Introduction

After democracy was introduced in Thailand more than 70 years ago, Thai people have since learned and understood more and more about the meaning and principles of the democratic regime. Sometimes they had to learn painful costly lessons but those lessons have eventually led to real development of democracy in term of its essence, not only its form. In the past, economic and political powers in Thailand had influence on each other and those who already possessed economic power often found ways to gain political power as well. On the other hand, some who had political power sometimes set policies to economically benefit their allies without considering public benefit first. Many times, general elections merely served as a tool for those with economic power to sustain their political power by citing the votes that they won by either abusing political influence or bribing. It was like what King Rama VI once said that "One with a bigger fist has the adventage".

Distorting democratic principles and lacking good governance, politicians who won power through dishonest electoral process often caused division among various sectors and they did not care to heal the rift, thus leading to growing disunity and potential confrontation among the people. This "Divide and Rule" strategy adversely affected the country's key institutions and was seriously detrimental to the democratic regime.

To achieve true essence of democracy and heal all those ills, intervention and reform are unavoidable in a form of "political and administrative reform". Although many in the international community and in Thailand may view the action as a "step backward", many others say it is better to "sacrifice an organ to save life". Once the reform gets started, it will be directed towards development of democracy under constitutional monarchy with both form and essence that sustain good social values and the people's well-being.

Main events leading to the reform

In the past five years, the government readily came under public scrutiny for trying to monopolise power and harbouring corruption by interfering in the administration of independent organisations, government agencies and state enterprises and intimidating the mass media. Major cases of suspected wrongdoing are:

Corruption and conflict of interests

- Transformation of mobile phone concession fee to excise tax

- Giving investment incentive to satellite business

- Suvarnabhumi Airport construction and purchase of CTX bomb scanners

- Airport link rail transit system

- State enterprise privatisation

- Public TV intervention

Abuse of power

- Appointments of relatives and close aides to senior government posts

- Budget processing without Parliament's approval

- Abusing international trade negotiations for personal benefit (Exim Bank loaning programme)

- Abusing legal power to investigate assets of government opponents

Government leaders' ethical and moral offences

- Selling satellite and TV concessions to foreign countries

- Trading of stocks among family members without paying tax

Intervention in constitutional investigation system

- Influencing the Senate's appointments of independent organisations' members

- Intervention in the appointments of the Election Commission members, Constitution Court judges, members of the National Counter Corruption Commission and the Auditor General

Right violations as a result of wrong policy implementation

- Extrajudicial killings of many drug suspects

- Failure to solve violence in the deep South

Public disunity and confrontation

- Blocking access to information by those wanting to investigate the government and the prime minister

- Setting up supporters' groups to confront government opponents

Attempted solutions under democratic system

- Peaceful anti-government rallies

- Solutions proposed by respected figures

- Courts' roles (Constitution Court's invalidation of the April 2, 2006 election date and the Criminal Court's ruling that held the Election Commission guilty of malfeasance by approving such an election date)

- His Majesty the King's speech to Supreme Administrative Court and Supreme Court judges on April 25, 2006

Political situation before September 19, 2006

The sights of tanks stationed in central Bangkok and the city's outskirts may look like something critically unusual but for Thai people, they have seen many bad things that suggested possible violent confrontation among themselves before. Superficially, the results of the last election may have reflected people's trust for the government to continue with its second term but voices of disapproval became loud and clear in September 2006. Favouritism and nepotism in the government appeared to know no end while independent organisations under the Constitution became too weak to effectively keep corruption in check. Earlier, opinion polls show declining popularity of the government while protests spread in Bangkok and through the provinces, leading to the House dissolution in February 2006.  Violent ways in the government's tackling of unrest in southern border provinces and of drug trafficking were a mistake that ruined the country's image. Public faith in the top government leader also continually fell as he faced growing allegations of abusing power to harvests interest for himself and family members.

[Note: We are in the process of translating the rest of the paper and will keep updating this file.]