The plan by the pro-Thaksin United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) to collect up to one million signatures to support a petition seeking a royal pardon for convicted former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, is unprecedented and highly improper, to say the least.
Why is it improper? Why can't a free people petition their king on any matter that they want?
Yes, it may be pointless and a waste of time, but, in the end, the king can answer or not answer. Up to him. He gets hit with petitions for this and that all the time that are beyond the scope of his power.
The UDD may genuinely, though mistakenly, believe that Thaksin's conviction was politically motivated and orchestrated.
Still, the UDD must realise that the attempt to mobilise mass support for a royal pardon would place His Majesty the King in an awkward position.
After all, Thaksin's case was decided by the court.
The case was politically motivated and decided. The crime that Thaksin was guilty of was being married to Potjaman when she bought land at a state auction. That's it. To prove criminal liability, one must bring evidence that a crime was broken and there was intent to commit a crime. Neither thing was proven. There was no injury to the state. There was no evidence of abuse of power, despite the lies that The Nation and Bangkok Post keep repeating over and over again. There was no evidence that Potjaman broke the law either. She was acquitted. Even if one can make the argument that Thaksin was culpable in the sense of breaking a statute as PM through professional inpropriety, he doesn't deserve two years in jail for that, since there was no injury to the state whatsoever.
I love how the Bangkok Post thinks just because a court decided something that makes it the right decision. Courts make mistakes all the time.
9 comments:
please note that the court decided on Thaksins guilt after deciding that the FIDF is a state agency, at variance with two previous rulings by the supreme court.
suggest you read Law is Law on the Bangkok Post weblog
the details are there of the clear twisting of the law to secure the
conviction of Thaksin.
the judges chose to go against previous rulings by the Supreme Court regarding the status of the FIDF.
in law, precedence rules, except apparently sometimes in Thailand.
no complaint about the law, Thaksin acted within the law as it stood and as it stands now, its just the judges were manipulated.
David,
Thailand is not a common law country, so I don't think precedence applies.
Thailand has a screwy legal system.
The judges can do what they want and nobody can challenge them because it is illegal.
How can Thaksin fight a case where the judges have already decided his guilt beforehand because Prem commands and the facts are completely disregarded?
I would have ran away too.
The petition is not improper, but the consequence is a catch 22.
An amnesty would prove a fault in justice system, practically be a blessing, and a boost to Mr. T popularity. He can come back to contest election(probably win) and no one can say a thing.
On the other hand, a non-amnesty would practically be a guilty verdict. Further charges of corruption would be launch and convicted, which in itself would widen the gap of a fault in justice system(again).
Either way, the justice system is toast and no one live forever. When people stop believing that they will receive justice from the court...
Was it because Thai courts were unreliable is why Thaksin went on an extra-judicial killing rampage against drug-running suspects during his rule?
And all you fools still think to this day that Thaksin was acting "within the law as it stood and as it stands now, its just the judges were manipulated" when he got convicted for corruption-cum-tax-finagling.
It is because of fools like you is why Marcoses and Thaksins could NOT be made to account for their abuses in a public trial.
Matty-
You have been crying over your drug dealers for years now.
Thaksin hater, Kraisak Choonhavan, exonerated Thaksin for the drug wars.
Your beloved junta and generals did nothing to bring the evil doers to justice, because they are the evil doers.
Thaksin is in exile in Dubai, maybe it time for you to contemplate going after the real criminals who presently reside in Thailand and have carte blanche to do what they want whenever they want. Like your buddy Newin.
Am I to presume that at the targetted 2.0 million signatures 'to pardon Thaksin', your signature Fonzi will be no. 3 on the list, after Andrew Walker and Bangkok Pundit, of course.
Drug dealers Fonzi?? All of those thousands killed by Thaksin's trigger-happy extrajudicial police vigilantes, are all drug dealers??
THAT is adding insult to fatal injury to the thousands of innocents who died during Thaksin's murderous extra-judicial rampage.
hi Vichai...
your mind still only on one track?
how about instead of concentrating on who got killed, comcentrate on who did the killing... the military, border patrol police (also military), police, drug dealers and other gangsters
when will Thai justice actually fall on someone that actually commits crimes?
only after actually proving who commits a killing (like Col Manas and his solders at Tak Bai) and punishing them then you can look at whether someone gave orders for the job and try to convict them
otherwise you are not really interested in justice just trying to score political points!
I don't know why I bother . . Because maybe because I am wrongly presuming that educated people like David and Fonzi, despite their affection for Thaksin, should be able to see that Thaksin had committed a grievious crime against thousands when he 'goaded and directed' his trigger-happy vigilante police to shoot at drug suspects during Thaksin's anti-drug insane murderous campaign.
David have you seen the classic movie 'The Accused' starring Jodie Foster? The three rapists in that movie actually got scot free. But the principal 'goader-cheerer' who encouraged the rapists to commit the crime was found guilty of the crime - see below.
"A person is guilty of criminal solicitation if he commands, induces, entreats or otherwise persuades another person to commit a felony"
Got it yet??
I will NOT forget NOR forgive!
hi Vichai
btw, its only an "entertaining American movie... but were the rapists judged guilty but set free? why?
meanwhile how can someone be comvicted of "criminal solicitation" if there was no conviction of those that actually committed the crime?
how do we prove the link between the words and the actual crime?
are we talking about incitement to a crime by "persons unknown". were they incited by Thaksin or by the damage done to their relatives or the community at large by drugs? or just their own criminal reasons? or all of the above?
how about cleaning up Thai justice before getting into politically motivated discussions?
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