The Office of the Attorney-General (OAG) has decided to indict a key Palang Pracharath Party MP in the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Holders of Political Positions over alleged graft on the construction of futsal fields in Nakhon Ratchasima.
Attorney-General Wongsakul Kittipromwong said on Friday that Wirach Ratanasate will be arraigned for siphoning off money from an Education Ministry budget for school repairs used to fund a futsal field project in the northeastern province.
Mr Wirach is the chief government whip for the Palang Pracharatch-led coalition government.
Mr Wongsakul said other people involved in the case would also be taken to court. He would not name them.
Mr Wirach said he was ready to fight the case and prove his innocence in court.
If the case is accepted by the court, he will be suspended from parliamentary duty pending the outcome.
The charge dates back to fiscal year 2012, during the Yingluck Shinawatra government.
Mr Wirach was then a Pheu Thai Party MP for Nakhon Ratchasima.
Irregularities were found two years later, and the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) then took up the case. (continues below)
State auditors inspect a fustal pitch at Ban Lum Khao School in Noen Sung district of Nakhon Ratchasima on Nov 3, 2014, and find it substandard. (Bangkok Post file photo)
In 2019, the NACC decided to charge Mr Wirach, his wife Thassaneeya, her sister Thassanaporn Ketmetheekarun and about two dozen other people for alleged irregularities in the project in Nakhon Ratchasima.
It was part of a 4.4 billion baht budget for the construction of 56 futsal pitches in Nakhon Ratchasima and 18 other provinces.
Mr Wirach and the others were accused of engaging in policy-oriented corruption by unlawfully interfering in budget matters and diverting funds meant for school repairs for the construction of futsal courts in Nakhon Ratchasima, the NACC said in its decision to indict him in August 2019.
After they were built, the futsal courts were found to be substandard and abandoned.
The bidding process was conducted in a way that favoured private companies who had close relationships with state officials, and the cost of the futsal courts was almost 10 times the standard market price of 330 baht per square metre, the anti-graft agency said at the time.
The agency forwarded the case to the OAG, recommending court action.
Mr Wirach’s wife is now a Palang Pracharath party-list MP, and her sister is a constituency MP in Nakhon Ratchasima.
The OAG has been criticised for its slow pace in moving forward on the case.
Siriya Intamra, director-general of the Corruption Litigation Department, said on Friday the department was drafting the prosecution statement and she expected it to be completed this month.
The exact number of people to be prosecuted had not been finalised, but they included school directors and local administration organisation leaders, she said.