TRT's Pongsak sues Suthep
Thai Rak Thai Party deputy secretary-general Pongsak Rukta-pongpisal yesterday filed a libel suit against Democrat Party secretary-general Suthep Thaugsuban for accusing senior TRT party members of paying candidates from smaller parties to contest next month's election.
Suthep, meanwhile, said the witnesses who appeared at his press conference on Sunday to back his allegation had been threatened. Should it rule in his favour, Pongsak asked the court to order Suthep to pay for notices publicising the ruling in nine daily newspapers as compensation. The court scheduled a hearing for May 29. The lawsuit stated that on Thursday and Friday last week Suthep accused three senior Thai Rak Thai officials - Pongsak, deputy leader Thamarak Isarangura and deputy secretary-general Prommin Lertsuridej - of conspiring to subvert the democratic system. It said Suthep accused the three of hiring candidates for between Bt100,000 and Bt3 million and recruited small parties to field the candidates in constituencies where the party might not get the 20 per cent of votes needed to make its victory legally valid if it were the only party contesting that constituency. Suthep said his four witnesses were at his house in Surat Thani as a precaution since people posing as state officials had threatened relatives with harm if they didn't reveal their whereabouts. The witnesses will today meet and testify to officials from the Election Commission (EC) at the Provincial Police Region 8 Bureau in the province, Suthep said. He said that in one case the husband of witness Thatima Phawalee was forced by his boss in Roi Et to report that she was missing. In another case, he said one person claiming to be a Nakhon Phanom provincial official and another claiming to be a local reporter asked the wife of Suksan Chayathet if they could meet him. Suthep's witnesses are Thatima; Chawakan Tosawat, a Pattana Chat Thai candidate in Bangkok's Constituency 29; Suksan, director of Pattana Chat Thai; and Suksan's as- sistant Monthiraphon Pimpchan. Thai Rak Thai executive Sutham Saengpratoom said Suthep was trying to prevent the election from going ahead. He said Suthep and his people were the ones behind the conspiracy to hire candidates for the small parties, and blamed it on his party. The EC was also confused over a candidate named Natpracha Kuasakul, who was running for a seat in Nakhon Si Thammarat and who had apparently changed his name, Sutham said.
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