By Shen Min, Xinhua,
Bangkok : Thailand’s Supreme Court on Tuesday convicted former House Speaker and deputy leader of Thailand’s ruling People Power Party (PPP) Yongyuth Tiyapairat of vote-buying charges and disqualified him as a member of parliament (MP).
The ruling could lead to the dissolution of the PPP and the collapse of the current coalition government led by Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej in its worst scenario.
The Court on Tuesday afternoon took two hours to read out the verdict, which upheld an earlier ruling by the Election Commission(EC) to disqualify Yongyuth as an MP.
The Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Holders of Political Positions found Yongyuth guilty of having bribed a group of local administration heads in Mae Chan district of his home province Chiang Rai in northern Thailand during the run-up to the Dec. 23 general election last year to ensure electoral victory of his sister La-ong who contested as an MP candidate for the PPP.
The Court’s verdict had cited the testimony of a key witness, a sub-district head in Mae Chan, Chaiwat Changkaokham, who told the EC last May that he and other local officials were offered 20,000 baht (some 606 U.S. dollars) each by Yongyuth in exchange for exerting their influence to support Yongyuth and other PPP candidates in the December election.
Yongyuth had won a seat in the 480-member House of Representatives as a PPP candidate, and was elected as the House Speaker and President of Parliament on Jan. 22, after the PPP declared victory in the election.
Yongyuth had pleaded not-guilty, but later announced resignation from the top parliamentary post on April 30 after the Supreme Court accepted the case.
Besides losing the parliamentary seat immediately, Yongyuth also faced a five-year ban from electoral process. A by-election will be held in his constituent to fill the vacated MP seat.
The conviction of Yongyuth, as party executive of the PPP when the alleged offences happened, will also give ground to the EC to appeal to the Constitutional Court to dissolve his party, which now led the six-party coalition government, in line with the 2007 Constitution.
In that scenario, all PPP party executives, most of whom are now part of the PPP-led cabinet, including PPP leader and Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej, would automatically lose their cabinet posts and be banned from political activity for five years, replaying what has taken place with the former ruling Thai Rak Thai Party (TRT), founded by ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra.
The TRT was dissolved last May on electoral fraud charges allegedly committed by party executives, and all its 111 party executives, including Thaksin, were banned from politics for five years, in the aftermath of the 2006 coup that ousted the Thaksin administration. Many former TRT members then joined the PPP.
Samak reportedly had met on Monday with leaders of the other coalition partners — Chart Thai, Pracharaj, Puea Pandin and Matchimathipataya parties to find a solution to the crisis.
The four parties also face possible dissolution on various charges.
The verdict against Yongyuth was handed down on the same day as the Constitutional Court ruled that Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama was in breach of the Constitution for signing on a Thai-Cambodian Joint Communique on June 18 which endorses Thai government’s support for Cambodia’s bid to list the ancient temple Preah Vihear as a World Heritage Site without prior approval of the parliament.
Noppadon has been one of the prime targets by the opposition Democrat Party and the civil coalition People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) in their recent campaign to denounce the Samak-led government as an incompetent administration.
Samak, Noppadon and another six cabinet members, all key members of the PPP, had just survived an no-confidence voting in the House last month, in which the Democrat Party grilled the four-month-old government over its “failure” in solving the country’s economic and political problems and safeguarding Thailand’s territorial sovereignty regarding the Preah Vihear temple located at the Thai-Cambodia border.
It was no surprise that the no-confidence motion failed to topple the Samak government as the PPP and the other five coalition parties control nearly two-thirds of the House seats.
However, a dissolution ruling would be fatal to the PPP, seen as an incarnation of the TRT, and the current government led by Samak.
After the verdict against Nappadon was announced, the Democrat Party and a group of senators have said they would seek impeachment of the Foreign Minister and the Samak cabinet.
Observers suggested that Samak might resolve to dissolve the parliament, call a snap election, or carry out a major cabinet reshuffle to ease the pressure on the government.
If the PPP was dissolved, MPs of the PPP who are not party executives and not subject to the five-year ban would have 60 days to join another party to contest in a snap election.
The proceedings involved in a party dissolution ruling could take months, which would allow the PPP or Samak some breathing space to work out a resolution.