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Sure, incremental half-measures will be undertaken and leading VIP’s will be photographed signing legislation, but the poor, the defenseless, the common voter will forever be prey to a legitimized corruption that allows women, schoolchildren, prison inmates, political opponents, social activists and all segments of the Thai media to remain prey to opportunism and corruption.
Such corruption recently raised its head in Thailand as a second milk-related scandal broke. One last year involved melamine-tainted milk imported from China that caused sickness and death in far reaches of the world, including making four children here in the northeast city of Nakhonratchasima sick.
In response to that crisis last September, the Thai Ministry of Public Health indicated within days it would work with the government to pass emergency legislation that would safeguard consumers by specifying the maximum amount of melamine that milk could contain. The ministry should have also included a statement on the amount of water not to be added, or that animal feed not be provided to schoolchildren. But this is not what happened.
Instead, the lack of regulations and oversight once again surfaced. In Chumpon province recently, irregularities in milk supplied to local schools became public. Of eighteen qualified milk suppliers, only two placed bids to supply local organizations with milk. One bid was exceedingly high, the other, which was accepted, was the median-priced bid. As well, it seems that both of the bidders were owned by the same party.
Probably none of this detail would have been uncovered if suppliers didn’t try to maximize profits by selling spoiled and diluted milk, which then centered attention on the supply process.
Collusion to win a supply contract was bad enough, but compounding this irregularity was the fact that of the milk actually supplied to schoolchildren, some contained worms, some smelled so bad that students could not drink it, and still more children became ill when they consumed bad milk.
Local government officials overseeing the milk distribution – and some say deeply involved in corrupt profit-sharing with crooked suppliers – have accused other officials who broke the news of the substandard milk of being publicity seekers. In a strange twist as well, Thai authorities have seriously suggested switching from regular milk to the flavored kind, totally ignoring the need to supply safe milk in the first place.
The milk scandals prompted well-known Bangkok Post writer Sanitsuda Ekachai to write a commentary stating that the milk scandal was one more proof that Thailand is “rotten to the core.” Her conclusion is based on decades of writing about Thailand and Thai society, observing the endless stream of scandals and lack of successful investigations that permit hardcore corruption to thrive in the kingdom at the expense of the common folk.
What is the solution to Thailand's problems? Giles Ungpakorn – the Chulalongkorn academic who recently fled to England rather than face three months’ forced incarceration while a lèse majesté case against him is investigated – told a gathering of Thais and foreigners in Oxford that what Thailand needs is a welfare state.
Unfortunately, that is also part of the problem. Thailand already has a welfare state, with those at the top taking care of those at the bottom. All that is demanded in return are compliance, obedience and loyalty. So a welfare state does not seem to be the answer to Thailand’s problems whether they are political, social or economic.
Instead, the country needs for its military to step aside and allow democratic changes to take place, changes that will remove underpinnings of elitist power that have hung around since the 1932 revolution that changed Thailand from an absolute monarchy into an absolute hybrid of monarchy, military domination and political chicanery.
Thailand’s United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship, or “red shirts,” underscored this “need” for the military to get out of politics on Feb. 26, when one of its leaders, Jakrabhop Penkhair – also under investigation for lèse majesté – told thousands of supporters gathered around him that the Thai military needed reform. According to him, the military brass care about nothing, including their troops, but are only concerned about themselves and the benefits they can receive.
Those who hold the fate of the country in their hands – the military and the elites they protect – not long ago indicated that the next time political uncertainties arise there would be another military-backed coup. According to top military brass, “Who can be sure of what will happen?” if the old guard is put aside in a democratic vote and people used to running things are no longer able to run them.
So rather than taking a chance of a successful grassroots political reform process that could involve some violence, the Thai military is apparently committed to the use of violence to make sure reform does not occur. What is important for the nation, the army indicates, is unity and national security.
That former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra had become so popular, and that he still is; that he could apparently begin meddling with fundamental structures of ancient Thai governance to bring about populist changes, was a huge threat to the status quo and remains so. The UDD, or red shirts, continue to demonstrate this threat in pro-Thaksin support and accusations against the yellow-shirted royalist People’s Alliance for Democracy.
The UDD is also accusing the country’s latest anti-corruption agency of being pro-dictator, and questioning whether Thai society can any longer live in unity with such divergent views. The fact that pressures in Thailand seem to be increasing toward unity on one hand, and against it on the other, is more than mere food for thought.
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(Frank G. Anderson is the Thailand representative of American Citizens Abroad. He was a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer to Thailand from 1965-67, working in community development. A freelance writer and founder of northeast Thailand's first local English language newspaper, the Korat Post – www.thekoratpost.com – he has spent over eight years in Thailand "embedded" with the local media. He has an MBA in information management and an associate degree in construction technology. ©Copyright Frank G. Anderson.)
