Is This Really People Power?
 The Nation
December 13, 2005 - Some of the people who flock to Lumpini Park every Friday to attend Sondhi Limthongkul’s political talk-shows claim that the best part of the event is seeing how many people share their hatred and suspicion of the government.
A senior Manager Media Group staff member said last week before the show that the mobile “Muang Thai Rai Sapda” event was not just Sondhi’s stage.
“It is a public platform for democracy,” he said, adding that some people bring political books and posters to sell at the event.
Some areas along the road near Lumpini Hall that used to be occu?pied by Sondhi’s followers are now occupied by people selling sou?venirs, snacks and beverages.
But they were not the only group that went early to the event last Friday.
About 20 students turned up to distribute pamphlets wearing white T-shirts that said “We Love the King” on the front and “Stop Fighting” on the back.
Their pamphlets contained a short story called “Daddy, I’m scared”, in which the narrator tells his father that he is concerned about a fight between his two big brothers. He tells his father that unless they stop fighting, the father will have to solve the problem.
One newspaper photographer who attended the event said the students almost clashed with secu?rity staff. The group eventually agreed to walk away, he said.
Sondhi himself made mention of a group of people in white T-shirts who had come to disturb the show.
“They came with some packages to make noise and dump the pack?ages in the garbage,” he said at the start of the show after co-host Sarocha Porn-udomsak greeted the audience.
“Please keep an eye on them and if you see them, do me a favour and tell the security staff with green armbands. Then we can attack them so they don’t come anymore. Sometimes we have to teach them not to play with people power,” Sondhi said.
But it wasn’t clear if Sondhi was talking about the students.
Nevertheless, is it lawful for a person to ask people to attack oth?ers? Was that a proper reaction by someone with a lot of support against those who disagree with him?
Sondhi has attacked the gov?ernment for muzzling the media and many media outlets have pri?oritised the Sondhi-Thaksin row as a media-freedom issue rather than a news story.
But is Sondhi any more capable of listening to his detractors than Thaksin is?
Many people who have attend?ed the shows at Lumpini Park said they only went to see what was going on. Some just wanted to wit?ness the phenomenon for them?selves and others hoped the con?frontation would end soon.
They said that if our leaders had any moral fibre, such conflicts would not exist and many of the problems we face would not have occurred.
One politically-aware school teacher said he went to see Sondhi because he was bored with the old-fashioned style of hosts like Samak Sundaravej, who only talk about the faults of others.
But he said peace-loving Thais might lose patience with Sondhi unless he tones down his “violent mudslinging”.
For now, either the Manager staff member must rethink his stance or Sondhi must make sure his goal is really something called “democracy”.
Kornchanok Raksaseri |
