Three distinguished foreign guests made thoughtful remarks about conflict solving and reconciliation at the international forum held in Bangkok on Monday -- Priscilla Hayner, senior adviser to the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, former British prime minister Tony Blair, and former Finnish president and Nobel Peace prize winner Marti Ahtisaari.
Mr Blair, for example, said that Thailand’s protracted political conflict must be resolved by Thai people themselves, rather rather than by outsiders. However, he emphasized that reconciliation will come only from a genuine democracy that does not discriminate against the minority and does not promote vested interests.
Democracy is not about domination by the majority, but about sharing space and working together, he said.
Mr Ahtisaari also made the valid point that trust is essential for reconciliation.
Priscilla Hayner, senior adviser to the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (centre), former British prime minister Tony Blair, and former Finnish president and Nobel Peace prize winner Marti Ahtisaari (left).
Of the three speakers, Ms Hayner was most straightforward and hardhitting about the conflict in Thailand. She said reconciliation would not work if there was a hidden agenda at play.
"Reconciliation cannot mean overcoming an opponent to achieve a political purpose. It must build trust between parties and build common interests," she said.
There were more wise words from Ms Hayner -- reconciliation cannot be rushed, but must be treated with care and respect; any amnesty plan should progress with respect for victims and should not have specific political interests at heart.
The government people, including Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra who was at the forum, must have heard the well-intended advice from these distinguished speakers. The key question is: will they really listen to them and take them seriously?
The question seems to have been at least partially answered by Deputy Prime Minister Pongthep Thepkanchana, the man charged with the forming a council of elders to discusss political reform. He said the government would press ahead regardless with Pheu Thai MP Worachai Hemma’s amnesty bill, even while claiming he agreed with the speakers at the forum.
It appears that the government or, more specifically, the ruling Pheu Thai Party, is hell-bent on ignoring almost all the advice given by these three respected forum speakers.
The amnesty bill was hurriedly passed by the House in the first reading, with the ruling party using its majority to ram through the bill and cutting short the opposition's debate response. The bill also goes against the will of relatives of the dead victims among the red-shirts, who want those ultimately responsible for their deaths to be held accountable and punished.
Both the amnesty bill and the ongoing political reform process are widely suspected to have a hidden agenda, one that will benefit fugitive former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
For the Pheu Thai Party, it seems that democracy is not about sharing space and working together. It is all about domination by the majority. It is all about winners take all, and the losers lose all.
That is why all the senators have to be elected, according to Pheu Thai, so that the Senate can be a "husband and wife" chamber that will sing in tune with the House, as the first step in rewriting the entire constitution to dismantle or neutralise all the independent agencies that are deemed an obstruction to the party’s ultimate ambition of complete domination of the country.
No. Democracy in Thailand is not about sharing space and working together. Not at all.