Secret cash mars monks

Secret cash mars monks

Strengthening morality and cleansing the country of corruption are repeatedly cited by the military junta as its reason for intervening in electoral democracy.

This goal will remain elusive, however, if temples — the supposed centre of morality — are still allowed to freely abuse and steal public donations.

Monks cannot touch money, according to the monastic codes of conduct. Yet temple wealth is commonplace, as is temple corruption.

Last week's financial scandal at a famous temple in Tak province gave us a glimpse of temples' conspicuous wealth — and easy opportunities for abuse.

Seeing is believing. The photo, which went viral on social media, shows piles of banknotes — 43 million baht altogether — kept in a private room of Phra Kru Pitak Boromtaat, the abbot of Phra Borom Taat Bantaad Temple in Tak province.

The temple is famous for its principal Buddha image called "Luang Por Tanjai", believed to have magical powers to quickly grant donors' wishes.

The abbot insisted he kept the money in his room because the temple has many construction projects under way and it is inconvenient for him to go to the bank to withdraw money every time the temple has to make a payment.

He only agreed to deposit the cash in a bank after rumours spread that some of the banknotes had been destroyed by termites, which he said was not true.

It was reported earlier this week that the temple also had another 30 million baht in bank deposits, but the bank account book was lost. It is unclear under whose name the money is.

No one has accused the abbot of abusing temple donations. But what happens at Phra Borom Taat Temple — the abbot was able to exercise total control of temple donations without any external monitoring — is similar to what is going on at over 30,000 temples in the country. It is this total lack of financial transparency that has given rise to temple corruption nationwide.

The huge amount of cash in Phra Kru Pitak's room is relatively insignificant compared to other temple scandals.

Phra Phromsuthi, abbot of the prestigious Wat Saket and a member of the Supreme Sangha Council, has been accused of abusing billions of baht of temple donations.  Clerical authorities have cleared him this week, but public suspicions remain.

Research by the National Institute of Development Administration (Nida) reveals that temple donations across the country amount to at least 100-120 billion baht a year. Corruption is inevitable when monks are allowed to treat temple donations as personal money, or use temple donations at a whim without proper accounting, or any internal or external monitoring.

To be fair, there are temples which strictly follow the monastic codes of conduct, and their donations are managed with transparency. But they are few and far between.

According to the Nida research, only 1,321 out of 37,075 temples in the country send annual reports on temple money and assets to the National Office of Buddhism as required.

Following the Wat Saket corruption allegations, the National Office of Buddhism has proposed a law that requires temples to be financially transparent. Interestingly, it has faced fierce opposition from monks who insist the public should trust their integrity.

The bill is in the pipeline for deliberation by the National Legislative Assembly. But proper accounting alone is not enough. Systematic monitoring from communities and civic groups is necessary to make temples accountable to the public. Thai Buddhism cannot stand proud when its system continues to be tainted with corruption.

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