Officials should not try to whitewash the government

Panitan Wattanayagorn, deputy secretary-general to the prime minister and acting government spokesperson, dropped by my institute in Singapore on June 3 to give a talk on the topic "Thailand's future after the election".

The objective of this talk was clear: to glorify the Democrat Party, rather than to discuss the future of Thailand as the title suggested.

His talk lasted for just over an hour, including a question and answer session. Many expected that, as the government's spokesperson, Panitan would have no problem in delivering a straightforward and well-thought-out speech. As it turned out, some of his statements were confusing, others simply surreal. He said that he was a government official and not a member of any political party. Yet, he continually spoke in favour of the Democrat Party.

Obviously, Panitan is launching a nationwide and international election campaign on behalf of the Democrats.

Unsurprisingly, there were two fundamental threads in Panitan's talk: eulogising the Democrat Party for its past success, and demonising the government's opponents. But while Panitan was keen to give his side of the story, he refused to answer some hard-hitting questions - questions that challenge the legitimacy of the government.

Panitan chose to look at the Thai political situation from late 2008 onward, the period after which the Democrat Party came to power. In so doing, it allowed him to ignore other significant political events in the pre-2008 period, such as the launching of the anti-Thaksin campaign by the yellow-shirt People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) which led to the coup in 2006; the PAD's politicisation of the Preah Vihear Temple issue; and its occupation of Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport. Some of these political events were supported, or even participated in, by certain members of the Democrat Party.

Instead, Panitan reiterated an angelic image of the Democrat government. He could not emphasise enough the success of the Democrat Party's economic and social policies, including free education, cash handouts to poor Thais and an income-guarantee scheme for farmers.

Thailand under the Democrats was prosperous, he said, with the country's economic growth reaching 7.8 per cent in 2010, with only 1 per cent unemployment, despite the protracted political crisis. But Panitan could have avoided a lengthy and somewhat tedious elaboration on Abhisit's "impressive" programmes by just referring to Thaksin's past populist policies - since both are astonishingly similar to one another.

Panitan then embarked on attacking his government's opponents, not directly but through sarcastic rhetoric. For example, he reminded the audience that Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva was unable to deliver a policy statement to Parliament on December 31, 2008 because of a blockade by a group of anti-government demonstrators. To Panitan, this marked "the beginning of a long two years of struggle between the opposition and the government".

Panitan also said that the Democrat government wanted to pull Thailand out of a vicious circle of political protests, violence and instability that were "very much centred on the interests of only one man". It doesn't take a genius to understand that Panitan meant to say that Thaksin is behind all the bad things that have gone wrong in the kingdom over the last few years.

The government, according to Panitan, was sincere in wanting to restore peace and promote reconciliation, particularly after the deadly confrontations in Bangkok in May 2010. To demonstrate this, the state authorities decided to release some of the red-shirt core leaders from prison and permitted them to contest the upcoming election. Panitan said proudly that Abhisit had a clear idea at the beginning that he never wished to serve a full term but rather to return power to the Thai people, on the condition that the economy was strengthened and vital political reforms carried out. And Abhisit has kept his promise. In other words, Thailand was lucky to have a prime minister who was not power-hungry.

On top of that, according to Panitan, Abhisit enjoyed an amicable working relationship with the media. Panitan stated: "In all major decisions we made, we invited the media to come in and observe."

Ironically, Panitan swept under the carpet one shocking fact: Under the Abhisit regime, more than 113,000 websites had been blocked and over 300 Thais to date have been arrested for airing views that are different from those of the state.

As the focus was on the freedom of expression, an American scholar asked why Panitan was reluctant to talk about the contentious case of Thammasat University historian Somsak Jeamtheerasakul, who has been charged with lese-majeste, despite the fact that Abhisit once said that academic views were tolerated. Panitan admitted that the case was complicated, but pointed out, "No man is above the law in Thailand."

The glorification of the Democrat government was fulfilled at the expense of many critical issues facing Thailand being totally neglected. Panitan failed to discuss the ongoing conflict in the deep South, the long-drawn-out investigation of the brutal crackdown of May 2010 which led to 91 people being killed and more than 2,000 injured, the political intervention of the military, the reform of the royal institution and the repeated abuse of the lese-majeste law.

Analytically, Panitan's Singapore tour revealed a deep anxiety within the Democrat Party and its associates within the governing and elite circles. They live in fear that the power of electoral democracy will once again pose a serious threat to their entrenched position. When asked by a journalist if the Democrats and their backers would accept the election result this time around, Panitan did not say a word.

Never mind. His silence provided an answer to this intricate question.

Pavin Chachavalpongpun is a fellow at Singapore's Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. The views expressed here are his own.