Listen to this story |
The reasons given by the former chairman of the junta-drafted Constitution Drafting Committee (CDC) in defense of the 2014 coup leader and currently suspended Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha’s 8-year term limit do not make sense as it contradicts itself, former minister of justice said.
“Meechai [Ruchuphan] argued that General Prayut’s term should be counted from 2017 because the current constitution came into effect in 2017 was unreasonable,” Chaturon Chaisang told Thai Enquirer in a phone interview.
“It was unreasonable because Article 264 of the 2017 charter states that the Cabinet which was in power before the 2017 constitution comes into effect should be counted as a Cabinet under the 2017 constitution…this means that there is no reason why Prayut’s first Cabinet during the interim charter should not be counted at all,” he said.
The Constitutional Court suspended General Prayut’s premiership duty on August 24, pending their verdict on his 8-year term limit.
The opposition parties argued that his 8-year term started since August 2014, three months after he took control of the power via a coup that he led and when he was royally endorsed as Prime Minister under the interim charter that was in effect between 2014 and 2017.
His supporters said it should be counted from April 2017, when he was royally endorsed as Prime Minister under the current junta-drafted charter.
The court asked Meechai and Former Secretary of the CDC Pakorn Nilprapunt to provide their statements on the matter and the court said they have considered it since Monday.
Meechai’s statement was then leaked to the public on Tuesday.
Chaowana Traimas, the secretary-general of the Constitutional Court’s Office, said on Wednesday that the president of the court, Worawit Kangsasitiam, was “sorry” to see “the leak”.
While Worawit was explaining the possible leak, Prayut’s statement to the court was also leaked to the public on Wednesday.
Today the Constitutional Court is meeting to deliberate on the issue and to see if there was more information that it may need or was the information provided to the court was enough for the 9-bench judges to make a call.
Besides saying that Meechai’s argument was unreasonable, Chaturon noted there is not much point in arguing with Meechai because the court will make the verdict based on the intention of the CDC, not only Meechai’s opinion right now.
“CDC’s intention on this matter was recorded in their meeting on September 7, 2018, and Khun Meechai’s current opinions were not only illogical, it was also deviating from the truth,” he said.
“His own opinion cannot overrule the intention of the entire CDC,” he said.
Chaturon, who is now a member of the Pheu Thai party, said the unauthenticated document that believes to be Prayut’s statement also used the same logic as Meechai’s argument which was also unreasonable since the charter clearly stated that the Cabinet under the interim charter should be counted under the current charter as well.
Chaturon said if Prayut’s first term during the National Council for Peace and Order era was not counted then all of the NCPO’s orders should also be void and that would be very problematic because the NCPO’s orders have already been used as a part of the law.
He also said if Meechai’s logic is to really be used, then Prayut can keep on tearing one charter after another so that he can continue to stay in power for as long as he wants.
“If this logic was used and this charter was lifted then his term would restart under the new charter again which is against the intention of the charter which is to prevent any leader from being in power for too long,” he said.
“This should also include preventing a person who came into power via a coup from staying in power for too long and Prayut already enjoyed absolute power for at least 5 years during the NCPO era and he also enjoyed more power than other civilian Prime Ministers in the past for another 3 years because no one can check him as he had intervened with the power of all independent institutions that were appointed by the NCPO,” he said.
[Update] The Constitutional Court said on Thursday that they will meet again on September 14 as they need more time to discuss the CDC’s minutes from its meetings in September 2018 when they were discussing a premier’s 8-year term limit.