06BANGKOK3745 PRIME MINISTER THAKSIN’S BAD DAY AND OTHER UPDATES
“69180″,”6/23/2006 12:33″,”06BANGKOK3745″,
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SUBJECT: PRIME MINISTER THAKSIN\’S BAD DAY AND OTHER UPDATES
Classified By: Political Counselor Susan M. Sutton, reason 1.4 (b) (d)
1. (C) SUMMARY: According to leaks in the press, on June 22
the EC recommended the dissolution of Thai Rak Thai (TRT).
The Office of the Attorney General now has the case, and will
vote on June 27 whether to forward it to the Constitutional
Court for a ruling. Deputy Prime Minister Wissanu announced
his resignation on June 22 as well, making it a bad day for
PM Thaksin. Former TRT members and others say that many party
members are sticking with TRT largely for the money; we hear
that the party members are discouraged. The Democrats insist
that there is no real threat from the dissolution case
against them, but many contacts suspect it will be both or
nothing in the dissolution cases. In any case, dissolution
turns out not to be such an enormous penalty. If a party is
dissolved, its leaders cannot found another party or serve an
executive board, but they can be MPs or even ministers,
(provided they\’re not subsequently convicted on a any
criminal charges.) The events of this week probably shook up
TRT, but many are still loudly proclaiming that the party
will weather the attacks. END SUMMARY.
THAI RAK THAI DISSOLUTION CASE
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2. (U) The embattled Election Commission caved in to the
Office of the Attorney General on Thursday, June 22. It
returned the Thai Rak Thai (TRT) dissolution case to the
Office of the AG, along with its assessment of the section of
law TRT violated, and the recommended penalty. It asked the
Office of the AG to keep the EC recommendation confidential.
It leaked within hours, and it is now generally reported that
the EC recommended that TRT be dissolved for violating
provisions of the Organic Act on Political Parties. The
provisions cited are Article 66 (1) and (3):
\”The Constitutional Court may issue an order dissolving a
political party which has carried out any one of the
following:
(1) an act which shall overthrow the democratic regime of
government with the King as the Head of the State or shall
gain the power in administration of the State by
unconstitutional means;
(2) an act which may be adverse to the democratic regime of
government with the King as the head of the State under the
Constitution
(3) an act which may endanger the security of the State, or
may be contrary to law or public order or good morals.
3. (U) The AG met today (June 23) to review the case. If
the AG agrees with the EC recommendation, it will forward the
case to the Constitutional Court for decision. If not, the
AG and EC will form a joint committee to review the case.
The Office of the AG reported that they will need several
days to review the 2000 pages of the file, and they intend to
vote on the case on Tuesday, June 27. It seems unlikely that
the AG will reach a different conclusion than the EC, but we
do not know what pressure may be brought to bear.
ABANDON SHIP?
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4. (U) Deputy Prime Minister Wissanu Krea-Ngam announced on
Thursday that he would resign from his government position
and return to work as an academic. Wissanu was not a TRT MP
or even, as far we can ascertain, a member. He was a talented
bureaucrat who served, by his own account, \”10 governments
and seven prime ministers.\” He was an important defender of
TRT policies while in the government, and helped to put the
best face on controversial decisions. He follows his cousin
Borwornsak Uwanno, the Cabinet secretary-general who resigned
on June 6 (although he will not become a monk, as Borwornsak
did.) He refuses to comment on why he resigned.
5. (C) There is much speculation on who might be next,
Commerce Minister Somkid and Education Minister Chaturon are
mentioned, possibly because both still enjoy some respect
among the educated citizens, and also because both seem to be
clearly out of the running as potential replacement Prime
Ministers if Thaksin does not return to office. We heard
that Somkid may use his upcoming travel to the US and Europe
to lobby for a WTO position.
6. (C) We keep asking why more TRT members aren\’t heading for
the exit. One member who did bolt, Dr. Likhit Thirawekhin,
is already promoting his own new party. He was a political
science professor at Thammasat and former deputy interior
minister; he was a TRT MP from the party list in the last
parliament. He told us, \”My wife said that the honor of our
family had increased significantly\” after his resignation
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from TRT. His former students had written to him asking him
to leave the party. He had gotten tired of the indignity of
being in a party that permitted members no real freedom to
contribute to party policy. He says he is not concerned if
his new party (Force of the Thai Land) does not win many
seats in parliament; he wants \”to be a force\” for clean and
responsible government. The party will focus on educating
voters and supporting political reform. Several other
lesser-known TRT members have joined him. Others stay in
TRT, he claimed, largely because of the financial benefits
that TRT pays adherents.
7. (C) The son of former PM Banharn Silapa-Archa had an
interesting, if unconfirmable, rumor, he heard from friends
in TRT. He said that, after Thaksin\’s May 19 audience with
the King, Thaksin gave TRT members an encouraging readout or
the meeting. Thaksin told them the King had said that the
Electoral Commission could stay in their positions, that it
was fine that Thaksin had returned to work, and that the
Courts had misunderstood the King\’s April 25 speech. The
King allegedly said that he would set the record straight
with the Courts. According to Silapa-Archa, this greatly
encouraged the TRT members, who are now disappointed that
nothing of the kind occurred. He described his TRT friends
as disheartened; unable to speak candidly within the party
and constantly afraid that other party members will stab them
in the back.
A POX ON BOTH THEIR HOUSES
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8. (C) The EC has not yet finalized their position on the
Democrat party dissolution case. A prominent Democrat told
us that the case was not serious, and was mainly a nuisance;
she said that she was not concerned about it. Others are not
so sure. If a bookie were taking bets, a lot of punters and
pundits would put money on either both parties facing
dissolution, or neither of them. (Comment: This being
Thailand, there probably is somewhere you can gamble on this
question. End comment.) We asked a prominent jurist on the
Supreme Court secretariat to assess the likely outcome of the
case. He anticipated that TRT could successfully defend
itself against dissolution by arguing that it was only the
action of an individual, Gen. Thammarak, to pay off the
microparties, not the action of the whole party. We asked
whether the public would really believe that Thammarak had
undertaken this project on his own, without Thaksin knowing
anything about it. The judge laughed uncomfortably, and
conceded, \”if the Court wants the truth, it will have to
dissolve TRT.\”
AND SO WHAT?
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9. (C) As it turns out, party dissolution is not a serious a
penalty as most people here thought. It was the general view
(and ours, until we double-checked the law) that party
dissolution carried a five-year ban on political activity by
the party\’s executive board (several dozen party leaders).
In fact, the law specifies that executives of dissolved party
may not found a new party or serve on the executive board of
another party. There does not appear to be any restriction
on them becoming MPs or even ministers. There is a provision
for the party assets to be given to charity (which would hurt
the poor Democrat party more than the wealthy and
financially-astute TRT.) The main penalty would appear to be
the moral impact and loss of face. Depending on the grounds
for dissolution, criminal charges might also follow, which
would result in a real political ban.
COMMENT
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10. (C) We have speculated that TRT members must be feeling
enormous pressure from family and people they respect to
separate themselves from the party. The account of ex-TRT
member Dr. Likhit supports that theory, This week\’s EC
decision will probably shake the members up still further,
but the party has shown remarkable resilience, and a
readiness to fight every step of the way.
ARVIZU
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