Updated: Rule of what?

ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights has released a press statement by Charles Santiago, APHR Chair on media reports “that Min Aung Hlaing, head of the Myanmar junta, and his family have ties with Tun Min Latt, a man arrested in Thailand on charges of drug trafficking and money laundering…”. While some might think this about Myanmar affairs, it is also about Thailand and the decline of rule of law.

Santiago states: “… It is a well-known fact that the Myanmar generals have been engaging in illicit businesses for decades. Senior officers like Min Aung Hlaing not only plunder Myanmar’s natural resources paying close to no taxes, but are also involved in the narcotic trade, or at the very least turn a blind eye to it and are paid for doing so.” And adds:

Clipped from https://www.freepik.com/

… The Thai authorities should conduct an investigation on the ties of Min Aung Hlaing and his family with the underworld, and make its findings public. If it is found that they have broken Thai laws, they should be charged in a Thai court.

Readers might recall that, naturally enough in Thailand, Tun Min Latt has “connections.” One of them is Senator Upakit Pachariyangkun. Yes, one of the junta’s approved senators.

Less than a month ago, it was reported that prosecutors in Thailand had (secretly) indicted Thai-American Dean Gultula and Tun Min Latt “for their alleged roles in laundering drug money by purchasing energy from a Thai state-owned company, and sending it over the border to be sold in Myanmar.”

Senator Upakit is Gultula’s father-in-law.

Back in October 2022, an arrest warrant was issued for Senator Upakit “in connection with an alleged drug trafficking and money laundering ring operating out of a casino in the Golden Triangle.” But, the warrant was “quickly canceled.”

Then, the case was said to be “a test for Thailand’s law enforcement and justice systems…”. Move Forward Party MP Rangsiman Rome “said police could be under pressure from powerful people seeking to protect Upakit from prosecution.” He called for a transparent investigation.

He’s likely to be disappointed. Justice is for sale under the regime, especially as it splinters and cash is the most significant electoral asset.

Update: Prachatai has a story on this topic.

Recent writing on protest, monarchy, and law

PPT wants to draw attention to two recent works by academics that should get some attention.

The first is “Thai Youth Movements in Comparison: White Ribbons in 2020 and Din Daeng in 2021” by Chulalongkorn University political scientist Kanokrat Lertchoosakul. One reason for reading it is that it is from New Mandala. Once once mighty source of debate on Thailand, New Mandala has dropped off in recent years and is all too tame these days. Another reason for reading it  is that the article offers consideration of different political strategies that include a move away from non-violent protest. While we wonder about the (middle-class academic) notion of “the power of individuals to create change,” the discussion offers a nuanced account. It concludes: “In spite of differences in socio-economic status, political demands and protest strategies, the two groups have several features in common. They are politically active citizens and stand in support of political freedom and social justice.”

The second work is harder to access. A pricey new book, with an altogether too fancy title, is available. Constitutional Bricolage. Thailand’s Sacred Monarchy vs. The Rule of Law is by Eugénie Mérieau who is an Associate Professor of Public Law at the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne. An extract from the book is available. The publisher’s blurb states:

This book analyses the unique constitutional system in operation in Thailand as a continuous process of bricolage between various Western constitutional models and Buddhist doctrines of Kingship. Reflecting on the category of ‘constitutional monarchy’ and its relationship with notions of the rule of law, it investigates the hybridised semi-authoritarian, semi-liberal monarchy that exists in Thailand.

By studying constitutional texts and political practices in light of local legal doctrine, the book shows that the monarch’s affirmation of extraordinary prerogative powers strongly rests on wider doctrinal claims about constitutionalism and the rule of law. This finding challenges commonly accepted assertions about Thailand, arguing that the King’s political role is not the remnant of the ‘unfinished’ borrowing of Western constitutionalism, general disregard for the law, or cultural preference for ‘charismatic authority’, as generally thought.

Drawing on materials and sources not previously available in English, this important work provides a comprehensive and critical account of the Thai ‘mixed constitutional monarchy’ from the late 19th century to the present day.

Based on this, the extract and the table of contents, this looks like a serious piece of scholarship.

Updated: Lawfare and constitution

The regime is now a lawfare regime. This means that it misuses the legal system against an “enemy,” seeking to delegitimize them, wasting their time and money, and repeatedly harassing them. Like other repressive regimes, Gen Prayuth Chan-ocha’s government seeks to prevent and discourage civil society and individuals from claiming their legal rights, even when these are supposedly granted by the junta’s 2017 constitution.

Such lawfare is “especially common in situations when individuals and civil society use non-violent methods to highlight or oppose discrimination, corruption, lack of democracy, limiting freedom of speech, violations of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law.” It is rule by law rather than anything remotely close to rule of law.

As democracy activists seek to reactivate a movement that was attacked by a myriad of legal cases and detentions, their rallies are now met with multiple legal cases: the pure definition of lawfare.

Like other despotic regimes, the protesters face, according to Deputy Royal Thai Police Spokesman Pol Col Kissana Phathanacharoen, a “health safety announcement issued by the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration.” We guess that the leaders of one of the rallies, who are on bail, will find themselves targeted for more jail time. It is the way authoritarians use the law.

It is worth recalling that the protesters chose to rally on what used to officially be National Day. As the king has demanded, 1932 is a memory that only the public can keep alive, with the regime simply ignoring the date after years of removing its symbols.

1932 began an era of constitutional innovation and ended absolute monarchy, with small steps taken to establish the rule of law.

As the relatively small rallies went on, in parliament, a farce played out. The regime has, from time to time, indicated that it wants some constitutional change, mainly to further its already mammoth electoral rigging. But, as anyone who has followed politics since 2007 knows, the royalists, rightists and military allow no changes that might level the playing field. The lies on constitutional change began with the 2007 constitutional referendum and the brickwall to change has been strengthened by a biased Constitutional Court.

Pretending to promote constitutional change, 13 constitutional change bills were introduced. All but one was rejected by a joint sitting of the elected lower house and the junta-appointed senate. The legislation this hybrid “parliament” approved “would raise the number of constituency MPs from 350 to 400 and restore the old selection formula for 100 list MPs.” All this does is make regime thugs like Gen Prawit Wongsuwan and Thammanat Prompao more powerful as they redevelop money politics.It also opens the opportunity for MP and party purchasing on a grand scale.

Those who link this change back to earlier times, miss the changes that have taken place under military regimes and ignore the way that state resources and the misuse of law have made the the regime all but impregnable in the next election.

These commentators should also consider that the appointed senate makes a mockery of parliament. The senators, who all owe their positions to the military junta and the thugs running the current regime, essentially voted as a bloc.

Bencha Saengchan of the Move Forward Party correctly states: “Last night’s vote shows that parliament is a drama theater that lacks sincerity towards the people…”. But that’s way too mild. This regime will have to be forced out, laws changed, constitutions rewritten, monarchy tamed or deleted, and the thugs imprisoned. It is the only way to roll back 15 years of rigging and corruption.

Update: For an example of horrendous “journalism,” see the Bangkok Post’s About Politics column. It is usually rightist tripe, but this week’s column is a doozy. Somehow it manages to ignore all of the regime’s efforts to rig constitution and elections and to blame the opposition for failed constitutional reform. Quite an act of political contortion.

Law vs. king

We want to draw attention to a thoughtful article at Boston Review. “The Law Ought to Be King” is by Peera Songkünnatham. This is a story about the underlying motivations of recent protests and deserves a “long read.”

Here are some of the highlighted bits of the text:

Thailand has been gripped by the largest wave of protest in years, forcing a reckoning between the country’s dual structures of democracy and monarchy.

Thailand is formally a constitutional monarchy, but in recent years the king has made it clear that he is above the constitution rather than bound by it.

The fearful wait-and-see attitude toward the new reign that pervaded Thailand four years ago has been superseded by a decisive impatience: we’re sick of waiting; we’ve seen enough; let’s get it over with now.

With the ceiling of acceptable criticism blown off, language has taken on a particularly charged political power.

The hard fact is that the monarchy’s undoing comes from inside the house. Vajiralongkorn’s actions have become increasingly hard to defend even to the monarchy’s die-hard, born-again supporters.

Leaders are careful to frame their demands in terms of monarchical reform rather than anti-monarchical revolution. But in effect the two are joined in an ultimatum to the king: either you rehabilitate yourself, or your entire establishment will fall out of the people’s good graces forever.

Regime preparations

The regime’s preparations for Saturday’s rally suggest that it is feeling the heat. The activism of rabid royalists is meant to support the regime and to threaten the students.

The Bangkok Post reports that so serious is the “threat,” that “Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwon will run the Operation Centre monitoring the anti-government rally on Saturday, when protest leaders expect at least 40,000 people to attend.”

In addition to some 2,000 police, the regime is mobilizing more than 8,550 “crowd control officers.” Exactly who they are – military? other officials? – remains unclear.

The Thai Enquirer reports, in ironic terms:

Prime Minister [Gen] Prayut Chan-ocha, who came to power in 2014 after deposing of a democratically elected government in a military coup and proceeded to rip up the constitution, said on Thursday that anti-government protesters must respect the rule of law and be appropriate during their demonstrations.

They have a point in their irony, for when Gen Prayuth avers that Thailand is “a country is governed by the rule of law and if you do not respect the law other people might find that unacceptable,” seems to express the double standards that the regime is infamous for.

This is reinforced when the general who was in charge of troops that gunned down protesters in 2010 said that “Thailand’s economy is suffering and the protesters should understand that their rallies may hurt other people.”

He’s gone further, invoking virus techno-fascism:

I would like to take this chance to tell various groups that want to protest for various reasons, that protesting is exponentially multiplying the risk of infection and will create a new wave of COVID infection in Thailand…

He added that “the protests could damage the gains achieved by doctors and nurses who worked hard to contain the virus.”

Gen Prayuth was also loud in warning” “protesters know what is appropriate and not appropriate in the Thai context and that they should respect the boundaries of Thai society.” He means that the protesters should not “touch” the absent king.

Meanwhile Thailand’s yellow shirts are morphing into a version of America’s Alt-Right, blathering about color revolutions and US oligarchs joining with Thai oligarchs and the CIA to bring down the regime and the monarchy. Such claims have previously been mainly limited to Russian sites but are now being widely circulated. Part of the reason for this is that the mainstream media in Thailand has been less critical of the current student protesters than was the case with the red shirts.

The yellow ones are quite deranged, but their concocted claims of “plots” have been effective before. Expect more of this.

“Law” and repression I

The current discussion of a biased and politicized judiciary should not be separated from the use of “law” for political repression. In fact, the military junta of 2014-19, under the direction of the evil, rightist lawyer-for-military-hire Wissanu Krea-ngam and the military’s ideologues, worked harder on establishing rule by law – quite different from rule by law – than most previous rightists regimes. The military junta recognized that its laws could be used for ongoing political repression once the regime it self transmogrified into a corrupt civilian front organization now sometimes erroneously referred to as an elected government.

Rule by law has been an increasingly favored means of political repression adopted by rightist regimes worldwide and is also infecting electoral democracies as well.

Human rights lawyer Poonsuk Poonsukcharoen recently observed that “the authorities’ main method of suppression has evolved into the use of laws and state orders to enable them to cling on to power.”

In essence, the law is used to repress the regime’s opponents, whether they be journalists who step outside the bounds of self-censorship, elected opposition politicians or democracy activists.

Anurak. Clipped from TAHR

Recent cases involve a Belgian freelance journalist Kris Janssens,taken into police custody “for inquiries because our intel suggested that he might have been a threat to national security…”. In fact, he was detained because he planned to interview an anti-government activist Anurak Jeantawanich. He was warned not to and advised to leave Thailand. The Immigration Police claimed this was “normal procedure” and cited immigration law. But they could not specify how the journalist was a threat to this vague but useful notion of national security.

A second example of the authorities using the law to repress opponents is the case of the 12 speakers – academics and opposition politicians – at a public discussion of constitutional reform who have all been slapped with sedition complaints by the shadowy Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC).

Behind a “national security” law, ISOC lies that “it is persecuting opposition political parties in laying a sedition complaint over their public forum in the far South…”. Unbelievably, “Isoc spokesman Maj Gen Thanathip Sawangsaeng said … no one ordered that legal action be taken.” We do know the action was taken, so this being the military, someone ordered it. We also know that the nasty watchman Gen Prawit Wongsuwan approved the action.

Maj Gen Thanathip continued his charade by insisting “Isoc was not abusing its power to persecute the opposition parties.” In a warped sense, he’s probably right on this because the military junta allocated ISOC powers to repress its opponents before it metastasized.

He then babbled in a manner that explains how authoritarian regimes use the law for repression: “Isoc does not see the people as an enemy, but it does abide by the law. Words spoken at the constitution amendment forum in Pattani caused concerns…”. He doesn’t say for who. Obviously the person who did not order the legal action.

Obviously and unreservedly, the military and other authorities supporting the present regime are using the law for repression. We can expect much more of this abuse of the law. Meanwhile, thugs, forgers, liars and criminals serve as ministers.

Fake charges

As we have previously posted, the military junta, in its efforts to frame Future Forward’s Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, has suddenly had to concoct cases against 15 activists for events four years ago.

We can only wonder about all the time that elapsed and no charges over each of those four years. Of course, its the opportunity to kick Thanathorn that the junta now manufactures charges against the activists. A bigger pile of buffalo manure is hard to imagine.

How high can the junta pile it?

The Bangkok Post reports that recently released Jatupat Boonpattararaksa and 12 other activists have all “denied newly-filed charges against them over a rally outside Pathumwan police station four years ago.”

Four years ago!

It seems somehow fitting that this, the latest of the military junta’s manipulation of law came fiver years to the day after the military coup – itself illegal – that brought these fascist buffoons to power.

And, it was great to see “[s]upporters waiting outside [who] cheered the activists as they reported to Pathumwan police on Wednesday, some carrying pieces of paper criticising the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) for holding on to power for five years.”

Police have “pressed charges of sedition and engaging in gatherings of 10 or more people under the Criminal Code against them.” Sedition! For fuck’s sake, this was four years ago. Does sedition mean so little now that the junta can casually wait years and years to use the charge for base political purpose?

PPT has never used a profanity in a post in nearly a decade, but this is the most base, concocted and ridiculous piece of junta buffalo manure we have seen in five years.

Fortunately, the activists were released and will fight the case, but the case is a farcical political use of the law and judiciary.

Another Federation link

The three missing activists, probably deported from Vietnam to Thailand on 8 May 2019, have been associated with the Organization for a Thai Federation.

Readers may recall that back in about September 2018, several persons were arrested in Thailand for distributing black t-shits, claimed to be connected with the Organization, then said to be operating from Laos. At the time, Deputy Dictator Gen Prawit Wongsuwan claimed that these republicans had a network in Thailand. It seems that the regime has made a determined effort to track down the group in Laos and to destroy it.

Thai Lawyers for Human Rights recently reported that a 58 year-old woman, identified only as Praphan, “was arrested by the Malaysian Police and deported back to Thailand on 10th May 2019 while waiting for refugee status from UNHCR in Malaysia.” The police in Thailand have charged her with sedition, being a member of a secret society, and other charges related to her having allegedly having worn a back t-shirt bearing a federation symbol.

Interestingly, this refoulement occurred at around the same time that the three men were said to have been deported to Thailand. Fortunately, Praphan has not been disappeared. Indeed, she seems to be jailed with another woman accused of the same crime.

Praphan fled Thailand in January 2019 and sought asylum via the UNHCR in Malaysia. While awaiting a third country to take her as a refugee, she was arrested by the Malaysian police on 24 April and detained.

Praphan was arrested for her black shirt on September 3, 2018. Soldiers and police “seized 3 phones, UDD cards, Thaksin Shinawatra pictures and 3 other UDD books.” She was initially held at a military base and then handed over to police and charged. In December 2018 “she was re-detained at the 11th Army Regiment, together with 8 other people, with the wife and son of Mr. Chucheep Chiwasut or Uncle Sanam Luang is also included. Then the military released her on December 14, 2018…”.

She fled before her second court appearance on the sedition and other charges.

Her refoulement, the charges laid and the disappearance of the three are yet further demonstrations that, under the junta, the rule of law has ceased to exist in Thailand.

Analysis of recent events

PPT has refrained from mentioning much of what passes for analysis of the events of the past week. One reason for this is that most of it has been highly speculative and bound in rumor.

Some self-styled analysts and quite a few academics have produced speculative accounts. Several managed to come up with different interpretations of the same events. Some have seemingly reproduced other accounts. Some of the more careful have come up with possible scenarios, allowing readers to choose the version that suits their perceptions and biases.

Perhaps that’s why PPT found New Mandala’s “Q&A: Supalak Ganjanakhundee on Thailand’s week of chaos” useful. Supalak is editor of The Nation. We highly recommend reading it, and we only present some highlighted bits and pieces here.

Supalak says that both Thai Raksa Chart and Puea Thai are under threat and the former will be dissolved by the Constitutional Court according to the so-called Royal Command:

The court will probably rule against the law, as the courts often do—the appeal to something outside the law, to make judgements on the law. If we are to make a clear argument, there is no legal status to the royal command.

The “election” campaign will now be dominated by the junta’s party attacking the pro-Thaksin Shinawatra parties as disloyal:

[Palang] Pracharat will try to create a political discourse against the Thaksin camp, by arguing that he brought the royal family into Thai politics—this is a dirty thing in Thai society. It’s not appropriate to have high society running in dirty politics. Now Pheu Thai is in a very awkward position indeed.

It is noted that Thaksin’s gambit was  not supported by many progressives who believe that there’s no place for royals in democratic politics. Supalak doesn’t rule out a pro-royalist alliance between Palang Pracharat and the Democrat Party.

The comment that “Thaksin underestimated the King” seems self-evident:

… the royal command on Friday night was not a law. A royal command can only be applied within the [royal] house, not to people outside the house and particularly not in the political sphere. So it was logical for Thaksin. He might have calculated that this outcome was possible, but he underestimated the King. The other possibility is that the King changed his mind—otherwise Prayuth might not have shown his confidence by jumping into the game.

Later Supalak adds:

The royal command is an interpretation of the law…. The royal command has implied that if you’re born into the royal family, you cannot resign. I think that’s a very ambiguous interpretation to establish the monarchy above the law.

Supalak dismisses analysis that has the king commanding the military and opposed to the junta:

… I don’t buy the theory that the King is so strong. I understand that he is trying to build the influence of his faction in the military…. His power is not—well, he could not have consolidated his power already. It will take time to have everything under his control. From my understanding, the military wants to have their own voice…. Now we live in a situation where the monarchy and the military are in tension over who will control who. It will take a few years for a clear picture to emerge….

The King commands loyalty from some factions of the military but people like Prawit and Prayuth want to be like people like Prem—middlemen between the palace and the military. They’re building their own regimes but this might also take time as they each hedge their bets.

In moving forward, Supalak is, in our view, making a good point in observing:

If you combine the idea of network monarchy and the deep state together, we might say that the overall effect is the emergence of some new regime that combines the military, the monarchy and capital. Big capital is always willing to support the monarchy, willing to support the military. Pracharat is the perfect model for combining royalty, the military and capital. The difficulty [in consolidating a model] is the unpredictable character of the King.

On the king’s politics:

… the monarch is not interested in institutionalising its power, working through laws, custom, norms and tradition. We cannot simply say—refer to the constitution for the role of the monarchy. Every constitution in recent history has been designed to enhance, not limit, the role of the monarchy. The trend is towards a direct form of rule. The people surrounding the King are not trying to institutionalise the monarchy.

On the future of free and open discussion:

The trend will not be an opening up [of discussion]. It will be a closing. Look at what the King has done since he took the throne—the message has been that he wants the country to be in order, disciplined. Look at the way he dealt with the constitution. He amended the constitution after the referendum—that’s the standard by which he exercises power. It’s not the rule of law. I really have little hope and will be pessimistic that our country will be ruled by the rule of law…. We are living with fear.

Academics, posterior polishing and freedom

Readers might recall a brief flurry of posts about the lackadaisical discussion of academic freedom in Thailand from an Australian-based historian. We complained that the events that saw several people associated with a conference in Chiang Mai being tried (since dropped) and with the situation of academics in Thailand could not be viewed as just another example of the ordinariness of academic (non/un)freedom in Thailand or that surveillance of academics is something to be viewed as somehow normalized.

In a recent article at East Asia Forum, “The fate of academic freedom in Thailand,” academic Tyrell Haberkorn takes a more serious look at the case of those who were charged in Chiang Mai and the rule of law in Thailand. Well worth a look.

For examples of how unfreedom, repression and military dictatorship has cowed academics and commentators in Thailand, read just about anything written in the past couple of weeks about the now undated “election.” So intense has been the junta’s efforts to crush any semblance of criticism of the monarch and monarchy, that when it is obvious that the king is land-grabbing, including turfing out parliament and leaving it homeless, and that it is he who has caused the current “election” imbroglio, what is seen from commentators and academics? Nothing. Deafening silence. And when the silence is broken it is to posterior polish.

Take as an example a recent op-ed for the Bangkok Post. Thitinan Pongsudhirak complains about the election delay, but blames no one. He pussyfoots about, claiming that 24 February was not the day: “An election date that many thought would be Feb 24 has now gone into limbo without clarity.” He’s afraid to say that this was the day the junta chose and worked and cheated and rigged towards, but that it is now off the table because there’s no royal decree. Stating the facts might be dangerous. Perhaps, but his piece is royalist and new reignist, declaring the coronation and the junta’s rigged election as linked and glorious. Buffing posteriors is easier, safer and likely to be rewarding. Freedom, though, is crushed, aided and abetted by complicit royalist “academics.”