OPINION

Turns at the trough

I moved here right when the junta took control of the country and honestly felt that the reasoning of rooting out political corruption was noble, and I was willing to wait and see what would transpire.

It would be nice, I felt, if this could be accomplished and it would go a long way to setting the framework for Thailand to advance as a society and culture. Having a Thai wife and several Thai children, I have a vested interest in this. I am not a farang just passing through.

Now that we are four years into this dictatorship, the results demonstrate that there was not an overthrow of democracy to eliminate said corruption, but rather just a shift of who gets to benefit from the state of corruption here. Suing a legitimate prime minister for losses in a government aid programme for farmers set a tone for rooting out corruption -- but not extending this same diligence to the military and current regime exposes the hypocrisy.

When there is not a swift and transparent investigation into Gen Prawit and his flaunting of suspected wealth or holding the generals financially responsible for GT200s as Yingluck was for the rice-pledging programme-something is truly amiss!

Re: "Somkid defends ministers' party posts", (BP, Oct 2).

For four key ministers to retain their government posts while joining a political party is a clear conflict of interests, and fools no one, for no game is considered fair where a player is also a referee.

PM Prayut Chan-o-cha, according to all the polls, is highly popular, and the junta will win a landslide -- after all, didn't it write the rules of the game? Having the ministers keep their positions unnecessarily rubs salt in the wounds of Thai democracy -- they should play by the same rules as everybody else, so their win will be legitimate.

Re: "No extension of service life for old passenger vans", (Online, Oct 1).

The real reason for those operators' request for extension is that they have no money to replace their vans with minibuses and operate them. Those guys are still financially weak after so many years operating their vans. They are not organised businesses and not qualified to subcontract public transport projects in the first place. Those shady contractors/operators should be replaced before replacing old vans.

Re: "Besting Thaksin", (PostBag, Oct 2).

Dear Mr Felix Qui,

I found your letter very confusing and impossible to grasp.

The only impression I got was that you took my letter seriously when you said, "Somsak Pola might indeed be correct that...". After that I was completely lost.

Anyway, in my letter, I was only trying to be sarcastic and lighthearted, humorously blaming every fault in this country on the man in Dubai, like coup-supporters always do. Apparently, you misconstrued my words and took them literally.

You did teach me a valuable lesson, though, that what one considers a sarcastic remark or a joke may not be so to someone else. Paul Simon said it best, "One man's ceiling is another man's floor".

Re: "Putting plastic in its place", (Asia Focus, Oct 1).

The excellent article neglected to mention microplastics, an alarming and poorly understood dimension of plastic pollution.

A recent study found 83% of drinking water worldwide and 94% in the US is contaminated by microplastics. Groundwater, tap water, ocean water, lakes and rivers -- almost all water in the world is polluted with this unseen and potentially deadly contaminant.

It is in all of us, can be spread by the wind, can be inhaled, and is in our food and drink.

I wonder how well what people think about this compares with what government and industry are doing about it if it is not even mentioned in an article as thorough as this?

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