• 
• 

Published on November 18, 2007

Gongsak Yodmani, 35, son of Tourism and Sports Minister Suvit Yodmani, is running for a Bangkok seat in the December 23 polls under the Democrat Party's banner.

Representing a new generation of young MP hopefuls, Gongsak, who holds law degrees from the University of Bristol and Chulalongkorn University, says he hopes to utilise the legal skills he has honed over the past several years at the Bank of Thailand to help implement some new policies.

"I'm particularly keen about national sports development as well as about education so I also hope to help modernise our national library system.

"Over the past few years, I've been helping the party by doing research on some of these policies. On sports, it's sad that we've never really had any serious national development programme over the past several decades. "In my opinion, sports is crucial to public health, youth development, community well-being and international competitiveness etc, so we hope to come up with new legislation to promote sports at various levels in an integrated manner.

"At the basic level, we need to make sure there are adequate facilities and equipment for schools and kids, while at the community level, budget and managerial skills are still short.

"We also hope to overhaul the way we manage young talents and professional sport players so that we can create a working national league for football, for instance.

"I also hope to push for enactment of legislation on a national library system. We need to modernise all libraries nationwide as most are currently outdated, including the national library.

"Our facilities are no longer competitive compared to those in Singapore or Hong Kong. We need to take urgent action, as libraries are crucial to the quality of education and learning.

"The previous Thaksin government might have started a new and modern library (in Bangkok), but it's only a small one. We need to do a lot more.

"If we had to compare the Democrats with the People Power Party or the disbanded Thai Rak Thai party, then I think we could say that our political style is more sustainable as we prefer to deliver our policies by legislation.

"The previous Thaksin government might have delivered quick results, but the foundation was usually weak, so many of its policies were not long-lasting.

"In addition, the previous government liked sensationalism. The multibillion baht purchase of Manchester City football club is another example of creating strong public feelings about a Thai owning an English club, but it's not really the most important thing in Thailand's national sports development plan," he said. Asked if a Democrat-led government would be able to meet the public's expectations, especially in terms of speed, Gongsak said the 43-year-old Abhisit Vejjajiva now leads the party, so speed shouldn't be a problem.

"I guess we will be able to work faster due to younger age, and other factors. For instance, I've been working with Khun Korn Chatikavanij, (the party's deputy secretary-general), and things move pretty fast usually with very tight deadlines. "However, the party also insists on adhering to sound principles, which is the legacy of former premier Chuan Leekpai, [now chairman of the advisory party board].

"In other words, we'll have to show that we really have good policies for the country and we could also implement them with speed or else we'll not be able to meet the public's expectations."

"In addition, we will also have to highlight the short-term benefits of a given policy quickly, as the public might be impatient while we wait for medium or longer-term results.

"More importantly, the government under our leadership will be more transparent [than the previous regime], as we respect and believe in the importance of checks-and-balances mechanisms," said Gongsak.

Nophakhun Limsamarnphun

nop1122@yahoo.com