A day after Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi visited Samut Sakhon to meet with thousands of her compatriots in the country's western fishery province amid a chaotic reception, National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) chief and Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha signed an order to transfer the provincial governor and three other senior provincial officials to inactive positions with immediate effect.
The officials were accused of either committing corruption, fraud or other misconduct or neglect of duty in relation to resolving those problems. The order did not say what specific wrongdoings those officials were accused of, but Samut Sakhon is home to hundreds of thousands of legal and illegal migrant workers who are vulnerable to abuses by traffickers and employers.
The order was implemented under Section 44 of the interim charter that gives Gen Prayut a free hand to bypass legal obstructions and issue laws to solve either long overdue or immediate problems that cannot be tackled under existing legal mechanisms.
Nopporn Wong-Anan is deputy editor, Bangkok Post.
Over the past two years of the military regime, Gen Prayut has used this power to dismiss or transfer hundreds of allegedly corrupt office holders, from provincial councillors to top national bureaucrats, without waiting for final investigations or court rulings.
However, when it comes to the case of Bangkok governor Sukhumbhand Paribatra, whose City Hall has faced a flurry of graft allegations exposed by his ex-colleagues at the Democrat Party, it is a completely different story.
The prime minister told reporters on Tuesday it was "not necessary" to invoke Section 44 to dismiss MR Sukhumbhand though the Office of the Auditor-General (OAG) has recommended that the governor be suspended from duty over his alleged involvement in irregularities in the 39-million-baht light display.
Auditor-General Pisit Leelavachiropas has suggested that suspending the governor would be in the best interests of the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA), because the BMA is obliged to take legal and disciplinary action against the governor and seven others implicated in the wrongdoings.
According to a complicated procedure, the OAG has forwarded its findings to the Interior Ministry to ensure City Hall completes its obligation. As the supervisor, the ministry is also responsible for launching a probe to figure out who must be held accountable.
But Interior Ministry permanent secretary Grisada Boonrach said yesterday the governor, as head of the organisation, has 30 days to file a police report over the alleged wrongdoings. Police will then have to find evidence and forward the OAG findings to the National Anti-Corruption Commission to set up a probe panel.
Will the former political science professor do so? I don't know.
But what we know from the news is MR Sukhumbhand's team of lawyers are collecting evidence to take legal action against the OAG for "destroying my reputation", insisting he will not resign from the governorship.
Since March 2013, the governor's second term, which ends next March, has never been short of controversies, thanks to his colleague, former Democrat MP Wilas Chanpithak, who has exposed a series of alleged irregularities.
The latest scandal is the BMA's controversial purchase of 20 mini-fire engines at a cost of 160 million baht, which the OAG is investigating.
The 2013 procurement came under attack after it was revealed the vehicles are left-hand drive with plastic doors and may not comply with Thai traffic laws. The vehicle engines may also be too small to carry fire equipment. The BMA governor has not yet responded to the allegations.
Oh, and please don't forget the 16.5-million-baht renovation costs of the governor's office, which includes a 75-inch TV costing 329,900 baht and dining chairs priced at 54,500 baht each. The list goes on, but can the ruling regime stop further wrongdoings at City Hall, which has a combined annual budget allocation of 70 billion baht?
Fighting corruption is the priority of the NCPO which vowed to tackle it after toppling the civilian government in the May 2014 coup.
An unnecessarily long delay will do more harm than good to state coffers. Drastic action, preferably under regular laws, must be taken against corrupt officials. Therefore, the NCPO chief must be colour-blind when going after cheating office holders, no matter what colour political shirt they wear.