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Published on October 17, 2007

Sutthipol Thaweechaikarn said Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont would present the draft to His Majesty the King next week for royal endorsement.

The decree will take effect a day after it is published in the Royal Gazette.

He said the registration of candidates would be carried out early next month.

A source familiar with the draft said registration of party-list candidates would be held from November 7 to 11 while registration of constituency candidates would be from November 6 to 12.

Sutthipol said the Cabinet approved the draft as prepared by the EC, so all the key dates would be the same as those earlier agreed by the agency.

He said the EC would also campaign for people living or working outside their home provinces to register to cast their votes in advance. The voters would need only their identification cards to register for the right of advance voting from October 22 to November 22, he said.

He added that the EC would not begin the tackle the issue of election campaign adverts on electronic media until the royal decree comes into effect.

The EC resolved yesterday that provinces will be grouped into eight constituencies with similar voter populations and represented by 10 party-list MPs each.

This approach was picked out of six proposals for organising the eight electorates because more than 20 political parties including the Democrats and Pracharaj backed it as the best arrangement, EC member Praphan Naikowit said.

The decision will take effect after being published in the Royal Gazette soon.

Under the old 1997 Constitution, all 76 provinces were regarded as a single party-list constituency for 100 party-list MPs. The new charter staffs the House with 400 constituency MPs and 80 party-list MPs.

Surapong Suebwonglee, secretary-general of the People Power Party, said the EC's third option was more consistent with the new principle for zoning, which assigns provinces to constituencies according to their socio-cultural profiles.

The first pattern, which was selected by most political parties, divided provinces only by population, he said.

"For example, the first pattern put Nakhon Ratchasima in the same zone with provinces in the Central region. But we know well that Korat [Nakhon Ratchasima] belongs to the Northeast [in terms of culture and lifestyles]," he said.

However, the composition of the constituencies would not make much of a difference to the voter bases for political parties, he added.

Atthayuth Butrsripoom,

 Kornchanok Raksaseri,

 Hassaya Chartmontri

 The Nation