A Coup by Stealth?

Law would be 'a coup by stealth'
Academic slams draft legislation; ex-senators to petition their peers
The Nation, July 15, 2007

The military junta is quietly staging yet another coup d'้tat, turning Thailand into its notorious neighbour, Burma, by trying to pass the draconian internal security bill while the public is preoccupied with debating whether to approve or reject the new draft charter, says a political scientist.

Some former senators are trying to collect the signatures of their peers against the bill.

"This law will give great power to the Internal Security Operation Command [Isoc] and in effect pass the power of government and politicians to the Army. It's a quiet coup and poses the question whether it will lead to Thailand becoming a military state," Chulalongkorn University political scientist Surachart Bamrungsuk said yesterday at a symposium on the proposed Internal Security Act organised by a group of former senators in cooperation with the Matichon newspaper group.

Surachart decried fellow academics who have mostly been quiet about the bill and said the peculiar silence on the part of Thai academics was "very strange". He added that if the bill, which has already been approved by the junta-appointed Cabinet, is approved by the junta-appointed National Legislative Assembly (NLA), human-rights violations by the military will become easy, and this will turn Thailand into another Burma.

Former Tak senator Panas Tasneeyanond, who is representing the Club of Former Senators who served from 2000 to 2006, said the bill was not unlike the anti-communist law during the Cold War and was in itself a "threat to national security".

He said the basic rights of citizens would be curbed under the law. "The law gives immense power to the military and restricts the democratic rule of law. It seeks to re-establish a long-defunct military state," Panas said, referring to the Cold War period when Thailand was run by successive military regimes.

The former senator added that the club would shortly issue a statement opposing the bill and petition Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont, the National Security Council and the Chairman of the National Legislative Assembly.

The former dean of Thammasat University's Law Faculty, Kamchai Chongchakphan, concurred and warned that the right of assembly would be curtailed under the new act and anyone could be put under house arrest by the Isoc director, a post traditionally occupied by the Army chief. Other draconian powers under the law include search and arrest without warrant, intervention in the judicial process to appoint joint police interrogators and the subpoenaing of police investigation documents without being answerable to a court of law and with no legal redress by those affected.

"I can scarcely believe that this law is to be passed for national security or for the people's well-being; it's interesting to speculate whose 'security' it is intended for," Kamchai said, adding that the existing power of the Cabinet to declare a state of emergency granted enough power to deal with any national problem.

Another speaker, human-rights commissioner Jaran Dittha-apichai, said such a law would be unconstitutional, considering that both the Cabinet and the NLA were appointed by the Council for National Security itself. He added that it contravened international treaties on citizens' rights to which Thailand was a signatory and would cause diplomatic problems.

Meanwhile the caretaker leader of the now disbanded Thai Rak Thai Party, Chaturon Chaisang, said the bill would perpetuate military rule because the Army chief would become "all-powerful" and it would no longer be of any relevance whether future prime ministers or cabinets were elected or whether there was a constitution, because everything would be up to the Army, which could order the arrest of any person on a whim.

Chaturon said the law would empower any Army chief to tear up the constitution at a moment's notice and pave the way for a coup.