Thailand's War on Poverty Hindered by Graft and Corruption by Phairath Khampha 24 November 2002 Is it good news that more corruption cases are being exposed, or bad news? Good news, if the government would be truly effective in going after those responsible for corruption. Bad news, if what one sees being exposed is just the tip of an iceberg. The really bad news is that most people in Thailand are sure the latter scenario is the case. Much like in many countries in the world, corruption is known to be one of the country's oldest crimes. Everybody knows how difficult it is to contain, let alone eradicate. Thailand still ranks high in terms of levels of corruption around the globe, and the Thais were glad when the government of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, leader of the Thai Rak Thai party, announced the three main enemies of his administration--corruption, poverty and drugs. But has there been any success in fighting those enemies? Not yet--and mainly because the Thaksin government has turned out to be one of the most corrupt in Thailand's history. The war against narcotics was quite intense when Purachai Piumsombun was serving as interior minister. However, the end results were far from successful as the number of methamphetamine addicts and dealers continued to rise. Most worrying is the rising trend for the pills to be sold at primary and secondary schools. Many Thais have said if men in uniforms remain behind the drugs trade, the menace will never go away. This leads to another of the government's stated enemies: corruption. Government officials and politicians are as responsible for corruption as the men in uniform. Corruption appears to be rife in the government of Prime minister Thaksin, and nobody can deny the outlook remains gloomy; especially as Thaksin himself and his family seem to have their fingers deep in the till. Does anything that the Thais have encountered spring to mind? Major scams involving many of the country's infrastructure projects--including Nong Ngu Hao international airport and the national school milk scheme, which saw millions of baht in taxpayers' money go into the pockets of official and uniformed crooks--have been well documented. And what about the most recent, a 400-million-baht scam involving fake fertiliser? The government's supposed intention was to help farmers that had fallen victim to severe flooding by offering them free fertiliser. But this turned into a major corruption scandal, with most of the fertiliser distributed having been found to be fake (some government officials, particularly those directly involved in this scam, preferred to call it "below specifications"). In this case, one cannot be sure that it involved politicians because no one was able to see the receipts, although it was clear this was the case. Neither can one say that about illegal gambling dens. The most recent case of large-scale corruption to be exposed was carried out at motorway toll plazas, right under the nose of the Highways Department. Transport Minister Suriya Jungrungreangkit ordered a crackdown, and is currently expanding the investigation to all transport agencies that collect tolls and fares. His actions would suggest that corruption exists everywhere. So, the war on corruption continues, and it is good to see corruption being exposed, but what is most important is that action is taken against the crooks. The proliferation of corruption has also made the fight against the third enemy--poverty--extremely difficult. Of each baht allocated to rural development, how many satang (there is one satang to a Thai baht) actually reaches the intended recipient? Failure to fight the spread of narcotics and corruption in state projects--like the distribution of school milk and compost, as well as schemes aimed at helping rice and rubber farmers--adversely affects the quality of life of rural families. Thailand's government was right to set as its policies the fighting of narcotics, corruption and poverty, but so far it would appear Mr Thaksin needs to place more pressure on his team to suppress drugs and end corruption if he wants to see any concrete results. If he can succeed with those two targets, the poverty issue will be easier to deal with.