Pheu Thai takes aim at 20-year plan

Pheu Thai takes aim at 20-year plan

Pheu Thai's Kanin Boonsuwan, who helped to write the 1997 People's Constitution, says the draft charter's '20-year national strategy' is a huge trap for future governments. At right is Pongthep Thepkanchana, a colleague during the drafting of the 1997 constitution. (File photo by Kosol Nakachol)
Pheu Thai's Kanin Boonsuwan, who helped to write the 1997 People's Constitution, says the draft charter's '20-year national strategy' is a huge trap for future governments. At right is Pongthep Thepkanchana, a colleague during the drafting of the 1997 constitution. (File photo by Kosol Nakachol)

The government-proposed 20-year national development plan will drive political parties into a corner with no guarantee of promoting economic prosperity or political progress, Kanin Boonsuwan, of Pheu Thai Party's legal team, has warned.

Mr Kanin said the cabinet formed after the next general election will bear the immediate brunt of the national strategy which is now being promulgated into an organic law.

The post-election cabinet ministers would be required by law to comply with the plan whether they like it or not, and whether they campaigned on it or not, Mr Kanin said.

If the new cabinet decides to be "obedient" to the new Senate, whose ranks will include armed forces leaders, along with independent organisations and the Constitution Court, it will have to report on its progress in implementing the national strategy every three months throughout its tenure, which will place a burden on the national administration, he said.

Mr Kanin warned the task would be arduous and restrict the cabinet's work, which could take its toll on ministers' efforts to push through economic policies to solve problems for the poor.

As such, the country would be "dead" before the 20-year national plan ends, said Mr Kanin, who chairs the party's panel monitoring the drafting of the organic laws.

The country's economy in particular would likely be stalled by the strategy and the first group in society to suffer would be low-income people, he said.

"When the national strategy is turned into an action plan, it will become a gigantic trap causing the country to get stuck, unable to move forward or backward," he said.

Under Section 162 of the new charter, the cabinet must declare in parliament policies that are line with the government's responsibilities as stated in the national strategy.

Constitution Drafting Committee chairman Meechai Ruchupan defended the strategy as a product of public input conveyed to the CDC during the drafting process.

"If the government refuses to follow the strategy, it will be regarded as intending to defy the constitution," Mr Meechai said.

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