On Tuesday, the Surayud Cabinet approved a landmark bill to fight against abuse of power by holders of public office. The anti-conflict-of-interest legislation, proposed by PM's Office Minister Thirapat Serirangsan, will be considered by the National Legislative Assembly shortly.

The bill is based on Thirapat's extensive research on Thai politicians' ethics, conflicts of interest and corruption. In fact, the former political science lecturer at Sukothai Thammathirat Open University compiled a book on this topic just before he was approached to be one of the 26 interim Cabinet members following the September 19 coup. The minister, currently an associate professor, earlier told me his book project was intended to fulfil the academic requirement for a full professorship after working at Sukothai Thammathirat for more than 20 years.

Thirapat believes that the country needs a specific law to combat the abuse of power among politicians and senior state officials because many of them do not clearly separate the interests of their public office from private or personal interests, resulting in conflicts of interest.

Under the proposed law, politicians or state officials, as well as their spouses, relatives or dependants, would be barred from taking part in any bidding for state schemes, using insider information or state property for private or personal benefit and many other practices.

During the first term of the Thaksin administration, Khunying Pojaman Shinawatra, the former premier's wife, was controversially allowed to bid for a multimillion-baht land plot in Bangkok when a committee concluded that she could do so because the premier did not have direct oversight over the state agency selling the land plot. At present, the Assets Examination Committee, installed by the military junta that overthrew the Thaksin government, is pressing charges against Pojaman over the sale.

According to the bill proposed by Thirapat, the National Counter Corruption Commission (NCCC) would be empowered to stop any bidding for state projects if it received a petition signed by at least 5,000 people suspecting a conflict of interest, or if a minimum of 50 members of Parliament came up with a resolution suspecting such a problem.

In addition, public office holders - especially those involved in the bidding process for state projects - as well as their spouses, relatives or dependants, would face scrutiny of their assets if there were allegations of conflict of interest. Given this provision, it will be more difficult for unscrupulous politicians and senior state officials to be corrupt and then transfer the ill-gotten gains to members of their extended families. The proposed law carries a maximum punishment of 15 years in jail for those convicted in cases of conflict of interest.

Thirapat told me the existing rules and regulations were inadequate to deal with widespread abuses of power among politicians and bureaucrats, as there are currently only a few articles in the National Counter Corruption Commission law that deal with these kinds of offences. He also advocates the use of trusts to manage the assets of public office holders and their spouses, who are barred from holding more than 5 per cent in listed companies while in office.

"We have this requirement under Article 209 of the NCCC law, but unfortunately none of the politicians in the previous government, including former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, complied with it. By law, shareholdings that exceed the 5-per-cent threshold are supposed to be transferred to a professional trust for independent management. This separates the interests of public office from personal or private interests," he said.

"However, our politicians just ignored the law and instead transferred assets which exceeded the 5-per-cent threshold to relatives or their children. They were probably afraid that all their assets would be locked up if they obeyed the law and used the trusts."

Hopefully, Thirapat's bill will be enacted into law by the National Legislative Assembly before the end of this interim government's term so that Thai politicians and state officials can be expected to be less corrupt in the future.

Nophakhun Limsamarnphun

 nop1122@yahoo.com