TOT's board yesterday decided to delegate the management authority of the state agency's president to its director before it begins an investigation into the huge debts of the cellular business.

According to the board's resolution, and with effect from yesterday, Vuthiphong Priebjrivat will handle the management work of Somkual Buraminhentr on a temporary basis until the board finishes investigating the case of ACT Mobile and Thai Mobile.

Somkual was managing director of ACT Mobile. The move has been taken to ensure that the probe into both ACT Mobile and Thai Mobile is conducted smoothly and transparently, according to the board.

TOT spokesman Djitt Laowattana said yesterday that Somkual's responsibility would be limited to the academic area and other certain tasks.

ACT Mobile and Thai Mobile are joint ventures of TOT and CAT Telecom Plc. ACT Mobile has operated the cellular network, which Thai Mobile has utilised, to provide the 1900 MHz cellular service.

The board also approved TOT forming a committee to investigate the huge debts, of around Bt8 billion, of Thai Mobile. The Auditor-General's Office informed TOT last week that it was also investigating the same case.

Thai Mobile, which started operations in 2003, has only about 80,000 subscribers out of around 40 million total mobile-phone subscribers in Thailand.

Earlier the board intended to transfer Somkual to an inactive post at the Information and Communications Technology Ministry but could not do so because Somkual's contract states that he can only be removed if he fails to meet the board's performance evaluation of his presidency.

The board will evaluate his six-month performance next month.

The board also decided to remove the state agency's senior executive vice president, Vasukree Klapairee, who was in charge of Thai Mobile's business development, on a temporary basis until the investigation is finished.

TOT is the major shareholder of Thai Mobile, with a 58-per-cent stake, while CAT owns the remainder.

TOT is in talks with CAT to buy all 42 per cent of CAT's stake in Thai Mobile as part of a plan to take over the cellular operator.

Vuthiphong said that during his management stint he would focus on ensuring the TOT's operational transparency and would move to realise the TOT's "telecom network pool" project.

Under this project, TOT intends to consolidate the management of the country's major telecom networks, citing the need to maximise the networks for the country's interest. However, the major telecom operators have yet to fully support the idea, and are awaiting more details.