Re: ''PM calls for army to help quell protest'', (BP, Jan 2).
Caretaker prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra has asked the military to help police enforce law and order if Suthep Thaugsuban carries out his threat to ''shut down'' Bangkok.
When then-prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and his deputy Mr Suthep called in the military it was because the police did not cooperate in quelling the armed red shirts. This time, the police are trying to tackle the problem even using covert policemen in black uniforms to do so.
The red shirts are determined to intervene when Mr Suthep tries to control Bangkok. Will the red shirts reunite with their black-shirt comrades?
RICHARD BOWLER
Coup won't change things
Re: ''Citizens' right to protest'' (PostBag, Jan 2).
In a civilised society, protesters do have their right to protest but they do not have the right to shut down the city, government agencies and businesses and cause damage to the livelihoods of others. Protests for few days or a week or two should be sufficient to make a statement.
Nobody has the right to hold others hostage. The agenda of the protest leaders has nothing to do with reform, otherwise they would be sitting across the negotiating table.
After so many coups, lessons are clear: Yet another coup will not change society.
Corruption is a systemic problem. It has to be dealt with at all levels, just not in governance. Saying ''No'' to elections or a negotiated settlement makes Thailand look like a country of pirates and hoodlums, or even worse as a Third World dictatorship.
KULDEEP NAGI
Democracy on the edge
The reason for the criticism of the current anti-government protests is a lack of understanding of what constitutes democracy.
Those who do understand democracy are those who are currently protesting. There is no magic wand which can suddenly achieve democracy. It has to be fought for, as we have seen throughout history, and the protests in Thailand are tame compared with the bloodshed suffered in other countries for similar goals. Democracy cannot be imposed _ it has to come from the people themselves.
In his speech recorded in Hansard on Nov 11, 1947, Winston Churchill said: ''No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government _ except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.''
The important phrase here is: ''form of government''. That is exactly the point. Democracy is a form of government, not simply voting at a ballot box. The struggle in Thailand is for a form of government that qualifies the country as a democracy. When this is understood and established, Thailand will move forward, out of the rut in which it has been trapped for so many decades. It will relegate corruption, totalitarianism, partisan policing and coups to its history books.
JC WILCOX
Protesting is no holiday
I don't know what PostBag contributor Kuldeep Nagi has against Suthep Thaugsuban. First, he warned the people who joined the rallies and not to be fooled by the leader. Now, he wants Mr Suthep arrested.
It looks to me that Mr Kuldeep didn't pay any attention to the kind of participants in the protests. They aren't paid to do this, but come of their own free will, no longer able to tolerate the prospect of the prime minister, cabinet and members of parliament ruining their country. And protesting is certainly no holiday, requiring many of them to sleep at the roadside with minimal sanitary arrangements.
Doesn't Mr Kuldeep know that the government lost the legal right to administer the country when it rejected the Constitution Court's rulings?
In developed countries, this kind of thing simply couldn't happen, but here the government still holds on to power. The police not only turns a blind eye, but also uses excessive force against the protesters. On top of this, the government has an army of heavies to harass and even kill protesters, and ''misguided upcountry citizens''.
It will be interesting to see what happens when this government eventually loses power, and the protesters take the police to court under the Criminal Code's Section 157.
The military is not a willing spectator. Its role is to protect the nation, the monarchy and the people. The protesters are unarmed Thais, and they act within the constitution and within their rights. If the situation spirals out of control and excessive force is used against the protesters, I'm positive the military will tell the government to leave.
I don't understand why this government is so afraid to resign, allowing us to find a neutral prime minister with a national government, paving a way to reform, and leading eventually to a general election, free from the insidious plague of corruption which has been with us for so long.
DUSIT THAMMARAKS
Highlighting hypocrisy
Congratulations to Fantia for yesterday's letter about the PM calling in the army to quell the protests. A simple four-line letter said it all. Bravo Fantia! It reminds me of that proverb: ''Do as I say, not as I do.''
JACK GILEAD
Thaksin did a lot of good
As a foreigner living in Thailand, I don't feel it's my place to tell Thais how to run their affairs. At the same time, the current political crisis does raise strong feelings in me, since I do come from a country with a long democratic history which may have some relevance to Thailand in the present circumstances.
I would like to point out that former PM Thaksin raised millions of rural Thais out of poverty through his rural development programmes, especially through the Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives, one of the best rural banks in the world (that's not just my opinion _ just ask rural finance experts at the World Bank). He also built Suvarnabhumi airport, the Bangkok subway, the skytrain and other infrastructure that we all thankfully use daily here in the capital.
To me, helping people out of poverty or giving urban dwellers a way to escape Bangkok's dreadful traffic is not, as often claimed by Bangkokians, bribing the voters. I would simply say, rather, that the PM did his duty to improve the lives of his people. That's what we elect politicians to do, after all.
I would have thought that the reaction of fellow Bangkokians would have been to simply thank providence for sending them such a wise leader, but clearly that is not the case in Bangkok, although Thaksin and his sister Yingluck are widely beloved in the North. And since the majority of Thai voters live there, it is essentially impossible for other parties to win a majority in a national election. We all recognise this.
Imperfect as Thai democracy may be at this point, it seems quite foolhardy to me to abandon existing democratic structures to put the country's future into the hands of a ''people's council'' made up of members chosen by the Bangkok elite, and not by voters nationwide.
Real reform will fail miserably unless it has participation from all sectors and regions of the country, not just Suthep Thaugsuban's hand-picked Democrats. I appreciate the Democrats' frustration at not being able to win an election, but to follow Mr Suthep's prescription is to throw the baby out with the bath water.
If the Democrats want to win elections, I suggest they design new, progressive policies and programmes that appeal to the majority nationwide, not just to those in the capital and the southern provinces, instead of simply grabbing power out of frustration, possibly provoking a civil war.
CHET AESCHLIMAN
'Elite fascists' got it right
Sometimes people just can't seem to get it right. Bung Kan Bernie (''Democracy's real benefits'', PostBag, Jan 2) slams what he calls the minority elite trying to destroy democracy in Bangkok, then says yes, the amnesty bill was a mistake, but the government eventually withdrew it.
Does Bernie not realise it was this bunch of ''elite fascists'' that made the government correct their mistake? Had they not done so, Thailand would now be saddled with it.
CHARLIE BROWN
PM bears responsibility
When Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said: ''It seems the country is in a state of lawlessness. People can do what they want'' (BP, Jan 2), it is doubtful that she will ever recognise the irony of this statement.
In other words, she and her brother have had a big hand in bringing about this current anarchic state of affairs. When Thaksin was prime minister, he always seemed to feel he was above the law. His so-called ''war on drugs'', with more than 2,000 killings committed by the state, is just one example. From Dubai, Thaksin set loose his red shirts upon Bangkok. This deliberate mayhem was another example of Thaksin's disrespect for both human life and the law. Currently, Thaksin's police force is doing his dirty work again: It is attacking and even killing protesters.
Ms Yingluck may be only a mere puppet of her fugitive brother, but she still bears responsibility for her government's decision to ignore the ruling of the Constitution Court on the makeup of the Senate. If US President Barack Obama were to declare his intention to ignore any decision made by America's Supreme Court, there would be a national crisis _ probably followed by an insurrection.
If Ms Yingluck has any wisdom whatsoever, she will resign and give her blessing to a delayed election.
CM PHILLIPS
Yingluck has a mandate
I must question Songdej Praditsmanont's sincerity (''How to avoid a coup'', PostBag, Dec 30) when he asks Prime Minister Yingluck to step down to prevent a further outbreak of violence.
How come I didn't read any letters by him demanding that former prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva step down before the 2010 riots?
And what about the millions of people who support Ms Yingluck? Should their wishes and votes be ignored because they haven't taken over the streets of Bangkok, beating up journalists and attacking policemen?
While I have been critical of Ms Yingluck, if she was to step down now it would mean protesters can always have their way by threatening to kill people if the prime minister doesn't resign. Is that what democracy has come to in Thailand?
ERIC BAHRT
Chadchart misses point
Caretaker Transport Minister Chadchart Sittipunt declared that better lighting and warning signs would be installed at the bridge in Phetchabun where a passenger bus plunged into the ravine, killing all but four people.
Should the caretaker minister have bothered to leave his office and tour the highway system while he was still a real minister, he might have noticed the danger at this bridge crossing.
So many so-called ministers are appointed simply because they are rich and know the right people.
BERELEH
Tourism takes a battering
It seems to me that Thailand could be just a few weeks away from destroying its tourism industry, in the way that Egypt has.
The violence on the streets of Bangkok now has a very nasty edge to it, with mobs roaming the city and attacking anyone who challenges them. Several people have died. I've read the tale of a foreigner in Chiang Mai who was warned to change the shirt he was wearing as it was the ''wrong'' political colour.
That, and the hate speeches on TV 24 hours a day, remind me very much of Germany before World War II. The ranting is exactly what we saw from Adolf Hitler. The only difference was his ranting was based on race; in Thailand it is based on politics.
The Election Commission now says it is too dangerous to hold the Feb 2 election because of the amount of violence it would generate. When it is too dangerous to hold an election, where do you go from there?
BARRY WOOD
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