The lion of Songkhla

 31 jan 2005 

In the tape transcript claimed to have been recorded in Songkhla, someone addressed as “minister” proposes “we buy everything everywhere” to overtake poll rivals. He concedes that  “sometimes our own relatives cannot be bought” but urges them to be bold. He will leave Baht 100,000 with the governors and they can pick it up one day after the poll “if we win.” He adds, “we’ll worry about the yellow and red cards later,” and rounds off “get the winning votes, then come to collect the money from the governors, and go celebrate.”

 Of course, nothing is proved. Newin Chidchob, alleged to be the minister involved, is threatening law suits. The prime minister says “the opposition appears to be very good at playing politics.” An Election Commissioner claims he cannot decipher the audio recording even though newspapers have transcribed it word for word. The Democrats have slipped up before by being too hasty to make use of flaky evidence.

 But a police colonel and local election official was present and is prepared to testify. Moreover, the incident fits a pattern from past elections. Remember a certain Chat Thai minister urging his lieutenants to pile on the “ammunition” in the last days before the 2001 poll? 

In truth, there are only two aspects of this incident which are important. The first is the role of the governors. If it is true that the “minister” expected the governors to act as paymasters in this exercise of wholesale votebuying, it suggests how much the bureaucracy has become a department of the ruling TRT party. The second is the role of Newin. 

Whether the Songkhla incident is true or a set-up, Newin is the perfect choice for the lead character because of his history. In 1995, police raided a Buriram shophouse and found 11.3 million baht in small denomination notes, some of them stapled to a campaign flyer for the Chat Thai slate led by Newin. These facts are not in doubt, nor (for most people) is the interpretation. But the election law is rather like the prostitution law. Judges will not convict unless police catch the client both engaged in the act and paying the money at the same time, which is technically a bit difficult for both the client and the police. In the Buriram case, judges convicted the shophouse owner, but not those who put up the money or profited from its use.

 Newin’s name also came up when representatives of a Japanese firm were physically prevented from submitting a bid for a construction contract won by Newin’s father-in-law. Again, Newin was not too embarrassed. 

At the foundation of TRT in 1998, Thaksin said his goal was to rid Thai politics of “professional politicians” who used money to gain political power, and used political power to make money. For many observers, that description would seem to include Newin. Yet, over the last few years, Newin has become one of Thaksin’s bluest-eyed boys. Newin was lured to defect from Chat Thai to TRT along with his local faction. He was initially excluded from the Cabinet because of his reputation, but has then been a minister continuously since March 2002. He was at the forefront of the great cover-up over bird-flu, but was defended from having to take the consequences. He is not standing for election but is tipped as a ministerial candidate after the coming poll. 

In short, over the past four years, Thaksin’s patronage has helped to launder Newin from being one of Thailand’s most yi politicians into someone almost establishment. If the Songkhla allegations are true, this has not happened because Newin’s political ethics have changed. Indeed what is new is that his skills are now being put to work for the TRT party. Was he sent to help the TRT’s campaign in the south – the most difficult region for the party – precisely because of what he is good at? 

Of course, in politics there is always a tension between what has to be done to gain power, and how that power might be used. By the time of the 2001 elections, Thaksin had stopped presenting himself as a new broom sweeping the old trash out of Thai politics, and instead hoped he could act as “the link between the old generation of politicians and the new”. Things have now gone much farther. TRT is beginning to look quite “old.” 

In 2001, several of the old local boss politicians missed the TRT boat. Perhaps they failed to predict TRT’s spectacular rise. Perhaps they believed Thaksin’s earlier claims that the party was not for the likes of them. As a result, several of them lost at the 2001 polls. Things are different today. The TRT’s candidate list for 2005 is a roster of the great local bosses, their families, and their friends. 

Some had made it into TRT before 2001 (Snoh Tienthong’s faction). Some were acquired by the merger of other parties into TRT. Many others, like Newin, have defected as individuals or factions. However they arrived, the pattern is now clear. Three Tienthong candidates in Sa Kaew. Three Khunpleum in Chonburi. Angkinan in Petchburi. Lik in Kamphaeng Phet, Khamprakob in Nakhon Sawan, Wongwan in Phrae, Tancharoen in Chachoengsao, Kitthithanasuan in Nakhon Nayok, Patdamrongjit in Khon Kaen, etc, etc.

 In the northeast, for example, 109 of the TRT’s 136 candidates are sitting TRT MPs. Of those 27 defected from another party into TRT before 2001. Another 41 were acquired by the merger of the New Aspiration, Seritham and Chat Phatthana parties. Another 8 defected from Chat Thai, and one from the Democrats. At least another 3 lost at the last election under another party banner. TRT has become a big magnet. 

Probably Thaksin believes that his personal popularity and his grip on TRT make him a lion-tamer who can keep all these lions under control. But a lion-tamer still has to feed the lions.