COMMENTARY
SANITSUDA EKACHAI
Why worry about the prospect of violence from political divisiveness? Thaksin Shinawatra's People's Power party is certainly not worried.
Setting its sights on the next general election, which might come sooner than later, the Samak government has announced two handout extravaganzas to win the voters' hearts and minds.
Two weeks ago we taxpayers were told that we must pay 46 billion baht to ensure the PPP's election victory through its mega-freebies, namely free electricity, free water, free bus and train rides, cheaper cooking gas, and cheaper gasohol and diesel.
Is this systematic bribery? Many believe so. And although the government claims these measures will cushion the poor against the economic crunch, critics say they will principally benefit the middle-class.
According to the free water and electricity scheme, qualified households must use less than 50 units of water and 80 units of electricity. But the very poor do not have their own households, says economist Somphop Manarangsan of Chulalongkorn University. Having to share their abode with others, their public utility bills mostly exceed the ceilings set by the government.
The urban poor also largely live in the inner city close to work. They then would not benefit from the free rides on non-airconditioned buses and third-class trains. The lower urban middle-class will benefit, however, because they need to commute from outer Bangkok to work downtown.
Cutting oil tariffs will also benefit those who have cars and trucks but not the very poor, Mr Somphop explains.
Some say this only goes to show that these policy-makers do not know how the poor live. I beg to differ. How else would you legitimise a mega-scheme primarily aimed at winning the political domain of the People's Alliance for Democracy and the Opposition, if you don't put the faces of the poor on it?
And it is not true that the rural households will not benefit from the handouts. Much of our rural communities have become urbanised, and free water and electricity bills, although for only six months, are enough to remind them who to vote for.
These are not the only things voters will feel thankful to the PPP for. Last month, the government told its rural stronghold that it would take one million rai of state land to lease out to farmers at only 20 baht a rai to grow food and oil crops.
Mind you, this land perk has nothing to do with land reform.
It is true that our inequitable land distribution structure must be addressed to help millions of landless farmers. But why only target state land? Most of the idle farmland is now in the hands of the super rich. Why not make the list of landlords public? Why not issue progressive land tax and inheritance laws to free idle land for land reform?
We all know too well why.
Incidentally, much of the state lands still remain lush forests. Do we want to turn them into plantations?
Farmers do not need only land plots. To grow cash crops designated by the government, they need seeds, saplings and, more often than not, expensive farm chemicals. This is why they will most likely end up as mere labour on contract farms which benefit agro giants. Is that the government's purpose in the first place?
There are now over one million families of farmers occupying state lands and forests. To help them, the government can simply stop evicting them and listen to their demands for community land ownership as a measure to prevent the land from being sold or transformed into commercial plantations.
But we won't see that happen. The farmers who will benefit from the land freebies will be those with political links with the PPP and its local cronies. Those outside the PPP's political patronage network will remain out in the cold.
This is because the government is not in it for land justice. It is out for votes. And the handouts, paid for by taxpayers, will do the trick.
Sanitsuda Ekachai is Assistant Editor (Outlook), Bangkok Post.
Email: sanitsudae@bangkokpost.co.th
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