Tag Archive for 'Thaksin-Shinawatra'

Reds set Bangkok ablaze. But did they get the wrong ‘elite’?

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on May 20, 2010
in The Times
. 9 Comments

FROM ANDREW DRUMMOND

 Bangkok, May 19 2010

Link to Andrew Drummond on RTE Evening News

And a much better article by me old mate Bill Barnes 

with some good research on the burnings

Angry anti-government demonstrators, claiming to be fighting for democracy and for the poor against Thailand’s elite, set fire to Bangkok yesterday burning down banks, shopping malls, and small shops.
After their leaders surrendered to Thai Army troops furious members of the United Front for Democracy over Dictatorship went on a looting and fiery rampage throughout the city and in upcountry Thailand.
Last night hundreds of tourists were reported to be stranded in the Thai capital unable to get to the airport for their flights home after the government announced a curfew from 8 pm to 6am for Bangkok and 22 other provinces were put under curfew.

Death toll rises

The day’s death toll rose to 12 after six bodies were found inside the grounds of Pathumwanram Temple in the centre of the former ‘exclusion zone’ after a firefight which lasted well into the late hours.
The temple was a place not only where women and children were sheltering but also where red shirt die hards decided to make a last stand.
Earlier black smoke washed over the Bangkok skyline after furious red shirts also burned down Central World, a show piece department store and conference complex, the second largest in South East Asia, and set fire to the country’s Channel 3 Radio.  By nightfall some 20 other buildings were ablaze.

Central World on fire. Snipers are alleged to have halted fire trucks

Central World on fire. Snipers are alleged to have halted fire trucks

But their mentor Thaksin Shinawatra, the ousted Prime Minister, who predicated guerrilla warfare if the troops used force, may not have been amused.

Red shirts target ‘wrong elite’

Channel 3 is owned by the wealthy Maleenont Thai Chinese family.  Pracha Maleenont was Thaksin Shinawatra’s Minister for Sport and Tourism before Shinawatra was ousted in a military coup.
The Central Group, which owns the now destroyed Central World, is owned by the Chirathavit Thai Chinese family which also has controlling shares of the Bangkok Post .

Kasikorn Bank burning/ thapanee3miti

Kasikorn Bank burning/ thapanee3miti

When Thaksin was in power he had the editor of the Bangkok Post fired, through director Samrit Chirathavit, after he wrote an editorial telling the Prime Minister not to be so ‘arrogant’.
Although Thaksin Shinawatra yesterday denied he had control of the UDD, he has admitted many times that they took his advice. The Government has also accused him of funding the protests. More specifically they say he vetoed a proposed ‘road map’ and has been funding the demonstrations.

Guerrila warfare

Yesterday Thaksin said: “A military crackdown can spread resentment and these resentful people will become guerrillas.”
No sooner had he said it that his prophecy appeared to be fulfilled.  Red shirts set fire to the Stock Exchange of Thailand,  Central World, Siam Cinema, the Office of the Narcotics Control Board and several banks and late yesterday some 23 buildings were reported to have been torched.
The Thai Criminal Court issued a warrant for Thaksin Shinawatra on terrorism charges but later withdrew it, seeking further information to back the charge.
Protesters also looted shops and attacked ATM machines with crowbars. But with no leaders there appeared to be no reason to their madness.
 There were also widespread reports of the targeting of journalists, who the redshirts blame for their defeat.  The Editor of the Nation newspaper has been urgently tweeting to journalists : “Take off your green press armbands now!”.
In the district of Samrong British schoolteacher Richard Barrow said: “Every time the TV showed pictures of burning buildings the red-shirts cheered. The biggest cheer was for the Channel 3 building on fire. This is not the Thailand I have loved for 16 years.”
In Siam Square, Bangkok’s equivalent of Covent Garden, a theatre was burned down. Shops  there as at Central World were also reported to have been looted.
As the government announced a curfew stores throughout the city started shutting up and there was a mad rush on supermarkets and petrol stations.
Similar incidents were reported up country with the provincial hall in Udon Thani, a redshirt stronghold near the Laos border, taken over by the redshirts and burned down and violent protests reported also in Khon Kaen in north east Thailand and in Samut Prakan and Sri Racha in the central belt.
Tens of thousands of tourists in the resort of Pattaya were confined to their hotels as all the bars and clubs shut.

Sharpened bamboo smashed into tooth picks

The day’s furiously paced events started at 4 am when there were scenes of chaos in the camp of the anti-government protesters when at first fires were doused with water cannon and then the Thai army sent in Chinese made Type 85 AFV armoured personnel carriers.  The vehicles made toothpicks out of the sharpened bamboo poles in the barricades.
Then troops slowly but methodically picked their way through towards the centre of the protest camp, taking time to secure hand grenades hanging within the barricades and defusing suspected bombs.
Around 1.15 pm, red-shirt leader Jatuporn Promphan had appeared on the rally stage making a passionate plea for the red shirts to end protesting at Rajprasong to avoid further loss of life.

Vandergrift - a tragic irony

Vandergrift - a tragic irony

“Please understand and I know you all know I will never abandon you, but it is now time to avoid more lives lost, because it is our redshirts who got killed.”
Some six are thought have been killed with scores of others injured in the initial assault. The scene of the bloodiest action in the last few minutes  before the surrender was near Sarasin Road, Bangkok, about five hundred yards from the Red HQ.
Among the dead was Fabio Polenghi, an Italian photographer who was shot in the stomach and who died before he could reach hospital. A second, a Canadian, Chandler Vandergrift who felt the full force of a grenade  together with two soldiers,  is believed to be critically injured.

Soldier injured by the same M79 grenade as Chandler Vandergrift

Soldier injured by the same M79 grenade as Chandler Vandergrift

Vandergrift, 42 , also a part time ngo, ‘film-maker’, and apparent expert on ‘risk assessment’ was a red-shirt supporter and in his last blog ‘Weapons of the weak’ he asked if Red shirts had weapons why there were no pictures of them.  He described Abhisit Vejjajiva as a failed Prime Minister and Panitan Wattanayakorn as a ‘former academic turned shameless government mouthpiece’.

Ironically Vandergrift, who also wrote stories together with Canadian Nelson Rand, who was shot by troops earlier in the week, took the full blast from a red-shirt M79 rifle grenade.
Bangkok based British photographer Andrew Chant, from Yeovil,  who was nearby said: “We came under attack from M79 grenades. The first one exploded in front of me.  I was stunned but I think a tree and roadside concrete must have sent the shrapnel the other way.
“Another one a hundred yards away took down a solder and the Canadian. The Canadian was moaning a lot. There was a lot of blood”.
Meanwhile some 20 protesters dressed in black, possibly members of the mysterious ‘Men in Black’, who the military claimed have been shooting back, were seized and detained in the Kian Kwuan building nearby, which houses the European Commission’s local office.
Shortly after 2 pm with the surrender of the leaders government spokesman Panitan Wattanayakorn announced that the government was back under control
The operation was inevitable after the Thai Government said yesterday it would no longer negotiate the with red-shirted demonstrators, who are in the main supporters of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra’, better known in Britain as the man who made a killing on Manchester City Football Club.
An angry Thaksin distanced himself from the violence yesterday” I am man of peace. I have never supported violence”.
Last night the city was in the control of the police and army. All television stations played ‘Auld Lang Syne’ prior to government announcements.
 Panitan Wattanayakorn said: “People caught out after the curfew should have their ID or their passports. But please stay at home.  We apologise.  We are so sorry. What we have seen is not the nature of the Thai people. We are gentle people.  It seems that journalists, in particular foreign journalists, have been targeted. We do not know why. We are trying to find out, and we are putting things back in order.

*Of course in the politics of the elite in Thailand nothing is set in stone and often the elite just give their allegiance to the Prime Minister of the day, and or the ‘winning side’.

Is Thaksin funding Thai protest? - al jazeera

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on May 18, 2010
in The Times
. 5 Comments

 

From ANDREW DRUMMOND, Bangkok

May 18 2010

Link to Al Jazeera Interview

Pictures: Andrew Chat

The top publicist for ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said today that he did not know how much his client was funding the violent street war on the streets of Bangkok.

“I have no idea. You might as well ask how much is the government spending on bullets,” said London based lawyer Robert Amsterdam.

Amsterdam was speaking after the Thai government froze the bank accounts of 106 people including the Shinawatra family and companies linked to red-shirted anti-government protesters

Robert Amsterdam, Thaksin Shinawatra's new spin doctor

Robert Amsterdam, Thaksin Shinawatra's new spin doctor

 

But in answer to a question as to whether the exiled former owner of Manchester City Football Club was paying protesters, he replied ‘Absolutely not!’

 

 

He replied: “People do not take bullets on the basis of who is funding what.”

The Thai government believes a disgruntled Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted from power in a military coup and subsequently accused of corruption, has been funding the riots.

In the initial stages of the protest protesters were reported to be getting up to 2,000 baht a day, a month’s pay for some people in North East Thailand.

From the red shirt side May18 2010 Rama IV Road, Bangkok

From the red shirt side May18 2010 Rama IV Road, Bangkok

Televisions stations have been set up to broadcast their message, and in their Bangkok camp they have state of the art power generators, fan cooled dormitory accommodation and free food, although cash handouts now appear to have stopped.

 

 A British businessman, who asked for anonymity said: “There is absolutely no doubt the protesters are being paid. I have seen it with my own eyes.  Most of my staff are ‘Yellow shirts’ or supporters of the government.

“But last month at lunch time my staff used to put on red shirts and queue up for cash.  They took the shirts off again when they came back to work. On the first day when they signed up they got 2000 Thai baht each (£50)  I do not know what they got later.”

Thaksin Shinawatra has been open in his support of the protesters and has called on the UN to intervene and negotiate a settlement.

When he was in power however , when the United Nations criticised  his war against drugs in which 2,500 were killed without trail he replied: “The UN is not my father”.  He has also stated that western styled democracy is not suitable for Thailand.

 

From the army side May 18th

From the army side May 18th

With the death toll running  has at 37 the Government rejected talks with the red-shirts before the disperse. Sporadic fighting continues in the capital and petrol trucks have been maneuvered into key locations. Several major hotels were evacuated.

Thai camerman begs Thaksin Shinawatra to answer why his mother and father were gunned down by police in his 'War on Drugs'

Thai camerman begs Thaksin Shinawatra to answer why his mother and father were gunned down by police in his 'War on Drugs'

 Yesterday when Al Jazeera put to Robert Amsterdam, a Canadian, that other human rights lawyers had a different view of Shinawatra ‘under whose government ‘thousands of people died arbitrarily without trial and the media was censored’, Amsterdam replied that he disagreed with that view and that Shinawatra  had ‘addressed the needs of the rural citizen ship.”

The rest of the week has been declared a holiday and all city train services will terminate tomorrow (Wed).

PM defiant as army snipers ’shoot to kill’

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on May 16, 2010
in The Times
. 7 Comments

FROM ANDREW DRUMMOND,

BANGKOK MAY 15 2010

Link to Andrew Drummond at Mail on Sunday

Swathes of the Thai capital were declared a ‘live firing’ killing zone by the army yesterday, as the death toll in Bangkok rose to 22 after days of violent protest.
And last night Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said his security forces would not retreat.
As troops attempted to quell the trouble, they fired live rounds at hundreds of protesters who are seeking to topple the government.
Demonstrators fought back by hurling petrol bombs, rocks and crude homemade rockets. Around a third of the city is now under emergency rule.
A volunteer medical rescue worker was shot and feared dead yesterday and at least four protesters were also shot and badly wounded.
 In a televised address Mr Vejjajiva said: ‘The government has to go forward. We cannot retreat. What we are doing is for the benefit of the country. We cannot leave the country in the hands of armed groups.’

Anti-government protesters are backed by ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the billionaire former owner of Manchester City. They want Mr Vejjajiva to dissolve parliament and call fresh elections.

As they fought the army on the streets, one motorcyclist was hit by a stray bullet. In another incident a journalist from the Bangkok Nation newspaper was shot. And a rescue worker was shot in the head as he tried to get a casualty into an ambulance.

Despite claims by the Thai government that the situation is under control and that its soldiers have only fired in self-defence, army snipers have been accused of targeting protesters. Footage from Bangkok yesterday showed the Red Shirts dragging gunshot victims to safety.

At the Din Daeng intersection, north of the main protest site, three bodies were taken away on stretchers, witnesses said, indicating that the death toll could rise further. Two had suffered head wounds.

The incidents yesterday followed a night of grenade explosions and sporadic gunfire as the army battled to set up a perimeter around the protesters’ barricaded encampment where thousands refuse to leave, including women and children.

Hardcore protesters set fire to vehicles, including an army truck, and hurled rocks at troops as they tried to set up razor-wire at checkpoints.

The violence has been escalating since Thursday after a renegade general who supports the Red Shirts’ protest was shot in the head by an unknown gunman. General Khattiya Sawasdipol, better known as Seh Daeng (Commander Red), is in a critical condition and unlikely to survive.

The British Embassy in Bangkok has been temporarily closed. Thai army spokesman Colonel Sansern Kaewkamnerd said the security steps – including the ‘live fire zone’ – had halved the number of protesters in the camp to 5,000.

Inside the camp, Red Shirt leader Kwanchai Praipana said stocks were running low because of the blockade but added that they would last ‘for days’.

He said: ‘We’ll keep on fighting until the government takes responsibility.’

In a message from New York, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appealed to both sides to ‘do all within their power to avoid further violence and loss of life’.
But, with negotiations terminated, the situation appeared headed toward a final showdown on the streets.
Jatuporn Prompan, a protest leader, said today: ‘The situation right now is getting closer to civil war every minute. We have to fight on. The leaders shouldn’t even think about retreat when our brothers are ready to fight on.’
 
The Red Shirt protesters began their latest campaign to oust the government in March, saying it came to power illegitimately and is indifferent to the poor. In several rounds of violence since then, a total 43 people have been killed and at least 1,620 wounded, according to a government toll that includes the most recent clashes.
Protesters have urged 82-year-old King Bhumibol Adulyadej to end his long silence and intervene, but there was no word from the widely revered ailing monarch.
Tyrell Haberkorn, a political scientist with The Australian National University, said: ‘I am gravely concerned that a bloody suppression will only further entrench the culture of violence in Thailand.’
She said the protests stemmed from the outrage that the marginalized majority felt at the lack of say they had in governance, which was largely in the hands of the elites.

 She added:’If one listens to the protesters… people are willing to risk their lives because they believe that they are making a more just Thai society for themselves, their children and their grandchildren.’
The latest violence erupted after the Red Shirts’ military strategist - a former Thai general - was shot and seriously injured, apparently by a sharpshooter, as he spoke to foreign journalists on Thursday.
Witnesses saw several groups of a dozen or more people detained at the scene of several clashes.

No figures were released on how many were detained.

As night fell yesterday, defiant Red Shirt leaders led followers in Buddhist prayers and called on volunteers to bring more tires for their barricades.
 
Another protest leader, Weng Tojirakarn, demanded today that the government declare a cease-fire and pull back its troops because ‘we don’t want to see a civil war. If it does happen, I don’t know how many years it will take to end’.

The Red Shirts, mostly rural poor, began camping in the capital March 12 to try to force out the prime minister.They claim his coalition government came to power through manipulation of the courts and the backing of the powerful military.

The military had forced Thaksin Shinawatra, the populist premier favored by the Red Shirts, from office in a 2006 coup. Two subsequent pro-Thaksin governments were disbanded by court rulings before Mr Abhisit became prime minister.

About 10,000 Red Shirts have barricaded themselves in a protest zone in Rajprasong, Bangkok’s premier shopping and diplomatic enclave. They have set up a perimeter of tires and bamboo stakes, refusing to leave until Mr Abhisit dissolves parliament and calls new elections.

The occupation has forced luxury hotels and high-end shops to close for weeks. Major roads around the protest site were blocked to traffic today, and the city’s subway and elevated train shut down. The embassies of the United States, Britain and other countries were also closed.

The political uncertainty has spooked foreign investors and damaged the vital tourism industry, which accounts for six per cent of the economy.
The crisis had appeared to be reaching a resolution last week when Mr Abhisit offered to hold elections in November, a year early. But the hopes were dashed after Red Shirt leaders made more demands.

The Reds are right. If not you can kiss my Welsh arse!

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on May 3, 2010
in Others
. 15 Comments

This is a blog only/Updated 07/05/10

andrew-drummond-2010-ipu-conf-cropI do not always see eye to eye with British Ambassadors but one who has been putting the egg back into the pudding since he left is British Ambassador Derek Tonkin who this week wrote to ‘The Times’ pointing out that the ‘Thunderer’, as it used to be known back in the Crimean War, had got its reporting, and in particular its editorials, in a twist when it came to Thai politics.
The Times has called for immediate elections and in the latest rant against Thailand’s Prime Minister repeated the miscomprehension that Abhisit Vejjajiva was not legally in power etc.  Previously The Times’s Asia Editor Richard Lloyd Parry had said of Abhisit Vejjajiva: “Rarely since the days of Dr Faustus has a gifted and promising man achieved power through such grubby and disreputable means”.

Yes. And Brutus was an honourable man.

Derek Tonkin

Derek Tonkin

Derek Tonkin was Ambassador to Thailand when I first arrived here working for the Observer and its film company.  His letter was written with Dominic Faulder, formerly Asiaweek, Asia Inc. They could just as well have addressed letters to the BBC, Sydney Morning Herald or Washington Post.

‘Set aside partisan grievances ‘


“Sir, When you say (leading article, April 26) that Abhisit Vejjajiva “has been undermined by a simple and devastating fact — that his party has lost every election under his leadership”, you overlook another much more important fact, which is that since its foundation in 1946 the Democrat Party in Thailand has been the leading coalition partner in several administrations, but has never won an overall majority. That good fortune has been enjoyed only once by a political party in Thailand — the Thai Rak Thai Party founded and led by Thaksin Shinawatra, which was itself an agglomeration of different parties and won 374 of 500 seats in the 2005 elections.
Coalition administrations in Thailand, for better or for worse, are the norm. In the last elections in December 2007 the Democrat Party came second and secured 30.3 per cent of the constituency vote for 400 seats and 36.6 per cent of the parallel party vote for the remaining 80 seats. This was the Democrats’ best performance to date, and it is quite conceivable that the party, which has performed creditably in by-elections, could do even better at the next general election. It was not, as you say, “the consequence of military force” that led to Mr. Abhisit’s selection by the House of Representatives as Prime Minister, but a realignment, Thai-style, of elected representatives after a court ruling went against the incumbent pro-Thaksin party.
Fresh elections may provide a useful breathing space in which tempers can cool, but it would be naive to suppose that the fundamental polarisation in Thai society of recent years will thereby be resolved. This can only be done peacefully at the ballot box if all concerned set aside immediate partisan grievances and come to a better agreement on the rules by which parliamentary democracy can be made to work for Thailand and all its people.
Derek Tonkin (British Ambassador to Thailand, 1986-89)
Guildford, Surrey
Dominic Faulder
Bangkok


Now if you read what ‘The Times’ has been publishing, quite often from the Asia Editor in Tokyo,  Tonkin has rather demolished ‘The Times’ stance on Thailand.  And indeed the newspaper, unusually, seems to have fallen for quite a few of the red herrings which have been thrown its way. Nor is ‘The Times’ alone.  Media manipulation gets quite easy when newspapers today are now running minute by minute deadlines, which means they are taking what they are reading without question.

That of course means a ‘fact’ presented in say ‘The Times’ can be a fact in hundreds of papers worldwide in a matter of minutes as the re-write men, who give themselves bylines, regurgitate the net.

So it is no surprise that Thaksin Shinawatra has hired London based political lawyer Canadian Robert Amsterdam, an entertaining self publicist,  to “assist in the current contentious struggle for the restoration of democracy and rule of law in the Southeast Asian nation”, even though Thaksin says he is a ‘minor cog’  in the red shirt movement.

Obvious choise of picture for Times Online

Above - an obvious picture used by Times Online

The days of ‘print these facts or we sue’ are upon us. Not an option open of course to the innocent victims who were gunned down during Thaksin’s ‘War on Drugs’.  So we can expect more of Thaksin ‘the Robin Hood’ or, now managed by a Canadian, perhaps ‘Anne of Green Gables’.  When you sue governments, particularly Russian ones, as does Amsterdam, or take on the Singapore government as Amsterdam does, your clients tends to lose while you gather lots of democratic Brownie points.

Amsterdam has of course taken the case on, not for the publicity, but for the justice, which is why I guess there are more jokes about lawyers than even journalists. But I can see the irony in him also representing the Dr. Chee Soon Juan leader of the Democrats in Singapore.

In Singapore you laugh at the system at your peril - just the sort of government Thaksin Shinawatra aspires to lead.

Well then, what we have been getting from ‘The Times’ is only a slightly upmarket version of what ‘popular’ papers do, just written in words of more than two syllables. I prefer to call it writing for affect, er,  which I guess is journalism, but the author does not necessarily have to believe it. Afficionados of the ‘Glenda Slag’ features in ‘Private Eye’ will understand. Its ’egging the pudding’ in its more commonly used form.

This story from ‘The SUN’ however is probably quite true despite the headline ‘Brits plan holiday in hell’

“Its not a people’s thingy is it?’

One of the problems with the red-shirt protest story may be of course the dearth of foreign correspondents.  In the last two years the correspondents for the three main British ‘heavy newspapers’ have jacked it in here in Thailand in the main replaced by Aussies (also filing to Fairfax and News Ltd., in Sydney)…and, of course, the re-write men.
The ‘re-write men’ are usually thousands of miles away from the places they are writing about, which is fine by me because it lets me get down to what I like doing best. But of course sometimes it does have its small disadvantages.
I spoke to a friend in News International in London last week who asked: “Andrew, what exactly is going on in Thailand?” then  she added: ‘Its not altogether a people’s thingy is it?’

So despite the BBC and Times reports etc some Brits at least are wondering what on earth is going on. Thailand’s red-shirt demos even became the butt of jokes in a ’dinner table’ Brititsh TV comedy sketch on ‘Bremner, Bird and Fortune’ when the merits of collecting blood or throwing poop were discussed.

The question ‘What exactly are they demonstrating about?’ was posed but never answered as the lady of the house declared she would probably use her maid’s poop to throw at Westminster.

Abhisit Vejjajiva

Abhisit Vejjajiva

The people’s revolution element has not been totally sold.
People are rightly suspicious of ‘People’s’ movements in Asia. You only have to look to Manila.

So here’s the rub. There are two ways of foreign reporting. One is to report the situation from your own perspective, knowledge and culture, and the other is to get down and dirty, and in this case do lots of mingling among the red shirts, listen to the stories of the poor etc, read Giles Ji Ungpakorn in the Socialist Worker, and write it from the ‘people’s’ perspective.

But every so often getting down and dirty is often not the right way about it if you need to know what is happening. The expression ‘can’t tell the wood from the trees’ comes to mind.

No matter how heart-wrenching the copy is from people living in poverty in north east Thailand, all it does is add bricks and mortar to the great social divide story, which is Thailand, Cambodia, the Philippines, etc….and which may be missing the point.

Some are suggesting that the white Thais in Bangkok are out of touch and are horrified at the unscrubbed working classes on their doostep and unable to comprehend what they are complaining about. They have a touch of the the Marie Antoinettes it seems.

‘Telling it as it is’ - a boy from the Valleys

In Bangkok too we have an Australian claiming to have served seven years in the Aussie Army giving speeches to the red-shirts exhorting them on from their podium and. On the blogs we have a Welshman reporting from within the red demos ‘telling it as it is’ and inviting those who disagree to kiss his hairy Welsh arse.

If the Scots sound like they are always about to start a fight then  the Welsh accent seems to seems to reflect a sort of desperation or depression in the valleys as in ‘Little Britain’s’  ’ I’m the only gay in the village!’  sketch. But I am assured they have made cultural and culinary contributions to Thai culture.

Cultural contributions. Welsh cuisine in Bangkok

Cultural contributions. Welsh cuisine in Bangkok

Anyway anyone can do this sort of reporting from Toxteth or the Sir Francis Chichester Estate in South London in a country where the current P.M. Gordon Brown was also not elected by the people but by fellow M.Ps. 
But what no newspaper or blogger has done yet is to paint a picture of what exactly may happen if this movement were to bring down the current government, and indeed who are the people waiting in the wings in the Phuea Thai party, which has aligned itself to Thaksin Shinawatra. And then of course it all becomes a bit deja-vue.

F-16s over Laos in the Green Curry war

The phrase ‘Pass the sick bag Alice’ comes to mind. What we have apparently is a lineup of politicians who have been screwing the working classes in Thailand ever since each discovered he was not one of them any more.  Their Chairman General Chavalit Yongchaiyudh even managed to lose a war against Laos, despite sending in the F-16s, which was started over logging, one of his wife’s pet past-times.

(Pause for self promo par: I managed to tag this ‘The Green Curry War’ in the Observer just as my ‘Battle for Sleeping Dog Hill’  in the Telegraph recorded the loss of the Karen base at Manerplaw to the Burmese army. The actual Karen translation I was given I think was ‘Dog lying asleep in a semi-prone position hill’ but its too difficult to shout between foreign and picture/art desks)

Chavalit also led the country triumphantly…..into its worst economic crisis ever, except for some advantaged rich people who were fortuitously forwarned and changed their baht to dollars.

These are the guys who have screwing down the price of rice….to the farmer that is. The exporters still have their BMWs! And who signed the free trade agreement with China leading to Thai supermarkets being flooded with Chinese fruit and veg?

There is no doubt that the encampments in Bangkok have bred a new solidarity among the UDD and redshirts, but where is it going to lead Thailand?

‘My, wasn’t that a rather jolly coup’

People complain that Thaksin was unfairly ousted.  They are absolutely right. He was ousted because those who did so thought that it was the only way to get a Prime Minister into the courts. Attempts to curtail his excesses had failed from many directions. Even at the height of the military coup there was a collective sigh of relief.  But you cannot use the words ‘tanks’ with ‘good’ when sending this story back home, and in any case, as is their wont, the military then hashed things up.

Considering Thaksin Shinawatra’s friendly and lucrative relationship with the world’s worst military in the world in Burma I am not crying too much over Thailand’s kast coup.

abhisit-hitler

Had the red-shirts come in to defend Thaksin before the tanks then we would be looking at a different scenario today. But these things cost time and money I guess and Thaksin was far to busy protecting his.

Traditionally in the past,  corrupt Prime Ministers have been allowed to keep the stash they made in power.  Thais can choose that system again when they go to the polls in November.

Then of course the yellow shirts think Thaksin is the dictator

Then of course the yellow shirts think Thaksin is the dictator

‘Don’t mention ze war!’

The placards in the red shirt camps of Abhisit depicting him as the dictator Adolf Hitler are of course nonsensical.  The irony of course is that, like Thaksin Shinawatra,  Adolf Hitler, was elected to office by popular vote, a good reason to fear democracy.
National socialism, as we know it,  is when you get one group of people, preferably all wearing the same colour uniform, claiming they represent the working man, who have a charismatic leader, who leads them to attack those whom they see as robbing them of their rights and destiny.  Following their ‘democratic’ election they have a tendency to plunder and dispose of their enemies both externally and internally. purging their own and of course the press and woe betide those who disagree.

But the use of ‘Hitler’ by both sides, yellow and red, shows just how primitive their messages can be.

I will say this however, I have spoken with hundreds but will never argue with a ‘red shirt’,  or the boss of a Bangkok motorcycle queue.

‘Eva’, as they say, was just a musical.

‘The Charmer Making a Mess of his country’ - The Times ”The Prime Minister of Thailand, best friends at Eton with Boris Johnson, is presiding over a chaotic and callous regime”.

Thailaind crisis is not a struggle against elitism

So Richard,Why can’t British public schoolboys rule Thailand?

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on November 10, 2009
in Others
. 44 Comments

This is a blog

I have been watching with interest the web reaction to ‘The Times’ interview with Thaksin on some of the local forums, and am amazed that few people actually get it……. and that, perhaps,  includes the author.
The interview by Richard Lloyd Parry was indeed a

Thaksin reminisces about his days in London

Thaksin reminisces about his days in London

scoop. It was the first time Thaksin laid his cards on the table to such an extent to the foreign press, and even though nobody else from the foreign press seemed to want to chase this particular scoop, Parry got full access and then a tape recorded interview - the transcripts which were apparently provided by Thaksin’s staff themselves.

So Thaksin went into this interview eyes wide open and obviously expecting some political capital out of it.
Now take a look at the news story and look at the actual transcript of the interview.
Well actually you can’t check the news story now if you are in Thailand, unless its posted somewhere else, because that has been blocked, well, so says the man you cannot gag in ‘The Times’.
Actually the interview has not been blocked which is quite surprising, or it it?  No not really, because it is the news story more than the interview, which has caused the offence.

Enter the conquering hero
Actually the author has missed the bottom line on this story and that it is quite simply: Thailand is going to the dogs but Thaksin says will come back to power in Thailand by hook or by crook with Puea Thai after the next election, his sins will be wiped, he will be found not guilty, and he then can put the country together again and save us all.
If he wants to march in, he will march in from the north, but he wants to avoid bloodshed, he says, thankfully for once.
Richard Lloyd Parry, in the interview labours a lot on, and questions, the role of the Monarchy and or institution thereof.  That is all perfectly valid. But Thaksin Shinawatra is very careful in his answers, whether we believe him or not. He has said nothing against the monarchy, but criticised advisors to the monarchy and even suggested they tried to ‘assasinate him’.  In fact the Times claims that Thaksin wants the monarchy reformed, but that comes from a question by RLP  and Thaksin is answering ‘Yes, Yes’  to reforms of institution around the monarchy.

So actually the interview does not stand up the story but perhaps could have done had he asked the appropriate questions and we have to assume the ‘ Times’ has not censored the interview.

Actually anyone reading the interview might gather that the interviewee thinks he is one step short of canonisation. So blood has already been drawn there intentionally or otherwise.

But in fact what ‘The Times’ has done is to use the interview to convey a certain set of circumstances, and relationships, which have been widely talked about in  journalistic and diplomatic circles in Bangkok, and London, and get them into a news story.
It would be inappropriate  for me to spell out what that conspiracy, real or imagined, is.

That ‘Times’ agenda seems to be confirmed by a follow-up story by Richard Lloyd Parry headed: ‘The interview that dared to break Thai Royal taboo’.

I have always seen, rightly or wrongly,  Richard Lloyd Parry, as a closet supporter of Thaksin, even though he once described him as unsavoury he has painted, the current Prime Minister, as much more of an ogre.  I took ‘The Times’ to task about it about earlier in this year. See this for example ‘The charmer making a mess of his country’.

Richard,  who lives in Tokyo, as a journalist has never had to live under Thaksin and things like the ’War on Drugs’ and media suppression and men with baseball bats at the FCCT.

The possibility that Thaksin could actually be guilty of the crimes brought against him have been given half hearted acceptance in ‘The Times’ if any at all.

The fact that he was democratically elected it seems is enough. This is about a threat to democracy. Of course democratically elected leaders can have their own agenda as Adolf did.

The newspaper was silent about his critics when Thaksin took over Manchester City. If you wanted to see criticism of Thaksin you had to look to the sports pages of the Daily Mail and Guardian.

Anyway I voluntarily  parted company with ‘The Times’ earlier this year to return to my old friends at the ‘Evening Standard’ (or rather  ’Eenie Stannit’ according to comedian Eric Morecombe).

By that time  I was concerned about ‘The Times’ and went public about why, and after 10 years, they were suddenly equally concerned about my byline appearing in ‘numerous other newspapers’.

Though I have since written for them, I do not want to represent them. They would be foolish to disagree.
Anyway, who am I to say Thaksin is not a democract and a man of the people which he described himself in the interview, agreeing he had some similarities to Aung San Suu Gyi?   Well they were both democratically elected and removed from power for example.

Needless to say Thaksin is a lot friendlier with Burma’s ruthless military junta, with whom he does business, so you wont see him chanting in support of democracy and Aung San Suu Kyi. 

(And ‘Man of the people’ ? Well he was not exactly brought up in the fields of Issan. He comes from a long line of Thai Chinese Royal tax collectors (ironically) and muleteers doing something along the Thai Burma border and dealing with whatever used to cross there)

On November 9th Richard also wrote this.”Mr Thaksin is a paradox. While in office, he was feared and loathed by many Thais, especially the educated middle-class, as an opportunist and authoritarian who trampled on human rights, the media and independent institutions in the pursuit of power. For the rest of the population he was — and remains — Thailand’s most adored leader, re-elected repeatedly and forced out by a naked military coup.

“After the generals returned power to elected politicians Thais voted for Mr Thaksin’s supporters and proxies who were subsequently forced out of power not at the ballot box, but through a series of questionable court decisions.”

That’s one way of looking it (though I am not sure what a naked coup is) and clearly Richard thinks the courts were rigged in all the Thaksin cases.  So lets not talk about what his new buddy Hun Sen in Cambodia  is doing to his people and their land and homes, which he is  bulldozing selling to foreigners, Thaksin included.  Thaksin will not be talking about it, as he is now economic advisor to the Cambodian government.

What it means though is that, if and when Thaksin comes back into town on his white charger, and Thai courts become honest again and find him innocent, I’ll be following British public schoolboy Abhisit and paddling my own canoe out of town and heading for retirement like that other ex-British public schoolboy and former excellent but unelected Thai PM, Anand Panyarachun.

So why can’t former British public schoolboys rule Thailand?

I guess we are of touch with the common man.

Thaksin’s ‘red army’ capitulates in Thailand

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on April 14, 2009
in The Times
. 1 Comment

 Link to Evening Standard    Link to Evening Times

From Andrew Drummond, Bangkok

A leader of the red-shirted army of embittered Thai ex-Premier Thaksin Shinawatra today announced an end to the protest which brought holiday chaos to the Thai capital.

With the red-shirted army in complete disarray in Bangkok today and cornered around government house, Veera Musikapong, one of its five leaders announced: “The protest is over”.

He added: “But that does not mean we have surrendered.  We do not want any more of our supporters injured.”

Buses were laid on by the government to take the protesters home. Musikapong urged supporters to head for the northern bus terminal and be careful.  

Then together with other protest leaders he surrendered himself to Police Commissioner-General Pol Gen Phatcharawat Wongsuwan, Thailand’s police chief.

With the exception of Thaksin Shinawatra all the leaders were all in the bag.

The announcement came after the number of supporters of the so-called ‘Democratic Alliance Against Dictatorshop’ which last week topped 100,000 had dwindled to just two or three thousand.

Overnight they had disappeared in droves. Many looked anxious as they left the barricades, abandoning their red shirts, hats and scarves.

As thousands began their return  to the North Eastern provinces, the current Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, a school chum of Boris Johnson, can claim a major political victory.

Almost miraculously there have been only two deaths in two days of fighting in the streets of Bangkok, and neither of them was inflicted by government forces.

The two fatalities came when red-shirts clashed with market traders at the city’s Nang Lerng market.  And one of them a 53-yr-old man was shot dead by a Thaksin supporter.

Overnight two soldiers were also injured in drive-by gun attacks.

Today is a black day for Thaksin Shinawatra , who commanded tremendous support from the poor people of north east Thailand , whose voting power alone can pull down a government.

For over a week he had urged his ‘red-shirts’ to converge on Bangkok and bring the government of Eton and Oxford educated Prime Minister to its knees.  For a day it looked like they were winning as they stormed a conference of ASEAN ministers in the resort of Pattaya, causing them to flee back to their home countries.

Egged on by their success, the red-shirts then marched again on Bangkok gathering over 100,000. As tourists were urged to leave, and the British Government advised travellers not to come to Bangkok, the situation looked grim.

But 43-yr-old Prime Minister  Abhisit Vejjajiva , who himself was hit with by a flying brick, hastily called police and army chiefs together. Yesterday the army moved in destroying barricades and sending protesters fleeing  by firing volleys of predominantly blank shots.

Today, despite complaints by Thaksin, best known in Britain as the one time owner of Manchester City Football Club and known to fans as ‘Frankie, that the Army had fired real bullets and that the army had ‘hidden’ the bodies, there appeared little evidence to back his claims.

He had described the crackdown as brutal. But many found irony in the remarks made by a former Prime Minister who has been widely condemned by Human Rights organisations, not only over the disappearance of human rights activists but for the injudicial killing of over 2,500 in his self initiated ‘War on Drugs.”

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, said: “Thaskin Shinawatra does not believe in democracy and never did. It is not in his nature.”

As for the remaining protesters he said: “They can continue to protest if they wish, but they must do it peacefully.”

Surrounded and without food and water supplies in the hottest week of the year they are not expected to stay long.

Mr. Vejjajiva said he would continue to try and unite the country and would listen to complaints from poor farmers from North Eastern Thailand.

army-joins-inA  black pall of smoke from burning tyres rose over Bangkok. But there was little else to show the weeks days of chaos.  Revellers celebrating Songkran, the Thai New Year, carried on with the tradition of dousing themselves with water, a custom which has turned riotous, but all in good nature.  And the army and police joined in.

 

‘

 

 

Thai Premier will not resign - Scene set for Bangkok showdown

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on November 27, 2008
in The Times
. 0 Comments

 

Coverage by this author on the Bangkok airport protests

Link Thai protesters block second airport Daily Telegraph

Protester is shot dead as chaos engulfs Thailand - Evening Standard

1500 British tourists stranded in Bangkok - Daily Mail

Britons tell of being trapped by Thailand’s politicial crisis - Daily Telegraph

Crisis leaves thousands trapped in Thailand - Daily Express

Thugs crack down on Thai protesters - Daily Express

Police brace for raids on Bangkok airports - Daily Telegraph

Thai PM declares airport emergency - The SUN

Thai airport to remain shut - SKY NEWS

Britain will not charter planes to rescue tourists - Daily Telegraph

5000 Britons stranded in Thailand as Foreign Office refuses to charter planes - Daily Telegraph

 Empty planes leave Bangkok as Britons remain stranded - Daily Telegraph

Thai Premier will not resign. Scene set for confrontation in Bangkok
From Andrew Drummond, Bangkok
November 26
Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat tonight refused to step down saying ‘I have done nothing wrong’  and left it to police to deal with the yellow shirted protesters who have seized the  country’s international airport.
Shortly after his return to Thailand from Peru to be greeted by red-shirted pro-government supporters in the northern capital of Chiang Mai, he immediately declined an invitation to resign made earlier in the day by Thai army chief General Anupong Paochinda.
His dry-mouthed 20 minute speech, which included a list of good things his government had done for the country, did little to allay fears that the long running dispute, involving thousands of tourists,  would deteriorate rapidly.
And it immediately spelt bad news for thousands of tourists, soon to become tens of thousands, trapped in the country, on the closure of the world’s 18th busiest airport and at the beginning of the country’s tourism peak.
Among those trapped are hundreds of Britons, who are now being housed in hotels in Bangkok and on Thailand’s eastern seaboard.  This number could rocket by a 1000 a day.
And last night there were real fears that a violent clash was imminent.
Earlier in the day General  Anuporn Paochinda announced at a press conference that that best course of action to solve the dispute would be for the government to dissolve parliament and call new elections.  Demonstrators of the PAD (People’s Alliance for Democracy)  should also relinquish their control of Bangkok International Airport , he said.
“I do not want to put pressure on the government,” he added.
Last night at Suvarnabhumi airport yellow shirted anti-government protesters jeered the speech by, the brother-in-law of ousted Prime Thaksin Shinawatra, and looked to all purposes as if they had dug in for a fight to the end.
A police operation to move thousands of them from the country’s new showcase international airport could cost millions of dollars and cause massive collateral damage.
After a night and day in which four bombs were set off , then tourists witnessed running fights at the airport,  while outside anti-government shot at supporters of deposed Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, Thailand’s army chief General Anupong presented a possible solution  which had been decided by an army monitoring panel, the General said.
Just hours before the General’s pronouncement, some 3,000 tourists trapped inside Suvarnabhumi airport were evacuated and taken on buses to hotels in Bangkok and the surrounding area, but some as far away as the resort of Pattaya 100 miles away. They were not told in advance where they were being taken, but assured that they would be found rooms.
Then the Airports Authority of Thailand began evacuating their own staff.  Currently thousands of supporters of the People’s Alliance for Democracy are staying put and several tons of water and foodstuffs has been brought in.
Early yesterday several flights managed to land and take off from Suvarnabhumi before the airport was completely closed at 4.am.   One of those was the British Airways Sydney-London flight, which had been diverted to Singapore.
On that flight was Geraldine an Investment Consultant from London who said: “I was amazed. People played down the troubles so much that all I expected was a couple of old men waving a stick. It was a shock to arrive to see thousands upon thousands of demonstrators.”
No sooner had the British Airways flight departed than bombs went off in several places, one outside Suvarnabhumi airport, one outside the former international airport at Don Muang, where the Thai Cabinet has been meeting since being ousted from Government House, and two in Bangkok city.
Some 18 people were injured but this fortunately there were no fatalities.
Overnight some 3,000 people slept over inside the airport’s departure and arrival halls: many making beds out of luggage trays.
Peter Pomfret, from Ealing, said: “All in all it was a good natured evening but not something I would like to repeat. I guess they know what they are protesting about.”
And in the morning an almost carnival atmosphere dominated the departure halls.  Scores of PAD protesters wearing yellow shirts and ‘We Love the King’ baseball caps, weaved among the tourists distributing food,( rice, omelettes, soya bean milk) and water.
They also distributed leaflets apologising for the inconvenience to foreigners. ‘We’re sorry. We just need to bring down this corrupt government,” read one.
Tourists were told that the protesters planned only to be at the airport for one day
Said  Don Lancaster, 63, from Clitheroe, Lancashire: “Its all been very pleasant, well for a protest that is. They have given me food, explained what they are complaining about, and even given me a plastic handclapper.  They told me to clap it if I ever had any problems.  Can’t get nicer than that.
“But this is no place for families. I have seen some families here with young children and they are getting pretty desperate.  The worst thing of all is that nobody, no authorities, no airlines, has been telling us what is going on.”
John Taylor, 44, from Southampton, stuck with his wife and daughter said: “They have asked us to be patient. But how patient can you be with a two year old girl in tow. These people are causing real hurt. I don’t care what they are protesting about.  Why take it out on us.”
PAD demonstrators who want an end to the current government led by Somchai Wongsawat, brother-in-law of disgraced former P.M. Thaksin Shinawatra, still a very popular figure among the rural poor, looked last night like they were prepared for a long siege, even though they claimed they just wanted to ‘greet’, or rather protest when Somchai returned from an Asia Pacific summit in Peru.
If they do not withdraw however, said General Anupong, they could be subject to ‘social action’ – and for that many people are reading military force.
Anupong has repeatedly said he will not initiate a coup against the current Thai government which was elected democratically and mainly on the vote of the rural poor.
But he is believed to be widely critical of a government which seems to be unable to come to any decision and has to meet in secret and now in Chiang Mai for fear of a PAD blockade.

 

 

 

Thaksin Shinawatra branded a criminal. Thais seek extradition

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on October 22, 2008
in General News
. 2 Comments

 

From Andrew Drummond,
Bangkok Supreme Court, October 21 08
Former Thai Premier and owner of Manchester City Football Club was branded a criminal today and jailed for two years while ‘in absentia’ in England.
After finding him guilty of corruption in a land deal  the Supreme Court submitted the verdict to Thailand’s Attorney General to pass to Britain for extradition proceedings.

PAD protesters at Government House - Picture Andrew Chant
Thousands of Thais, members of the opposition People’s Alliance for Democracy were last night on the streets of Bangkok also calling on Britain to return Mr.Shinawatra  which they said would to put an end to the Bangkok stand-off -  which started when they seized control of Government  House here three months ago.
Sporting banners reading ‘Send Thaksin back now’ and ‘UK Government Stop Harbouring Criminals’ members of the PAD cheered and sent thousands of plastic hand-clappers off as the sentence against Thaksin Shinawatra, known as ‘Frank’ to Man City fans was announced.
But as a sign of how split the country is the judges only voted 5 against 4 for the conviction and they acquitted Thaksin’s wife of corruption as she was ‘not a member of government’.
Behind the calls for the return of Thaksin is the belief, held widely on both sides, that Thaksin Shinawatra, has been affectively controlling the leaders of two proxy governments since the military junta ousted him in a coup.   The PAD say only if Thaksin is in jail will he stop attempting to meddle in Thailand’s affairs.
Kanchana Malaithong ,45, from Lampang sporting a ‘Stop Harbouring Criminals’ placard outside PAD headquarters at Government House said: “The only safe thing for Thailand is if Thaksin is actually put in jail.
“He claims he is not involved in politics, but that is a lie, even his puppet Prime Ministers admit to consulting him. The people are sick of corrupt and greedy politicians.”
The Thai National Human Rights Commission has blamed both the current Thai government, run by Thaksin’s brother-in-law Somchai Wongsawat, and police, for violence two weeks ago when 400 protesters were injured and two were killed, after police attacked with Chinese made tear gas bombs, which contained explosives and blew off limbs.
Shinawatra was found guilty of corruption by signing off on a deal which allowed his wife Pojoman, 51, to buy a massive city centre area of Bangkok from a government department at one third of its market price while her husband was Prime Minister.
Pojaman is currently appealing a three year jail sentence imposed in July for tax fraud involving the same 13 acre piece of land. But she and her husband fled Thailand to Britain, via the Beijing Olympics, after her last conviction.
Pojaman, born into one of Thailand’s richest Chinese Thai families, had bought a sixteen acre site of prime real estate in Ratchadphisek in the centre of Bangkok from a government financial department.
Today’s result was not unexpected even by Thaksin himself who said: “I had long anticipated that it would turn out this way”.
In the earlier case in his judgment the principal judge was quoted as saying that the defendants had ‘lied, cheated, and conspired to evade taxes, which is regarded as a serious crime.”
The last Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej, who admitted in his campaign that he was Thaksin’s nominee, was forced to resign his Premiership when it clashed with a politically oriented cookery show he hosted on television.
The current Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, Thaksin’s brother-in-law has been found guilty by the National Counter Corruption of dereliction of duty in a remarkably similar case in which he allowed subordinates in his department at the Justice Ministry to sell government land without taking the appropriate fee.
And to cap it all the office of the Attorney General’s Office last week petitioned the Constitutional Court to disband the ruling PPP government  and  two of its coalition partners  for electoral fraud.
So far the Thai Government of his brother-in-law Somchai has not even revoked Shinawatra’s diplomatic passport. 
In Britain Thaksin Shinawatra had been told he could not remain owner of Manchester City F.C. once he had a conviction, and last week  the passenger window of his Rolls Royce was reported to have been smashed.
On another occasion while dining at a Chinese restaurant in Notting Hill Gate other customers are reported to have banged their glasses on their tables in protest at his presence.
ends

 

 

Ex Thai PM linked to corruption with Burma junta Times 15 Sep 08

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on September 16, 2008
in The Times
. 2 Comments

Link to The Times story

From Times OnlineSeptember 16, 2008

Andrew Drummond in Bangkok

Thailand’s Supreme Court has issued another arrest warrant for Thaksin Shinawatra, the ousted premier, this time for cashing in on Burma’s military junta while offering himself as a mediator with the repressive regime.

While Mr Thaksin, until recently owner of Manchester City F.C., offered Thailand as host country for talks with Burma, he was secretly cashing in on his relationship and offering his own government’s money to clinch the deal, it is alleged.

This is the second warrant issued for the arrest of Mr Thaksin for corruption as the exiled Prime Minister continues his political career from his home in Weybridge, Surrey.

He is accused of instructing Thailand’s Import-Export Bank to offer the Burmese junta a soft loan for the equivalent of £65 million to enable the government to buy products from his communications company Shin Satellite, which was then totally owned by his family.
He also allegedly told the junta he could reduce the interest rate without consulting his Cabinet.

Mr Thaksin, who was ousted in a military coup in 2006, fled Thailand with his wife Pojama to evade a charge of corruption over a deal in which she was able to buy a 16 acre site in central Bangkok at a third of its price from a Thai government department.

Thailand is currently in a state of political deadlock. Mr Thaksin’s successor Samak Sundaravej was forced last week to step down for hosting a television cookery programme while in office. He also faces charges of corruption and libel, and the first court date has been set for later this month.

Yesterday the majority Peoples Power Party (PPP) nominated Somchai Wongsawat, Mr Thaksin’s brother-in-law, to lead the country - a move which has further angered protesters from the People’s Alliance for Democracy, who seized Government House in Bangkok three weeks ago and who plan to step up their protest.

A spokesman for the PPP, which is widely seen as Mr Thaksin’s nominated government while he is in exile, confirmed that he had been in touch by phone to make his personal recommendation as to who should be P.M.

 

Thaksin Shinawatra’s brother-in-law voted in as PM candidate- The Times 15-08-08

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on September 15, 2008
in The Times
. 0 Comments

Link to Times story

Link to Australian story

Andrew Drummond in Bangkok

 
Thailand’s government party the People’s Power Party (PPP) today nominated a brother-in-law of exiled Premier Thaksin Shinawatra as the country’s Prime Minister, a move which could send the country spiralling into further chaos.

The PPP’s choice of Somchai Wongsawat is certain to antagonise the protesters who have occupied Government House for three weeks, accusing the government of being a puppet of the ousted premier.

Mr Somchai has been acting prime minister since last week, when Premier Samak Sundaravej was forced to step down by the Constitution Court, for breaking parliamentary rules by hosting a cookery programme on commercial television while P.M.

The People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), whose protests have disrupted travel across the country, describing Mr Somchai, a former Minister of Education, as “Thaksin Number Three” vowed to continue in its bid to unseat the PPP.

Sathien Viriyapanpongsa, co-ordinator for the protesters in the People’s Alliance for Democracy said: “In 2006, we fought only to free the country from the grip of Thaksin [Shinawatra] without laying out long-term measures. Eventually, we got Thaksin episode 2 in the form of a proxy government led by Samak Sundaravej.

“Now we are being presented with Thaskin Episode 3. Our protests will continue. We cannot stop now. We can win.”

“We all know who Somchai is. Samak was just a nominee but Somchai is the real actor linked to Thaksin’s family,” PAD leader Somsak Kosaisuk told reporters. “We will not give him the benefit of the doubt or give him a honeymoon period.”

Mr Somchai’s ties to Mr Thaksin - his wife is Mr Thaksin’s younger sister - led to frequent cries of nepotism during his time as the top civil servant at the Justice Ministry. He denies the accusation, noting he got the job before Mr Thaksin came to power.

Somsak Kosaisook had already publicly stated that none of the PPP cabinet would be suitable as a Prime Minister.

The Thai Army is closely monitoring the situation and the end of the State of Emergency which was declared yesterday – even though the government are now planning to meet, not in government house, but at Bangkok’s old international airport at Don Muang.

But senior generals have repeatedly been quoted as saying they would not initiate a military coup.

Mr Samak had hoped to be voted back to power but last week Parliament could not find a quorum to vote him back in.

Mr Somchai is a barrister by profession and a former Chief Justice of Phang-Nga province in South Thailand. He also served in the Ministries of Labour and Justice.

The other possible contenders, Finance Minister Somporn Amornvivat and PPP Secretary Genereal Surapong Suebwonglee were also staunch allies of Mr Thaksin, who fled to London with his wife Pojaman, while on corruption charges. But they were not related to him by blood.

MR Somchai still has to be confirmed by Parliamentary vote on Wednesday, and with a large faction of the PPP now split, his appointment is by no means a forgone conclusion.

 

 

 

Thailand in political deadlock over new Prime Minister - The Times 12 08 08

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on September 12, 2008
in The Times
. 0 Comments

Andrew Drummond in Bangkok
 
Thailand was in a political deadlock today after the country’s parliament could not find a quorum to vote in a new Prime Minister.

Deposed Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej, who was forced to resign for breaking conflict of interest laws by going on a television show called Cooking and Grumbling, had hoped coalition government members, who have a massive parliamentary majority, would vote him back into power.

But most of the MPs boycotted the session, in what was seen as a time-buying move, while several different parties were in negotiation over the country’s leadership. The vote has now been delayed until next Wednesday.

Meanwhile thousands of supporters of Mr Sundaravej have arrived in Bangkok from the provinces, and exiled Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra is reported to have conveyed by phone his choice as new Prime Minister of Thailand.
 
The ‘Democracy against Dictatorship’ supporters have been bussed into the capital to counter demonstrations by the People’s Alliance for Democracy supporters who have taken over Government House, and last week paralysed airports in the country’s tourist hotspots.

PAD leader Chamlong Srimuang cancelled a planned protest by Young PAD, saying: “We do not want violence”.

The political turmoil has caused international tourist arrivals in Bangkok to drop by 70 per cent according to Charoen Wang-ananont, President of the Thai Tourist Services Association.

Holiday bookings to Thailand were being cancelled “right across the board” from Asia to Europe and already hotel occupancy was down 40 per cent for the time of the year, he said, calling for the state of emergency to be lifted.

Some 800,000 Britons travel to Thailand each year.

 

Thai ‘State of Emergency’ lull as government waits budget day- Daily Mail Sept 3 08

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on September 3, 2008
in The Times
. 0 Comments

State of Emergency Bangkok - lull as government hangs on for budget day

Daily Mail Edit
From Andrew Drummond,
Bangkok  September  2

4pm BST

Thousands  of tourists , hundreds of them British, continued their slow evacuation from the Thai capital Bangkok tonight as a ‘State of Emergency’ declared by the government provided a lull in violence.
The  state enterprise unions, who have joined the anti-government protest, allowed flights to continue uninterrupted from Bangkok and the country’s southern resorts of Phuket and Krabi while the stand-off in the city becomes more tense.
And the Thai Airways Union said they wished to help tourists to leave the country unaffected.
Protesters from the People’s Alliance for Democracy, numbering an estimated 70,000 in Bangkok, who want Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej and his Cabinet to step down immediately, were expected to be joined by thousands from the provinces.
The PAD has held Government House for a week, temporarily closed down the tourist airports, and shut down the country’s rail network, claiming that they believe Samak and his People’s Power Party Cabinet, were enriching themselves at the country’s expense – a charge they had previously laid against former Premier Thaksin Shinawatra.
That spells further trouble tomorrow (Wed) a crucial one in the besieged government’s calendar.
It’s Budget Day. 
The main agenda of the Parliament is how the PPP wth its majority is going to allocate government funds and the Prime Minister has refused to postpone the event.
Today, not only did the demonstrators asked him to resign, but the Election Commission which investigated how the PPP got into power also said Samak and his party should step down, because its members had concurred that the PPP were guilty of buying votes when elected.
But that has to be decided by the Constitution Court.
Samak’s resignation was also called for by Abhisit Vejjajiva, the Eton and Oxford educated leader of the Democratic Party, who said he was deeply suspicious that yesterday morning’s violence in which one person was killed and forty more injured was orchestrated…
Abhisit was careful not to directly point a particular person or party but said he was convinced the ‘violence was manipulated by important and influential figures.”
Co-incidentally amongst those treated for injuries in the violent eruption outside Government House was a government MP.
Udon Thani  MP Surathin Phimarnmekhin,  was treated at Bangkok’s Hua Chiew hospital with two stitches for the head injury he suffered during the clash between the pro and anti-government protesters.

But his secretary, Thirapol Suriyo,  insisted,  apparently with a deadpan expression , that Thirapol was not leading pro-government people into the clash.  He was ‘holding surgery for his constituents’ who had come to Bangkok.
Thailand’s Outlook Television Channel, strongly critical of the government, also broadcast footage of two former M.P.s from Thaksin Shinawatra’s Thai Rak Thai Party at this mornings demo.

PAD supporters insist that their opponents,  from the from a group calling themselves the Democratic Alliance against Dictatorship,  have been bussed in from the provinces and paid just under £10 a day to counter-demonstrate on behalf of the government and Thaksin Shinawatra.

So far tonight there remains a state of impass. The Army has been called upon to enforce the terms of the ‘State of Emergency’ but as it was the army who ousted Thaksin Shinawatra in a military coup just how far they will go remains to be seen.
So far they have refused to move the protesters, among which of course, are more than a few army wives.
Meanwhile workers in all the state unions, which cover mainly utilities and transportation, have come out in sympathy with the protesters.
They plan to use the national grid to black out and deprive water from the homes of politicians and police leaders responsible for police violence, they claim was used at an attack on the protesters at Government House.
The leader of the Democratic Alliance Against Dictatorship, is led by a man called Shinawatra Pabunchart who said:  “More of our supporters are coming. We will take back government house.”
Meanwhile a Thai style ‘State of Emergency’ continued to operate.  And that means that it was business as usual in the bars and clubs of Bangkok and the rule banning more than five people gathering was as usual ignored.
The Foreign Office updated its travel advisory to say major demonstrations were continuing in Bangkok but merely advised British tourists to be cautious in those areas.

 

Story One

5 am:BST

State of Emergency -  Graft authority says Thai government bribed for votes

From Andrew Drummond,
Bangkok September 2
An uneasy truce hung over Bangkok today after State of Emergency was declared at the end of a night of violence in the Thai capital.
Children were sent scurrying home from schools, workers went on strike, tourists, thousands of them British, struggled to get out of the country, and anti-government protesters dug themselves deeper into Government House.
Clashes began around 1.30 am and went on until 5am after hundreds of supporters of Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej and ousted Premier Thaksin Shinawatra made their first attack on protesters of the People’s Alliance for Democracy.
One person was killed some 40 taken to local hospitals. There were reports of gunshot wounds.
Then in a bombshell early today Thailand’s Election Commission which has been investigating how Samak Sundaravej came to power made the announcement that this years elections were rigged and the P.M. and his whole party should step down.
The Election Commission is taking Samak’s People’s Power Party to the Constitution Court claiming the party’s deputy leader bought votes.
Now the city is bracing itself for another night of violence. But from which direction they are not sure.
Crucial to any forthcoming battles is what role the Thai Army and Police will play now that a State of Emergency has been declared by Samak Sundaravej.
PAD supporters have been protesting for over a week demanding the resignation of the Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej , elected as the nominee of Thaksin Shinawatra, the former PM who was indicted for corruption and is now in exile in Britain, and selling off his shares in Manchester City F.C.
They claim that Samak, and his cohorts, will enrich themselves and bleed the country in the process. They want an end to western style democracy, because, they say, politicians are able to buy themselves into power.
They have successfully shut down most of the country’s railway system and for two days airports at the tourist hot spots of Phuket, and Krabi, in south Thailand.
Meanwhile police failed to get the protesters out of their occupation of Government House and the Army declined to intervene.
In the last few days Thailand’s police chief has been replaced and so has the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces.
The Army is expected to be called upon to enforce the terms of the ‘State of Emergency’ but as it was the army who ousted Thaksin Shinawatra in a military coup just how far they will go remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, after this morning’s violence, workers in all the state unions, which cover mainly utilities and transportation, came out on strike in sympathy with the protesters one day early.
They plan to use the national grid to black out and deprive water from the homes of politicians and police leaders responsible for police violence, they claim was used at an attack on the protesters at Government House.
Last night’s violence was prompted after supporters of the Democratic Alliance Against Dictatorship, a pro-Samak, pro-Thaksin group, led by a man called Shinawatra Pabunchart moved on protesters at Government House.
He said today: “More of our supporters are coming. We will take back government house.”
Just how orchestrated it was still remains unclear. But Democrats say Premier Samak predicted the violence two days ago and it gave the Prime Minister an excuse to bring in the army.
Meanwhile thousands of British tourists are still struggling to get home from holiday destinations in the south.  The Thai Airways Union which is coming out in sympathy however said they would do their best to help foreigners caught up in the troubles.
The People’s Alliance for Democracy remains defiant, one of its leaders Chamlong Srimuang said: “We are staying until Samak and his party goes. There are not enough jails for us.”

Thousands of UK tourists trapped - Observer August 31 08

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on August 31, 2008
in The Times
. 0 Comments

Andrew Drummond in Bangkok

Link to Observer article

Thousands of Britons were trapped in Thailand last night as mobs protesting against the country’s ‘corrupt’ government laid siege to airports in tourist hot spots. Some 15,000 people were turned away from the airport on the holiday island of Phuket after protesters from the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) stormed the runway and terminals.

Stranded passengers had to carry their bags through cordons to a nearby road where they were forced to hail cabs to take them back to their resorts. The chaos has sparked concerns that thousands of children will now miss the start of the British school term.

The airports at Krabi, now rivalling Phuket as Thailand’s No 1 tourist spot, was also closed, as was the airport at Haad Yai in the south. Last night demonstrators were also heading for Surat Thani airport, around three hours north of Phuket. ‘We want to bring government corruption to the attention of the world,’ said a PAD spokesman.

Having spent their holiday cash, many tourists were wondering how they would get home and find accommodation in the interim. The Tourist Authority of Thailand has asked hoteliers to give stranded tourists discounted or free accommodation, but almost all those from Britain have lost connections on to London which they booked months in advance. Last night many tried to make their connections by bus, minibus and taxi in a 13- hour road trip to Bangkok, but PAD said they were also setting up road blocks on major roads into the capital.

They insisted however that they were not targeting tourists and the protests have remained largely peaceful, though further chaos is predicted. Thailand’s railway system is already 70 per cent out of action due to action by unions in support of the PAD demonstrations. Unions at the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand, have threatened action against the national grid and the Thai Airlines union is threatening to join the protests.

The PAD began their massive demonstrations four days ago demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej and his cabinet. The group argues that corrupt politicians have been able to buy themselves into power.

PAD leaders claim that Samak and his cabinet intend to plunder the country, a charge which they brought against the former Premier Thaksin Shinawatra, now owner of Manchester City FC. The protesters are angry that Thaksin and his wife Pojaman were allowed to flee Thailand after she was jailed and he was charged with corruption.

As the government battles to restore its authority, arrest warrants for treason have been issued against the PAD leaders, who include media magnate Sondhi Limthongkul, former Bangkok governor Chamlong Srimuang, Pibhop Dhongchai, an academic, and labour leader Somsak Kosaisuk. However, police have so far been unable to serve the warrants.

After meeting King Bhumipol Adulyadej at his summer palace in Hua Hin, Samak insisted he would not back down. Bhumibol’s support is crucial. Although he is a constitutional monarch with no formal political role, he has repeatedly brought calm in times of turbulence during his 60 years on the throne.

‘I, the Prime Minister, have come to office in the righteous way and I won’t resign,’ Samak said. ‘I will not back down. I will rule this country and will lead it through all of the problems.’

He also defended himself against critics who say he should not have let protesters overrun Government House in Bangkok: ‘I have been very patient and have refrained from using force.’

But Samak’s position looks fragile. Army commander General Anupong Paochinda has rejected his request to declare a state of emergency, and the Chart Thai Party, a member of Samak’s six-party coalition, said it was ready to suggest the Prime Minister step down.

Last night thousands of protesters remained camped out at Government House, where leaders called for a million people to join their ranks and demand an end to Samak’s seven-month tenure. ‘The protest has already developed into a people’s revolution,’ said protest leader Sondhi Limthongkul. ‘I do believe that Samak is going to resign.

The Thaksin debate. Did he jump or was he pushed?

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on August 12, 2008
in The Times
. 0 Comments

Was Thaksin Shinawatra deliberately allowed to leave?

From Andrew Drummond

Request: Times Sport.

Monday 11th August 2008

 

Thaksin Shinawatra’s decision to flee to Britain was not only predicted but almost invited and today only his staunchest supporters seemed genuinely surprised in Thailand.

Two weeks ago on July 29th both he and his wife Pojaman had applied to the courts to travel not only to Beijing for the Olympics but also to Britain for the start of the football season.

They had been granted permission only to travel to Beijing after which the courts would consider their British trip.

No sooner had they left than the Bangkok press predicted that they would not return.  This was immediately vehemently denied at the weekend by people representing Thaksin saying not only would Thaksin and his wife return to Thailand but also giving the flight number and arrival time from Beijing.

A crowd of cheery supporters waited in vain at the airport.

Pojaman had already been convicted of a massive tax fraud and although she had been granted bail and could delay any imposition of sentence for years while on appeal, there was no appeal for the cases the couple were about to face.

Thaksin and his wife were due today to return to the Supreme Court in Bangkok in Bangkok to face the first in a series of other corruption charges.  They were accused of corruptly buying government land at a knock down price in the centre of Bangkok,  while Thaksin was in power, something akin to Gordon Brown ordering the acquisition of 16 acres of Whitehall for personal development.

And in this case three of their lawyers have already been jailed for trying to bribe a judge.

Thaksin is also due to face other corruption charges.  One is that he brokered a deal with the Burmese military junta enabling them to get very cheap credit from the Thai government Export Import Bank – provided they invested  in business with his Shin Communications corporation.

He is also accused of improperly running a government lottery.

“He was given the chance to leave. His permanent departure would bring an end to a lot of trouble in Thailand. He has massive support but also a section of the population is very angry at what he has done.  They even suspect than on his recent trip he smuggled more money out,”  a former Thai diplomatic official  told me yesterday, before rushing off to join an anti-Thaksin demo.

“This is a Thai solution.  But it’s not a good one.“

Last weekend it was reported that Pojaman boarded a flight to Beijing with nine cases, if so its of course rather a lot for  such an Olympic opening ceremony, now matter how smart one wants to look.

In affect even though Thaksin has massive amounts of money frozen in Thailand nobody really knows his real wealth.  If there is one thing he is good at it is moving his assets in and out of countries and banks. He has been acquitted once of concealing his assets, which he claimed was a genuine mistake.  Another  such charge is in the pipeline.

At the moment he is playing the ‘democracy’ card and he is citing Britain and a wonderful example of such. 

Sweet talk?  Opponents say that particular card was only dealt him when he was ousted in a military coup in September 2006.

Previous to that he had publicly stated  that western styled democracy was not the answer for a country like Thailand and when he was criticised at in the United Nations over misleading the world when he claimed that Thailand did not have bird flu he famously retorted: “The United Nations is not my father.”

Opponents also claim that he was not so concerned about justice when hundreds of innocent people, if not the 2,500 quoted by Human Rights organisation, were injudicially killed in the ‘War against Drugs’ which he initiated in 2003.  Nobody went through the courts for those offences perhaps because its a racing certainty that the police were the major offenders.

At any rate Thaksin’s hasty, or long planned departure, believe what you will, was good for the Thai Stock market which rallied on hearing the news of his departure.

It may also put an end to daily demonstrations against him throughout Thailand by the other ’champions’ of democracy the ‘People’s Alliance for Democracy’

At the moment however Thaksin Shinawatra probably needs Manchester City as much as the club needs his money.  It is a major conduit of his cult of his personality to the rural people of Thailand, from where his major support comes.

And without the fame and exposure City gives him he could just fade into the background completely as just another oriental politician.  There are no shortage of politicians in Thailand in the past,  who have allegedly robbed the country and then had to spend a considerable time in exile – until they are forgiven, of their crimes forgotten.

Thaksin is not expected to return to Thailand in the near future.  As one of his biographers, British academic Chris Baker, noted in Bangkok. “ He has defamed the court. So he has gone for good.”

Judges here are not addressed as ‘My Lord’  but when lawyers address them they usually end the sentence with the equivalent of ‘I am merely dust under your feet’.

The fact is that the judiciary is much the same as when Thaksin was in power . And he made full use of the judiciary to suppress his enemies.  Although the investigations against him were done by committees set up by the military rulers who ousted  him it was the judges who accepted the cases against him as worthy for trial.  Hoisted by his own petard?  We’ll have to leave it to other refs.

But the British government is going  to be hard pressed to support him even though it disapproved of the coup. When Brits are in the mire in Thailand, often claiming they have been framed by Thai police, the standard operating proceduce from the British government is a rather muted: ‘We will not interfere in the judicial process of another country’.   Sauce for the goose?

Wife of Premier League club boss jailed - jail boss fired - Daily Mail

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on August 1, 2008
in The Times
. 0 Comments

Wife of Premier League club boss jailed for three years on tax evasion

Daily Mail

By Andrew Drummond
Last updated at 2:02 PM on 31st July 2008

Comments (5)  Add to My Stories
The wife of Manchester City Football Club owner and former Thai Premier Thaksin Shinawatra was sentenced to three years jail for cheating her country out of millions in a massive tax fraud today.

But then she was released immediately on bail and is expecting to be leaving soon with her husband for the Beijing Olympics.

Pojaman Shinawatra is unexpected to do any real time in jail in the near future. Dressed in a pale blue suit and a string of pearls, she still looked shocked as the verdict was read.
The appeal process could take over eight years if the case goes to the Supreme Court.  The defendants had ‘lied, cheated, and conspired to evade taxes, which is regarded as a serious crime,’ the judge said at the Criminal Court in Bangkok.

 
Convicted: Thailand’s deposed prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra (L) and his wife Pojaman (R) arrive at the Court in Bangkok today

‘The defendants are high-profile and wealthy citizens,’ the judge added, remarking that Pojaman’s husband ‘was the leader of the country and she is obligated to pay taxes as a model for society.’

Pojaman, her brother and secretary were convicted of evading the equivalent of over £10million in taxes in 1997 through a complicated transfer of shares in the family’s flagship communications business Shin Corporation that involved placing stocks in the name of one of the family’s maids.

Pojaman, 51, was accused of conspiring together with her brother Bhanapot Damapong and her secretary.

Her brother, also received a two-year jail sentence. The secretary, who played a lesser supporting role, was sentenced to two years. 
Thaksin’s spokesman, Pongthep Thepkanjana said: “Thaksin is not disheartened. They respect the court ruling but it is not the end. We will fight until the end.”
In fact it is only the beginning of s series of cases now hitting the courts which have been in the pipeline for two years.

Thailand’s Supreme Court decided this week to put Thaksin on trial for corruptly offering the Burmese military junta a low interest loan from the Thai government’s Export-Import Bank in a deal to benefit his family’s satellite and broadband business.

Both he and Pojaman are also currently on trial for corruptly acquiring land in the centre of Bangkok from a Thai government department at a third of its market price, something akin to Gordon Brown ordering his government to hand over 13 acres of Whitehall.

In another case Thaksin Shinawatra is also accused of initiating a government lottery, the proceeds of which were not properly accounted. As these cases are being heard in the Supreme Court there is no appeal.

With houses in Hong Kong and the U.K. and billons of dollars offshore many people in Thailand have expressed the view that they do not think Thaksin Shinawatra will come back from the Olympics.

But if he does, they say, he is already prepared.

They point to the fact that in an unusual move a recent Cabinet resolution essentially replaced The Director General of Thailand’s Prisons, with the former Director General, whom Thaksin appointed.

The outgoing Director-General Wanchai Roujanavong is an authority on international crime and apparently corrupt politicians.

His book ‘Organised Crime in Thailand’ details how politicians play a major part in organised crime in Thailand, how they avoid tax, buy votes, and to a certain extent control the courts, while at the same time playing the role of benefactor to the people.

He said: ‘I expected to be here for another year. But I am a civil servant I must go where I am sent.”‘

 

Thaksin returns to a hero’s welcome -The Times February 28 2008

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on February 28, 2008
in The Times
. 0 Comments

February 28, 2008

Thai ex-premier arrives home to hero’s welcome

Andrew Drummond and Richard Lloyd Parry, in Bangkok

thaksinFeb2808 2

Thaksin Shinawatra, the deposed former Thai Prime Minister, was greeted with a hero’s welcome in the capital Bangkok today as he returned home to face corruption allegations.

The Manchester City football club owner, who was ousted in a military coup in September 2006, was accorded the welcome of a liberator after his Thai airlines 747 touched down on a flight from Hong Kong.

After telling officials in the VIP area that he was worried about his security but that he had confidence in Thai justice, he walked out of the airport and fell to his knees to kiss the pavement.

Mr Thaksin’s return marks the latest step in a remarkable turnaround in fortunes for the former Thai Prime Minister.

Months ago, he appeared to have been consigned to the dustbin of history after being forced out of office in a military coup, stripped of much of his fortune and facing criminal charges that could land him in prison.thaksinFeb2808

But this morning, analysts believe his triumphant homecoming could mark the latest step in his remarkable return to power.

Thousands of supporters, including members of Thailand’s new Government, a smaller number of opponents and 10,000 police, were waiting for him at Suvarnabhumi airport, some carrying banners and life-size cardboard cutouts of his image.

After arriving, he was immediately taken to Bangkok Criminal court to answer a charge of abuse of power.

Once there, he was, as expected, bailed for £136,500 and told not to leave the country without the court’s permission. However, analysts believe that the court was unlikely to refuse such permission, and that the allegations against him may soon be dropped.

No sooner had Mr Thaksin left court than Finance Minister Surapong Suebwonglee announced that he would be appointed as economic advisor to the government.

The former Prime Minister, who has kept himself in the international public spotlight by buying Manchester City and appointing former England head coach Sven-Goran Eriksson as manager, has been banned from politics for five years, along with 110 of his MPs in the now defunct Thai Rak Thai (Thais Love Thai) party.

However, Thailand’s current government, led by current Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej of the People’s Power Party, gained power largely by using the former Prime Minister’s popularity in its election campaign. He was accompanied home by PPP party officials.

It is likely now that moves will be made to lift the ban on Mr Thaksin’s political career even though he has repeatedly claimed he has retired from politics. He still has a massive power base in the north-east of Thailand where his policies are popular with farmers.

“I just want to go home to my family and thank them and everyone for their support,” he said.

Thaksin’s return, however, is likely to lead to further splits in national unity. The military coup came after months of street demonstrations by pro-democracy supporters, who objected to his clampdown on press freedoms, human rights abuses and his alleged corruption.

Memorable returns

— On return from exile last year, Benazir Bhutto, the former Pakistani Prime Minister, planned a two-day procession through Karachi. Hours into the journey, she narrowly escaped a suicide bomb that killed 100 supporters.

— In 1814 the French Emperor Napoleon lost to the allied armies and was exiled on the island of Elba, with a personal staff of 1,000. After 100 days, he escaped to the mainland and caused royalist forces to join him with the cry: “If there is any soldier among you who wishes to kill his Emperor, here I am”

— After 20 years in America, the dissident writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn returned to post-Soviet Russia in 1994, taking two months to cross the country by train, met by well-wishers at every stop

Sources: Times archives, One Hundred Days: Napoleon’s Road to Waterloo

Pictures: Reuters/Getty/EPA

“Why did your police kill my granny Mr. Thaksin?”

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on August 5, 2007
in General News
. 11 Comments

A QUESTION FOR BILLIONAIRE EX-PM OF THAILAND

WHY DID YOUR POLICE KILL MY LOVELY GRANNY?

SUNDAY MIRROR INVESTIGATES: DISTRAUGHT FAMILY SEEK TRUTH
By Kate Mansey And Andrew Drummond

As he ploughs millions into Manchester City, new owner Thaksin Shinawatra is being hailed by fans as the latest foreign billionaire to bring his riches to British football.

But back in his native Thailand, the exiled former prime minister is being investigated over policies which led to the deaths of nearly 2,500 people.

Last week, while Thaksin signed off the purchase of four new multimillion-pound players by Man City manager Sven Goran Eriksson, human rights groups accused the 57-year-old of supporting mass executions and torture during a yearlong war on drugs he ordered in 2003.

In a small town 100 miles south of the capital Bangkok, little Montililai Klinmalee is one of the innocent victims of that war on drugs.

Montililai - nicknamed Noon - was just seven when her grandmother was shot dead in front of her by policemen her family say were acting on orders from Thaksin’s government.Thaksin why did you klinmalee06

(Noon,pictured above, writes to Manchester City)

Now 11, Noon is still confused and traumatised by an event she cannot understand. “What did my granny do wrong?” she asks. “She did not know anything about drugs.”

Holding the hand of her mother Nongkran at the family shop in Baan Laem, in the northern Phetchabun province, Noon says: “I was very young. I did not know anything. But I know now. I am not scared. My grandmother had nothing to do with drugs. I know that.

“Can you find out why she died?” she asks. “Nobody has investigated it here.”

Nongkran, 30, has tried in vain to find out why her mother was killed that day. “I wrote to Mr Thaksin. I wrote to the interior ministry,” she says. “But they never even bothered to reply.

“I don’t understand those people in England who want him to run their football club. Is money all they care about? Maybe someone in England can provide the answers. How can he do these sort of things to his own people?

“When the police came here one of them took a photograph from his pouch and nodded. Then the other pulled his gun and shot my mother in the chest.

“She slumped forwards and then he fired at least five more shots. Then both men turned around and casually walked out of the shop. My mother knew nothing about drugs.”

The family’s story has been looked at by Pradit Charoenthaitawee of the Thai Human Rights Commission, which is investigating deaths during the drugs war launched by Thaksin in February 2003.

Dr Charoenthaitawee said: “I will bring the charges myself privately if need be. We have strong evidence in 400 or so cases. Many of these injudicial killings were carried out in daylight in front of witnesses and many had nothing to do with drugs.”

At the height of the drugs war Suwit Baisan, a cameraman working for Thailand’s government-run TV Channel 11, famously went on his knees in front to Thaksin to ask why his mother and father had been shot.

Thaksin cameraman begs

 (Suwit above: ‘What happened to my parents Mr. Thaksin?’ Courtesy The Nation)

He never received an answer. At the end of 2003, Thaksin declared victory in the war on drugs. He denied police were carrying out executions without trial and insisted many of the deaths were merely the result of drug dealers killing other drug dealers. No investigations were launched.

Thaksin has refused to return to Thailand under the current regime since he was deposed in a military coup last year. As well as human rights abuse accusations, he also faces corruption charges over a £11.3million land deal he struck while PM. If convicted, he and his wife Pojaman face 13 years in jail.

But a trial is more than many of the drug war victims were afforded, claim campaigners. Last week Brad Adams, Asia director of Human Rights Watch, sent a letter to the Premiership questioning Thaksin’s suitability to own Manchester City.

He said: “Mr Thaksin’s time in office was characterised by numerous extra-judicial executions, ‘disappearances’, illegal abductions, arbitrary detentions, torture and attacks on media freedoms.

“The most disturbing period of Mr Thaksin’s rule was his ‘war on drugs’.

“It appears Thaksin is trying to buy his way into polite society in Britain to cleanse his image. The Premier League shouldn’t play this game.”

“Thaksin’s lawyer, Noppadol Pattama, said the allegations against him are unfounded. He added: “As far as I am concerned, he has never instructed any public officer to execute a drug dealer. We will be able to prove his innocence after the general election when we are sure our client will get a fair trial.

“We just tried to solve the drug problem in Thailand by getting tough with criminals. But he has never issued any instructions for shoot-to-kill policies. I hope Manchester City fans and British people are fair-minded. They should suspend their judgment before deciding Thaksin is not fit. He is a fit and proper man to run the club.”

“Last night a Premier League source said they were prepared to question whether Shinawatra passed their “fit and proper person” test to run a football club if any new information came to light.

The source said: “There is ongoing due diligence and if something adverse comes to light we are empowered to investigate and take the appropriate action.”

Tanks roll in under cover of downpour

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on September 20, 2006
in The Times
. 0 Comments

The TimesSeptember 20, 2006Tanks roll in under cover of downpour From Andrew Drummond in

Bangkok

 Thailand fell to a bloodless coup under the cover of monsoon rains last night as tanks and Humvees surrounded Government House and took control of radio and televisions in the Thai capital Bangkok. From New York Thaksin Shinawatra, the controversial Thai Prime Minister, declared a “severe state of emergency” after calling the Channel 9 television station in the capital. But he was cut off mid-speech.

The coup went largely unnoticed in Bangkok’s popular tourist districts, where foreigners packed bars and cabarets oblivious to the activity about two miles away.

But word raced among street vendors hawking T-shirts who packed up their carts quickly and started heading home.

Hundreds of people gathered at Government House taking photos and video of themselves with the tanks, among them Sasiprapha Chantawong, a student at

Thammasat

University. “I support it’s because Thaksin has refused to resign from his position,” Sasiprapha said.

 “Allowing Thaksin to carry on will ruin the country more than this. The reputation of the country may be somewhat damaged, but it’s better than letting Thaksin stay in power.” Hundreds of tourists may find themselves stranded as airlines cancelled flights to the capital.

Last night Emirates, which flies from Bangkok to London via Dubai cancelled flights “due to the rebellious situation in

Thailand”. Passenger Gary Kings, 45, a buyer for a British clothes shop chain from Leicester said: “I have business appointments in Britain and

France.

If others follow suit then I’m totally stuck. There’s convoys of troops on the road from the airport to

Bangkok.” The

Royal

Palace remained brightly lit although the guard was doubled.

For most people the first sign that something was up was the shutdown of television programmes to be replaced with footage of the country’s revered monarch, King Bhumibol Adulyadej.

The coup faction was led by Thai army commander-in-Chief, General Sondhi Boonyaratglin, who was ordered by Mr Thaksin to report to acting Prime Minister, Chitchai Wannasathit.

However, the Prime Minister’s words beamed from the other side of the world on one of his own former satellites carried little weight. Instead General Sondhi ordered police to surrender their arms at Government House and apologised to the public for the disruption.

He then suspended parliament, the Constitution, the constitutional court and declared martial law. Coup leaders later said that they were in consultation with the King , but there was no confirmation from the palace.

In a short statement General Sondhi accused Mr Thaksin of causing disharmony in the country. “I will return the power to the people,” he pledged. The coup faction also broadcast a message across all television and radio channels.

They described themselves as a “group of people who want to develop a democratic leadership under the monarchy”. The coup happened on one of two days a week when Thai nationals wear yellow T-shirts and sweatshirts as a gesture of loyalty to the King.

Although only a constitutional monarch, King Bhumibol carries most moral authority in the country which is notorious for its corrupt politicians. Former Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai, and a member of the opposition Democrat Party, said Thaksin had forced the military to act.

 “As politicians, we do not support any kind of coup but during the past five years, the government of Thaksin created several conditions that forced the military to stage the coup. Thaksin has caused the crisis in the country,” he said.

Although Mr Thaksin was voted into power in elections, his reign has few of the hallmarks of democracy. He has clamped down on the press, has shown he is intolerant to criticism, and has been accused of enriching himself at the at the country’s expense.

Although he claims humble beginnings, his family were rich Chinese merchants. In a drugs war in

Thailand some 2,500 were killed after he ordered police to deal ruthlessly with the problem. When he was criticised by the UN on his human rights record, he retorted: “The UN is not my father”.

This year there have been regular demonstrations against him by the People’s

Alliance for Democracy. The last election was boycotted by the opposition, who said that it would not be fair. 

Powerful Man of Eastern Promises

Published
by
Andrew Drummond
on May 11, 2004
in The Times
. 0 Comments

From The Times
May 11, 2004

Powerful man of eastern promises
A look at the man behind the bid to buy into Liverpool
From Andrew Drummond in Bangkok

THE rise to power of Thaksin Shinawatra, Thailand’s Prime Minister, three years ago was secured by projecting himself as a patriotic, iron-fisted, man of the people.

His promises to slash rural poverty, set up a fledgeling national health service and to purge the country of its drugs problems struck a chord with voters who had never before seen any politician use spin to such effect, let alone base their campaign on real policies rather than a cult of personality.
A fervent nationalist — his party’s name, Thai Rak Thai, translates as Thais Love Thais — he swore to rid the country of its International Monetary Fund debt burden ahead of schedule and to turn Thailand into the new Singapore.

So how then does buying a stake in a farang (a slightly derogatory term for foreign) football team make any sense. The answer comes by asking any Thai, male or female, which team they support. Liverpool or Manchester United will be the reply.

The Premiership has become so ingrained in Thai culture that it is the de facto domestic league: why watch clubs such as Krung Thai Bank or BEC Tero Sasana in a near-empty stadium on a rutted, muddy pitch when you can watch television and see Michael Owen score in front of 40,000 passionate fans?

While he has not disclosed his exact intentions, one of Thaksin’s publicly stated goals is to set up a national football academy with Liverpool’s help. If, during his negotiations with Anfield executives this week, he achieves that and buys a stake, then it will be a coup, only seven months before a general election.
Not only does Thaksin sow the seeds for a better domestic football future, he also shows the world that Thailand has developed to the point where it can buy a stake in the world’s most prestigious league. It also turns attention away from the recent killing of more than a hundred Muslim insurgents in the country’s restive southern provinces.

There are, however, reasons why Liverpool may not wish to be associated with Thaksin. He rose to power under a cloud of corruption allegations. Shortly after his election in 2001, he narrowly missed conviction by the National Counter Corruption Commission for concealing his funds.

The past two years have seen his international standing fall dramatically. He carried out his promised war on drugs, but more than 2,500 people were gunned down across the country in the process.

Thaksin brushed aside the deaths as infighting between drug dealers, but he was heavily criticised by both the United Nations and the US State Department, which condemned Thailand in a human rights report. Characteristically, Thaksin reacted by saying “the UN is not my father” and describing the United States as a “useless friend”.

To compound the matter, Thaksin is also viewed as the man who lied to the world by denying the presence of bird flu in Thailand this year, putting export revenues ahead of the welfare of both Thai and foreign consumers.

Born in July 1949, in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand, the son of a silk producer, Thaksin rose to become reputedly the wealthiest man in Thailand. As a teenager he worked in the family business and ran a cinema for a short while, before entering the police force.

He earned a masters degree in criminal justice at Eastern Kentucky University and a PhD in the same field at Sam Houston State University, Texas.

He was promoted to lieutenant colonel but resigned from the police force to start a career in telecomunications. During this time he organised and signed a deal with the Thai police to provide all its software — a contract that was to set him up for life.

With the profits, he set up his own Shinawatra Computer and Communications Group, which started out making software and then branched into pager services and the cellular phone market. Today, his mobile phone company remains the largest in Thailand and his businesses have branched into real estate, retail and a low-cost airline.

THAI BREAK
• Population: 64 million.

• Thai FA was established in 1916 and became a member of Fifa in 1925. World ranking: 57.

• Honours: 1972: third place in Asian Cup; 1990, 1998: fourth place in Asian Games; 1965, 1975, 1981, 1983, 1985, 1993, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2001 and 2003: winners of the Southeast Asian Games tournament.

• Peter Withe, the former Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest striker, was Thailand coach until November 2003 when he was suspended after the team failed to qualify for the Athens Olympics.

• Teeratep Winothai, a forward, was at Crystal Palace academy, but has now left. Kiatisak Senamuang, also a forward, was briefly with Huddersfield Town.