The secretary general of the Civil Service Commission, Benchawan Srangnitra, has been appointed as chairperson of a new screening committee for the transfer of senior police, Deputy PM Suthep Thaugsuban said yesterday.
Suthep said he was confident Benchawan could manage the task. He also expected a meeting of the Police Commission concerning the police transfers to be held on Monday (Nov 16).
Suthep said the new panel was set up because there had been objections about the old screening committee so the change was made to try to work smoothly without obstacles.
The commission had been informed about Benchawan's new responsibility via a memo, he said.
All seven panel members - mostly senior police and police inspectors - were individuals who had no objections made against them. He expressed confidence Benchawan could handle the pressure as the chairperson.
Asked if previous bids to transfer police had not worked because of pressure on the prime minister in regard to appointing the next police chief, Suthep said he believed the two matters were different and not linked to one another.
It was up to individual commission members as to whether they still had doubts about whether the acting national police chief could transfer sen¬ior police, he said.
The transfer list would be done on a democratic system of majority votes, he said, adding that he was trying to get the majority of people to act in a harmonious way with openminded understanding.
Meanwhile, people who took part in a survey by Assumption University's Abac Poll recently urged the government to get the police transfers done as soon as possible because they feared delays would cause problems.
Some 58 per cent of respondents aged over 18 in 17 provinces said they had heard the police transfer list was unfinished, while 42 per cent said they had not.
About 79 per cent urged the government to complete the list as soon as possible. About 83 per cent said more drug problems would result from the delay, while 81 per cent feared a rise in crime. Some 75 per cent feared police would work lazily, while 73 feared there would be more gambling dens and more wayward police seeking bribes (69 per cent).
About half of respondents felt that getting more than half of top police transferred would be acceptable.