Last week it was disclosed that the Criminal Court had scheduled a total of six hearings in September and October on two perjury charges against our dear leader. The lawsuits were filed by an American businessman who alleges that he was taken advantage of by the caretaker premier in a cable-TV joint business venture dating back to the late 1980s.

The plaintiff, William L Monson, president of US-based Clearview Wireless, appears determined to see that the Thai justice system takes its course and that the truth prevails, even though the wrongs he is seeking to right occurred more than 17 years ago.

According to Monson, the story has been quite unpleasant ever since Thaksin, then simply a businessman, took him and company staff to court back in 1989 - a few years after the joint venture was set up here.

The background is something like this: Monson, then a pioneer in the cable-TV business in Hawaii, was first invited to invest in the Thai cable-TV industry in the early 1980s.

He came here and set up the first operation around 1982. Shortly afterwards, Pramut Sutabutr, then director of the Mass Communication Authority of Thailand, now Mcot Plc, introduced him to Thaksin.

At the time Thaksin was completely new to the cable-TV business, but he was keen to pioneer it in Thailand. Initially, he set up a 50:50 joint venture with Monson for a limited service, with each man investing US$250,000 (Bt9.4 million at today's exchange rate) in the business. Later, Thaksin wanted to pull out and sold his stake to the American, who understood that he had hired Thaksin to lobby for the grant of a proper licence to run the business nationwide in Thailand.

However, it later turned out that Thaksin had taken over the business entirely.

That business later became IBC, the country's first major cable-TV operator. When it listed on the stock market in the early 1990s, IBC was worth several billion baht. At that time, Monson claimed that he deserved a 40-per-cent share of IBC, amounting to an estimated $160 million.

IBC, now part of UBC, is currently the country's only major cable-TV operator. It is said to be Thaksin's first major source of wealth prior

to his expansion into satellite, mobile-phone and other businesses and, subsequently, the political arena.

For Monson, the bitterness started in 1989 when Thaksin and company accused him and his staff of embezzling broadcasting and related equipment originally belonging to Monson's first joint venture with Thaksin.

According to Monson, who was here last week to prepare for the court hearings, this was untrue, as shown by a court verdict acquitting him and his staff of the charges. The Court of Appeals also upheld the acquittal when Thaksin's lawyers took the case to the higher court.

In return, Monson decided to fight back by filing two perjury charges against Thaksin just before one of them reached the statute of limitations. Hence the court now has both cases on its hands.

Monson said he was aware of the political difficulties being faced by Thaksin, whom he still considers a friend, but the timing of court hearings wasn't in his control.

The American businessman insisted that he had been fighting for justice and honesty for a very long time - long before Thaksin's political troubles began and well before he became prime minister. In Monson's opinion, the timing is just providential.

Nophakhun Limsamarnphun

 nop1122@yahoo.com