Sondhi gets 'warning' letter from guardsmen
Editor tells crowd prime minister wants him out of the way for not holding his tongue. The showdown between Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and a onetime self-styled chum escalated to new heights yesterday.
 Pravit Rojanaphruk
November 12, 2005 - Just as Thaksin's lawyer was considering a gag order against Sondhi Limthongkul, who has been lashing out at the prime minister with increasing ferocity, Thaksin's estranged friend told a crowd of several thousand cheering fans: "If something happens to me, you know who's responsible."
Thana Benjathikul, Thaksin's lawyer, plans to file further libel suits against Sondhi next week and ask the court for an injunction on the newspaper publisher against engaging in additional verbal attacks on the prime minister.
"He's making serious further spurious accusations against the prime minister every day," Thana argued.
Yet neither the threat of further libel suits nor that of a gag order seemed to daunt Sondhi, who has clearly been buoyed by political celebrity as an anti-government firebrand despite his onetime staunch strong support for Thaksin.
Yesterday evening he staged his political talk show, banned from government-owned television, in Lumpini Park, telling a 10,000-strong crowd he was the victim of a political witch hunt.
His public forum yesterday drew especial attention because Sondhi's Phujadkarn newspaper has been accusing Thaksin of impinging on royal prerogatives.
Citing written documents, Sondhi says that Thaksin was supposed to have attended a merit-making ceremony held at the Temple of the Emerald Buddha last April as only one of the participants, not preside over the ceremony in place of His Majesty the King at Thailand's holiest temple.
Sondhi also alleged that the written authorisation used by the government as proof that His Majesty had given express permission for Thaksin to chair the ceremony was dated April 11, the day after the ceremony took place.
The outspoken journalist added that only one other prime minister had dared arrogate to himself royal privileges, Field Marshal Plaek Pibulsongkram in 1939 when the throne was still reeling from the political aftershocks of the 1932 coup that abolished absolute monarchy.
Sondhi's audience yesterday included some 3,000 people wearing yellow T-shirts with the slogan "We Shall Fight for the King". He reminded his listeners that Plaek had later been ousted in a coup and ended up dying in exile in Japan.
"That was the fate of the first Thai prime minister who dared preside over a ceremony in the Chapel [the Temple of Emerald Buddha]," he said. "I hope [Thaksin] will meet an even more beautiful ending." His sarcastic comment drew wild cheers from the crowd.
Sondhi went on to say he was a rebel fighting for the restoration of the honour and power of the monarchy and challenged the government to arrest him on charges of subversion. He said he was ready to go to prison for his beliefs because many like-minded people would be standing by him.
"Money can buy everyone. And because they can't buy me, they'll have to destroy me," he said.
He then launched into listing other examples of Thaksin's questionable conduct. Sondhi cited the Cabinet's decision to buy a brand-new official plane of its own while the Royal Family continued to use an aged aircraft as well as the government's appointment of a senior monk as caretaker for the ailing Supreme Patriarch.
The gathering yesterday draw a diverse crowd united only in their opposition to one or more government policies. Some listeners said they opposed the privatisation of the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand, while a group of monarchists stressed that they thought Thaksin had become a threat to the royal institution. The largest number of people, however, said they disliked the pervasive graft and cronyism in current politics.
From the podium Sondhi accused Thaksin, his family and corrupt politicians of plundering Thailand's riches by various means.
A onetime gubernatorial candidate who has written a book about corruption and was present at the gathering yesterday agreed. The man, who asked not to be named, said a general feeling of dissatisfaction with Thaksin was on the rise across society.
He stressed that the real story was not Sondhi's verbal tit-for-tat with the prime minister but the political malaise in Thailand.
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