The Constitution Drafting Committee has produced two books containing the main points of the draft constitution to be distributed to the public ahead of the referendum scheduled for Aug 7, CSD chairman Meechai Ruchupan said on Tuesday.
The 2014 interim constitution requires the CDC to produce documents to explain the draft constitution within 15 days of the completion of the draft charter.
Mr Meechai said the books are produced in two forms. The first one, with 35 pages of A5 size, is in the form of summaries of the main ideas of the draft charter for easy reading.
"The part which concerns the people will be in detail. The part on political proceedings which are already familiar to the people will be short, such as the legislative process. To conclude, the book will give information about political mechanisms, the form of the state, the people's rights and liberties, the checks and balances of power and the elections of senators and MPs," he said.
A sample page from one of the two books explaining the process of electing a prime minister. (Photo by Mongkol Bangprapa)
The second one is in the form of a pictorial book, with 14 pages of A5 size, for easy understanding.
In this book, there are pictures and graphics to explain 10 main points of the draft charter.
The pictures explain how the people's freedom is protected, the duty of the state to materialise the people's rights, the duties of the people, how to elect senators and MPs, anti-corruption mechanisms, the Constitutional Courts and independent organisations, how the prime minister is elected, the local administration and the country's reforms.
The CDC believed people who have no time to read the entire of the draft constitution would understand it after going through the two books.
Those who wanted a more profound knowledge of the draft could download the full text of it from a website, wait for copies of the draft charter to be distributed to various villages, or ask for a copy directly from the CDC, Mr Meechai said.
In addition to the two books, the CDC will also produce a brochure containing the gist of the draft charter to be attached to documents to be sent by the Election Commission to all households with eligible voters.
"We want the two books to be distributed to all of the 17 million households. However, whether this can be done depends on the budget allocated to the EC," Mr Meechai said.
