The committee tasked with selecting the new director of the Thai Public Broadcasting Service (Thai PBS) has defended its selection procedure in response to questions about the legality of selection methods, saying the entire process was lawful, fair and accountable.
The Thai PBS director selection committee on Thursday issued a statement defending itself against an accusation made by Kaewsan Atibhoti, a member of the TV station's committee on good governance and social responsibility, that the selection was conducted unfairly.
Mr Kaewsan on Tuesday replied in writing to a letter sent to him by Narong Phechprasert, a member of the Thai PBS committee on organisational management policy, requesting his legal advice on the director selection process.
Mr Kaewsan pointed out in his response that the selection process was done incorrectly as the committee had conducted a vote to select two finalists from all seven candidates without scrutinising the qualifications of all candidates first.
The selection committee should have first scrutinised all seven candidates to see whether they are actually qualified for selection, allowed them to present their visions and then voted on each candidate separately to rule if he or she is qualified to enter the final round of selection, said Mr Kaewsan.
Instead the selection committee picked two candidates to move forward to the final round, and discarded the rest without considering them independently of each other, he said.
If all seven candidates met the required criteria, the selection committee should have then voted for or against each of the candidates so that two of them with most votes would have been allowed to enter the final round of selection, he said.
As such, the five candidates, who may well be qualified for the position, have every right to petition the Administrative Court to declare the selection invalid.
Mr Kaewsan also recommended that Mr Narong request the organisational management policy committee formally discuss and decide if the selection process was carried out correctly or not before it moves on to selecting the new director.
The recommendation resulted in Mr Narong and Pipat Chanasongkram (another member of the committee) boycotting the final meeting in the selection process on Thursday and the remaining seven members selected Wilasinee Phiphitkul, 52, a former deputy director of Thai PBS, as the new director.
The other candidate was Adisak Limparungpatanakij, the former chief executive of Nation Broadcasting Corporation Pcl.
The selection committee, meanwhile, insisted in the statement released yesterday that it had strictly abided by the regulations set down for the recruitment and selection of a Thai PBS director.
The qualifications of all seven candidates had been scrutinised and the selection committee had already listened to the candidates' vision presentations before the vote was conducted to pick the two most qualified candidates for the final round of selection, said the statement.
The selection committee is only responsible for screening candidates for the final selection and if the organisational management policy committee agrees that the selection process was wrong, the former can declare the selection invalid, said the same statement.