Let the recriminations on charter begin

Published: 23/02/2012 at 02:20 AM
Newspaper section: News

Three draft bills on charter amendments sponsored by the government, Pheu Thai Party and Chartthaipattana Party, respectively, should pose no problem for the joint sitting of the lower and upper houses to deliberate on when they are debated in parliament today and tomorrow.

Protests like the one pictured above can be expected by those against the government’s move to bring about a new constitution. The placard reads: ‘‘What’s wrong with the [present] constitution? Why not straighten out the twisted character of your MPs first?’’

The thrust of the draft bills is aimed at amending Section 291, to pave the way for the setting up of a 99-member Charter Drafting Assembly (CDA).

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About the author

: Writer: Nattaya Chetchotiros; Position: Reporter

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pjt
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Discussion 2 : 23/02/2012 at 09:11 AM2
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Why cannot we simply have a referendum question which gives the option to readopt the 1997 Constitution wef say 1 July this year? This would then give us back what was in place prior to the coup - and might save a lot of future divisions. Of course there would need to be transition provisions, and if subsequently further amendment was thought necessary then this could be done through the amendment procedure laid out in the 1997 Charter
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whatajoke
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Discussion 1 : 23/02/2012 at 08:32 AM1
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What will happen here, according to a process which the Puea Thai and UDD champion as the people's constitution, is that 51% of the population will approve a flawed charter that clearly benefits one particular side, in which case the other 49% will not really accept it, so no reconciliation will be achieved, and civil disobedience will result (especially when those outcomes intended from the changes, such as reversal of verdicts, are enacted). And eventually this new charter will have to be abandoned and re-written, just like the flawed 2007. Chalerm et al can't see the irony here, the Junta sponsored a charter that had some patently unfair bits in it but overall it was acceptable to 60% of the people, and so shall it be the next time around. Selecting 99 members based on geographical provinces and parliamentary balance of power is a plain and silly idea, cynically engineered to benefit a particular party. A constitution cannot possibly be fairly called 'peoples' by that method.
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Let the recriminations on charter begin | Bangkok Post: opinion