A majority of people believe news reports about "ghost recruits" - government officials recorded as working at a state agency in three Deep South provinces without actually doing the job - are true, according to an opinion survey by the National Institute of Development Administration, or Nida Poll.
The poll was conducted on Aug 30-Sept 1 by telephone interviews with 1,102 people aged 18 and over of various levels of education, occupations and incomes in Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat provinces.
Public attention has focused on the case of Pol Cpl Kornsasi Buayaem, 43, who was recruited into the police force - allegedly through a high-level connection - despite being unqualified for the job, and then sent to the far South to fill a non-existent work assignment at the Royal Thai Army's Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc) Region 4 Forward Command.
Asked whether they believed the reports were true, a majority - 66.24% - said "yes", with 40.29% convinced the reports were credible, and 25.95% believing they were probably true. On the other side, 19.33% believed the reports were definitely untrue and 14.07% probably untrue.
The rest, 0.36%, had no answer or were not interested.
Asked to comment on the issue of "ghost recruits" - with respondents able to choose more than one answer - the replies varied as follows:
- 43.32% believed hidden interests were behind the practice;
- 41.55% said the practice was unfair to officials who actually worked in the far South;
- 30.65% said the fake assignments were only for future career advancement;
- 30.38% said it involved use of official and political connections;
- 27.38% said the practice was common in the Thai bureaucracy;
- 17.57% said the central administration had no intention on addressing the problem of "ghost recruits" in the far South;
- 14.58% said the practice indicated there were loopholes in the bureaucracy; and
- 1.91% were not sure or were not interested.
The respondents who believed the reports about "ghost recruits" in the far South were true - 734 of 1,102 - were then asked whether the problem could be solved.
Of that number, 57.08% said "yes", via careful monitoring and heavy penalties on wrongdoers; 40.47% said there was no way to solve the problem because the practice involved power abuse, special interests and use of connections; and 2.18% had no answers or were not interested.