” nine of the 13 commission members in attendance found that in deciding not to indict Mr Vorayuth, Mr Nate had acted without thorough judgement and had been careless.”

So off this small piece of the Red Bull collusion and cover-up goes off to yet another “probe team,” wasting more time, more money.

All of this stuff just goes on and on. Its boringly predictable, murky, and gives criminals and the corrupt carte blanche.

Thank the military for this state of lawlessness.

Revoking 112 bail

Via Thai Lawyers for Human Rights, Thai Enquirer reports that “the public prosecutor has asked the court to revoke the bail of [Wanwalee Thammasattaya or] Tee Payao, a student activist facing lese-majeste charges…”.

She was charged under Article 112 for a speech she made at a protest at Wongwian Yai on 6 December 2020. Later, after the Office of the Attorney General proceeded with the prosecution, the Thonburi Criminal Court sent her to pre-trial detention on April 27.

Wanwalee. Clipped from Prachatai

After 11 days in detention, she was granted bail on the “condition that she not publicly insult or arrange any activity against the royal institution.” The latter is royalist-speak for the monarchy, but a term now widely used, demonstrating the continuing strength of the dominant royalist ideology.

On 6 July 2021, the Thonburi Department of Criminal Litigation told a court hearing “that Wanwalee had breached her bail conditions when she made a speech during a series of protests by the Ratsadon group, the main student led pro-democracy group, on June 24.”

Remarkably, the department invoked the virus emergency decree as one reason for revoking bail. This is telling as it highlights how authoritarian regimes have welcomed the virus as a way of embedding their rule. It is ironic in that the regime’s prisons have terrible record on the virus, which has raged through them.

The department alleges that on 24 June, “Wanwalee had made a speech about the [monarchy] and the content could be against the lese-majeste law.”

The prosecutor “handed … evidence of her speech to the court…”. On its part, the court said it would “rule on the possible revocation of Wanwalee’s bail on July 12.”

This is unlikely to be the end of real and threatened bail revocations – now used as a means of political repression – as the regime’s (political) police “have asked the public prosecutor to request for bail revocations for five protest leaders from the Ratsadon.”

Still on the lam

The 2012 hit-and-run case involving tycoon scion Vorayuth “Boss” Yoovidhya of Red Bull fame, when he killed a policeman while driving his luxury sports car while intoxicated is back in the news.

The Bangkok Post recently reported that, after all these years, the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) is considering whether it might “launch an inquiry against at least 10 people for their alleged role in delaying justice…”. That means those officials who helped Boss and his associates tamper with witnesses and smooth his escape from the country to enjoy the high life on the lam.

It is not the NACC that has been investigating. According to spokesman Niwatchai Kasemmongkol it is the findings of an:

independent panel headed by former NACC member Vicha Mahakun [that] indicated a number of people, including several police officers and public prosecutors, played a big role in getting prosecutors to drop criminal charges against Mr Vorayuth.

That report was “taken up by a NACC sub-committee, which in turn recommended the NACC to launch a more detailed investigation into individuals which the Vicha panel believed had intentionally acted to derail the justice process.”

That’s the report. Will it do anything? Or is it just another stalling tactic? After all, as everyone knows, Vorayuth and his lawyers repeatedly postponed his court appearances before he fled abroad.

An AFP photo clipped from ChannelNews Asia

While Vorayuth was on the lam, “a speeding charge against him was dropped after its one-year statute of limitations expired in 2013…. Meanwhile, a second charge — failing to stop to help a crash victim — expired on Sept 3, 2017.”

Only a cocaine use charge and a reckless driving causing death charges remain. The former expires in September 2022 and the latter in 2027. Previously, the Office of the Attorney General had recommended dropping the reckless driving charge. It was the public outcry over that that saw Vicha’s panel put together.

Somehow, we feel that justice will never be served. In Thailand, for the rich, justice and injustice are commodities.