Corrupt cops

Almost no one would flinch if told that senior cops in Thailand are at the top of a corruption vacuum cleaner that sucks huge amounts of money to the top. The stories of police corruption have been especially numerous over the past couple of years. This is probably because the junta disrupted the system by tipping out those they identified as pro-Thaksin Shinawatra officers and because the palace has a serial police meddler in place.

Interestingly, The Nation has done a little research on the wealth of some recent top cops. The amounts of money they list are not at all surprising but their choice of cops to list is somewhat hit-and-miss,

They do mention the unabashedly corrupt former national police chief Pol Gen Somyos Pumpanmuang. PPT has had several posts over many years regarding his unexplained wealth.

It was back in 2014, following the appointment of scores of police and military to junta committees and other rubber stamp institutions, that a reader put together a list of unexplained wealth. That reader used official data.

Back then we observed:

The top money secretes to the top police. We acknowledge that there are a couple of low ranks listed, who probably report a rank having departed the cops early, but even so, the average for the top brass in the police is a whopping 258 million baht.

Nothing has probably changed, although we’d guess the top cops rake in more these days.

Deals continue to deliver

Thaksin Shinawatra’s deal to remake his position as one of that the establishment accepts has involved many betrayals and much bending and bowing.

His latest move is to close every Voice TV platform by the end of May 2024.

Credit: Khaosod

Voice TV was established in 2008 by Thaksin’s son, Panthongtae Shinawatra. It will lay off some 100 reporters and staff.

The network reportedly reached 22 million households through digital, satellite and cable TV, and “has long been known for its pro-Thaksin stance.” It was also a source of progressive programming for a number of years. “Talking Thailand” is one of the more progressive programs, which has recently become a toadying supporter of the Puea Thai coalition, ridding itself of several critical commentators. It explains the closure here:

“Station management” blamed economic losses for the closure, but we can’t help feeling that the ruling family no longer has a need for defending itself against the establishment it has (re)joined.

When the “management” implies that Voice TV is no longer needed as “there are many diverse media platforms and technologies that can carry on various social missions while democracy is taking root…”, they are kidding us all. What they mean is that Thaksin is back at the helm, albeit through proxies.

Whether this was a part of the deal done for Thaksin or the one being done for Yingluck remains an open question.

Much to lose, much to protect

VOA has an article reminding its readers of the popularity of Move Forward and the strength of the monarchy.

As it faces dissolution, as recent polls show, Move Forward and its leaders remain remarkably popular with the electorate. As Thaksin Shinawatra can attest, popularity is seen by the establishment as a threat to the existing order and, at its core, the monarchy.

As the article points out, this popularity derives from “a radical slate of reforms for equitable governance — to cut the military from power, break up an economic monopoly and amend the royal defamation law, known as lèse-majesté, which criminalizes criticism of the powerful monarchy.” In many places, such reforms would not be seen as “radical,” but this is royalist Thailand.

A Move Forward spokesperson stated the obvious: “We’ve seen party dissolution being used as one of the tools against parties that are opposite from the establishment institution of Thailand…”.

Clipped from Asia Democracy Chronicles

The article makes another obvious point:

Thailand’s monarchy is extremely powerful, and the royal defamation law protects it from criticism, with sentences of up to 15 years per conviction.

Dozens of young pro-democracy activists have been jailed in the last few years under the law.

That the monarchy remains powerful despite the youthful rebellion against it in 2020-21 demonstrates, for royalists, how important Article 112 is for maintaining the socio-economic and political order.

But does all of the establishment action against Move Forward suggest that the ruling class are in their death throes? Does party dissolution really “… make … no difference,” as legal academic Prinya Thaewanarumitkul says, arguing:

The coalition government will get slightly stronger [without an opposition]. But when it comes to the next election, there will be four million new voters. Without the appointed Senate, it’s highly likely that the MFP’s next version will be the government.

We can’t help wondering if the establishment doesn’t have a plan for that as well…. It has much to lose and much to protect.

Thaksin deal redux and double standards

While we don’t know the exact details of the palace/establishment deal done with Thaksin Shinawatra to get him back and to keep him out of prison, it does seem that another deal is being negotiated, quite publicly, for Yingluck Shinawatra’s return.

The public voice in this is lawyer and Shinawatra favorite Pichit Chuenban. Pichet is well known as a bagman for Thaksin:

He was sentenced to six months in prison while leading the defence team for former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra in June 2008. The Supreme Court held him and two legal representatives responsible for an apparent attempt to bribe the court.

Two million baht in cash was found wrapped in a paper bag in the court’s compound in early June 2008. Pichit claimed he thought it was a bag of snacks. He was seen handing the so-called “snack bag” to court clerks when Thaksin and his then-wife Potjaman Na Pombejra were due to appear in the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Holders of Political Office.

Pichit is now an “adviser” to the prime minister.

He says: “There is nothing complicated about the [return] process… It will depend on [Yingluck] on when she decides to come home.” He then made the extraordinary claim that the deals done and being done “is not considered a double standard as it is done in accordance with the law.” He says: “We have adhered to the principles of law enforcement and justice process…”.

Like so many who are trained and work in the legal system, Pichit is unable comprehend the meaning of double standard. This is because double standards are simply normalized. The rich, the powerful, and the influential get wondrous interpretations of the law while the poor, ordinary, and, significantly, political opponents of the establishment get something else.

In other words, “principles of law enforcement and justice process” are constructed on double standards.

Politics vs. the crown

In February, Thai Lawyers for Human Rights reported that almost 2,000 people, mostly youngsters, face charges for exercising their rights to speech and assembly. Many of these face lese majeste charges.

But the current prime minister and his party seem to dismiss the notion that “politics” does not involve the monarchy.

Responding to commentary by his boss, Thaksin Shinawatra – characterized as “Pheu Thai’s spiritual leader” – Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin stated that he “believes all political fugitives, including former premier Yingluck Shinawatra, are welcome to return to Thailand, provided they undergo the judicial process.”

But, as seen with Thaksin’s own return, there are gaping double standards in the “judicial process.” Clearly, in his case, he was given a dream run, facilitated by the palace deal and the Puea Thai-led coalition.

Obviously, the “political fugitives” that Thaksin and Srettha are intent on returning are their political allies.

Implicitly Srettha is rejecting amnesty and obviously running and hiding from anything to do with lese majeste. Kids charged under Article 112 are being left to a “judicial system” that is highly politicized and determined to punish them. “Law” hardly matters.

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.”

Updated: Move Forward’s location

In an article  at the World Socialist Web Site, Robert Campion reflects on the impending fate of Move Forward, noting that the “proceedings demonstrate the utterly anti-democratic character of the Thai parliamentary system.”

It is argued that the “party’s dissolution would represent the disenfranchisement of 38 percent of those voting in last year’s election, or 14.4 million people who voted for the MFP, more than any other party…. Millions of people no doubt backed the MFP hoping it would bring about genuine changes in government.”

The author then engages in some class analysis:

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MFP_B_Final-01-1024×724.png

In reality, the MFP is not a real threat to the Thai ruling establishment, but rather functions to contain growing political opposition to the ruling class within the narrow confines of what passes for parliamentary democracy in Thailand. It is a bourgeois party, representing aspiring sections of the corporate and financial elite, that masquerades as a “progressive” opponent of the military and more right-wing sections of the Thai state.

That would seem reasonable although the description is probably more apt when applied to Puea Thai: it is a bourgeois party that once masqueraded as progressive (to win votes) and which has been (willingly) co-opted to see off change.

And it points to “MFP’s passive response to its possible dissolution,” saying that the party “is not making any attempt to mobilise workers and youth in opposition to the Thai state’s flagrant attack on democratic rights.” It adds: “The MFP is just a fearful as its political opponents of any independent movement of workers and youth and is seeking to head off any mass protests, such as those that followed the dissolution of the MFP’s predecessor, the Future Forward Party (FFP), in 2020.”

We are not convinced that this is accurate, especially as the party is yet to be dissolved. It was after Future Forward was dissolved that people mobilized. This will be in the minds of strategists in other parties, in the courts and among military leaders, and in the palace as the Constitutional Court concocts its decision.

Update: For Puea Thai defacto leader Thaksin Shinawatra’s perspective on where the party is located, see his claim that it “is not a neo conservative party, but a reformist party, dating back to its founding as the Thai Rak Thai party…”. As to an example of the party’s “reformism,” he cited the “digital wallet” scheme, which he said was a “super new idea.” He added that “capitalism that lacks compassion will not make people happy and reaching out to the people, physically or through the media, is important.” At present, Puea Thai looks a sad reflection of the energetic Thai Rak Thai when it was in power.

A really big deal?

In a comment on the royalist court’s decision that the People’s Alliance for Democracy occupation of Bangkok’s airports was not criminal because the “airport protests were protected under the constitution because they were peaceful and the protesters were unarmed,” we asked if this decision was reflective of the secret deal done with Thaksin Shinawatra to allow him back to Thailand.

The same question might be asked regarding last week’s sudden return to Thailand of Jakrapop Penkair. A former spokesman for Thaksin when he was prime minister, in May 2008, Jakrapob had to resign as a minister in the then pro-Thaksin government after being accused of lese majeste during a talk at Bangkok’s Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand on 29 August 2007. He fled into exile.

While he remained overseas, in March 2012, it was reported that the public prosecutor had decided in September 2011 that it would not indict Jakrapob. The Attorney General’s Office sent its decision to the police chief. It was never clear to PPT whether the police chief had formally dropped the case.

Yet, following the 2014 military coup, the junta seemed to reconsider the case and viewed him as anti-monarchy and anti-junta. In December 2017, he was accused of caching “weapons” to be used in Bangkok to incite strife. The police claimed that some of the weapons came from the same sources those used during the 2014 political turmoil. Jakrapob and four others said to be red shirts were accused and warrants issued.

It seems pretty clear that the deal done with Thaksin, and the way the Puea Thai Party-led coalition “massaged” that return, encouraged Jakrapob’s return.

But even if it wasn’t part of that deal, it seems that the bigger deal is the defeat of Move Forward, seen by the establishment as a much bigger threat to the status quo than Thaksin and Puea Thai. The youth-led rebellion that effectively began with the dissolution of Future Forward clearly sent a shiver through the powers-that-be. They are now hoping that Puea Thai and the red shirts they so hated can shore up the establishment against progressives.

While The Nation speculated on more returns, some of which have been emphatically denied, the battle lines are being forged between the establishment+Puea Thai bureaucrats vs. progressives.

Political courts

AP reports on the acquittal of “nearly 70 people of all charges related to mass protests that shut down Bangkok’s two airports in 2008 for about 10 days.” These were leaders and members of the People’s Alliance for Democracy.

This ruling was not unexpected as the courts had already acquitted PAD protesters, ruling they “had not committed serious criminal offenses in their activities.”

In the latest case, the “court ruled … that the airport protests were protected under the constitution because they were peaceful and the protesters were unarmed.”

AP felt compelled to observe:

Witnesses to the 2008 protests, including Associated Press reporters, saw acts of violence and intimidation by sometimes-armed guards employed by the PAD….

This ruling could be just the usual royalist double standards or it could be part of the secret deal done with Thaksin Shinawatra to allow him back to Thailand. (What has happened to his lese majeste charges?)

Yet the statement attributed to the court, “protests were protected under the constitution because they were peaceful and the protesters were unarmed” should be remembered, because the hundreds of youth protesters who have been charged with political crimes exactly fit that defense. Yet the royalist courts continue to convict them.

The courts seem to revel in their politicized rulings.

Lese Thaksin III

Now that he’s on parole, Thaksin Shinawatra is getting royal treatment. His party, which did a deal some say was with the devil, to get him back to Thailand, now uses its status to protect him.

The deal has been well-described here. What has been amazing to all, is the lengths the Puea Thai government has gone to to make Thaksin’s return as smooth as possible and to make sure that their boss is happy. Some of the buffalo manure spread about has been breathtaking and on a par with the manure that the military-backed regime once spread about. We commented a couple of times, here and here, comparing efforts to protect the boss with the efforts to protect the king. Criticizing Thaksin won’t get you thrown in prison for years, but the Puea Thai Party promises law suits, threatening even members of parliament.

With his privileged status, Thaksin’s party and government have finagled deals and laws to manage, over about 6-7 months, to arrange his return from exile, his sentence-reducing royal pardon, his rapid transfer from prison to luxury hospital room, his parole, and, most recently, a regal tour of his domain in the north, with all the previous accoutrements that signaled “illness” very quickly shed.

Most recently, responding to media reports that opposition parties might ask questions about the double standards applied at many levels in Thaksin’s case, the Puea Thai Party has declared such questions “off limits.” Krumanit Sangphum, a Pheu Thai MP and a deputy government whip, said that “Thaksin is an outsider and, therefore, discussing personal matters concerning him during the debate would be a breach of House meeting regulations.” He said: “Pheu Thai MPs will object to anyone raising issues surrounding the former prime minister and will explain the facts and the House meeting regulations. If false allegations are made, individuals who are defamed will file lawsuits…”.

Clearly the party feels it has much to hide. Frankly, every one in the country knows that Thaksin has had special, royal-like treatment. But Puea Thai is protective to the point of demonstrating a subservience that is royal-like. The boss can do no wrong.

Thus,  the report that some red shirts are peeved, including those in Thaksin’s fiefdom, is of interest. There were only a handful of them, but “a large number of plainclothes officers were stationed in the area during the gathering.” How very royal.

The protest complaints were about double standards: “You did this and you’re the only one who survived. What about other people? You came back proudly. You can go wherever you want. You’re at home. How is your house like prison? It has everything. You are living in comfort. What about the Red Shirts?”

They won’t get answers from the boss or his underlings.