Gen Sonthi Boonyaratkalin's refusal to answer a question about who was the mastermind behind the 2006 coup may actually end up holding back reconciliation efforts.
Democrat Party MP Nipit Intarasombat, right, hands a letter to Gen Sonthi Boonyaratkalin, chairman of the House committee on national reconciliation, to oppose the panel’s decision to support amnesty for offenders who violated the emergency decree and to favour dropping criminal charges levelled against politicians by the defunct Assets Scrutiny Committee. CHANAT KATANYU
Somjet Boonthanom, an appointed senator and a former staff member of the coup team, said Gen Sonthi not answering has done no good but may have confirmed suspicions among some about who was behind the putsch.
The question was posed by veteran politician Sanan Kachornprasart, of the Chartthaipattana Party, during a seminar on national reconciliation. Maj Gen Sanan asked Gen Sonthi if Privy Council president Prem Tinsulanonda and the ammart (elites) were behind the coup as alleged by the red shirts.
Gen Sonthi, who led the coup that toppled the Thaksin government on Sept 19, 2006, said he would take the answer with him to the grave.
Gen Somjet said that Gen Sonthi, who chairs the House national reconciliation committee, had plenty of time to mull over the question.
"When he is the only person who can answer it, he should answer it clearly. He can't say, 'When the time comes the truth will reveal itself'," said Gen Somjet, who served as former chief of the secretariat of the Council for National Security.
"By not answering it, he faces questions of whether his stance has changed."
According to Gen Somjet, Maj Gen Sanan's three questions should have been easy to answer, as follows.
First, Gen Sonthi engineered the coup because Thaksin was corrupt, abused his authority and drove the country to the brink of carrying out atrocities.
Second, Gen Prem did not take Gen Sonthi to a royal audience with His Majesty the King.
And last, Gen Sonthi did not pay heed to Gen Prem and Gen Mongkol Ampornpisit's advice that the public should be informed of the reasons behind the coup.
Gen Somjet said that national reconciliation cannot proceed because the truth has not yet been revealed.
Tul Sitthisomwong, leader of the multi-coloured group, said Gen Sonthi's remarks would rekindle political rifts and deepen the red shirts' hostility toward the ammart.
But, he said that Maj Gen Sanan's question was wrong because the coup was not the cause of the conflict that has divided the nation."It was corruption and interference in the judicial system [by Thaksin]," he said.
Dr Tul said that there was a long way to go for national conciliation as long as efforts are under way to whitewash Thaksin.
A study by the King Prajadhipok Institute that was prepared for Gen Sonthi's committee is bent on clearing Thaksin of wrongdoing, he claimed.
"It doesn't reflect anything about reconciliation," he said.
Political scientist Pitch Pongsawat said that Gen Sonthi's answer should have cleared up any lingering doubts about the coup and who was behind it.
Gen Sonthi's answer has helped society come closer to the facts, he said.
"If no one was behind it, he would have said so," he said.
"It may cause him trouble but it has enlightened the public."
Mr Pitch lauded both Maj Gen Sanan and Gen Sonthi for being bold enough to address the issue.
In the academic's view, national reconciliation will be hard to achieve as long as Democrat leader Abhisit Vejjajiva tries to make the public think he is the "righteous minority".
Somchai Sawaengkarn, an appointed senator, said he agreed that national reconciliation will not happen anytime soon because the KPI study covers only part of the issue.
He said the study should be extended to make it complete.
"But even if it is incomplete, there is one thing it got right," he said.
"Thaksin is in conflict with the Thai state and ammart."
Mr Somchai was among 47 people interviewed by the KPI's research team when working on the report.