It is high time that such life-saving drugs were made available at an affordable cost to all HIV-positive people in all countries, not only in the wealthier ones where well-established social security systems absorb the cost. One can only hope that other countries follow suit and make the pharmaceutical giants realise that human lives are more important than profit.

Edward Duhigg

Bangkok

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Obscene wealth misspent or punctuation misplaced?

Re: "Laws need overhaul", Business Extra, December 1.

CB Richard Ellis chairman David Simister is quoted while talking about the property market in Bangkok and Thailand. He says: "One of our customers from Kazakhstan pays Bt500,000 a day just on his golf, dining and travel arrangements."

The mind boggles, and one wonders what he spends on all the other necessities in life. Is this a sick joke, a misplaced comma, or are there actually people that can manage to spend this sort of money per day, over a period of time, and in Thailand? I would just love to spend an hour of two with such a colourful individual.

And people complain about Borat!

Johnny Jørgensen

Pattaya

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Pattaya corruption worsens an already bad environment

Whilst the anti-corruption spotlight is shining on Thaksin and his gang, spare a thought for the poor taxpayers of Pattaya, a city where too much easy money goes into the Treasury, and where many overpriced, incompetently carried-out projects are never finished.

Now the scale of spending has gone crazy. The toothless local press recently reported in excitement how call centres (costing the city Bt80 million to set up) are now in operation, and discussions about a useless Bt90-million archway into the city are in progress. These sums are outrageous, yet the local press remains uncritical. Why is that?

The silence of the press, the lack of police action in big-ticket corruption investigations, the lack of professional auditing or accountability in the tender process at City Hall and the absence of quality control in commissioned projects all leave honest taxpayers concerned about the misuse of their money and the scale of influence-peddling in the city.

There are so many badly finished, or unfinished, major projects in Pattaya that even on a drive around the city - assuming the roads are not still potholed where recent road works have been left unfinished - folks get the impression that the idea of stage payments to contractors (subject to quality-control checks on their work, and final payment only on satisfactory completion of the job) are new concepts. In the US and Europe they are standard procedures. Why are they not here?

The new mayor seemed to be doing a good job. But last week he stunned the city by announcing he would not be standing for re-election. When we realised who the first new candidate for mayor was, a highly connected local person, who the mayor himself introduced, we realised this was a sensible announcement. The mayor said he did not feel he had the qualities to continue to lead Pattaya, but he was happy to be an adviser to the new mayor! Inconsistent statements at best, which make us wonder about his refusal to stand again.

The pillaging of Pattaya's budget cannot continue. The city has many social problems, too few police, poor schools and areas of great poverty - all of which could be helped by the sums mis-allocated from the city's budget, which are instead being wasted on incompetent work and overpriced vanity projects, with nobody policing the process.

It is surely time the national press and the national government began a more critical coverage and auditing of this city. Without it, the influence peddling, the jackass local press and the lack of police resources, or police will to take on corruption cases, will ensure that the reputation of this city will remain in the garbage dump.

AM

Pattaya

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Wasn't even aware that pedestrians had any rights!

Re: "Pitch battle at the market", Opinion, December 1.

I was pleased to see your editorial and your statement that the "BMA must not relent in its campaign to stop Bo Bae traders" taking over the sidewalks. The big surprise to me was that there were "rights" of pedestrians to use "footpaths unobstructed and these rights have been violated".

I invite you and the BMA, if they are truly concerned about "pedestrian rights", to walk the sidewalk from Sukhumvit Soi 4 to Soi 10. The Soi 4 vendors, until recently, used to set up their stalls and still leave room for two pedestrians to walk by. Now, since the BMA obviously doesn't care about pedestrians, the stall-keepers have expanded into setting up tables and chairs and kitchens, which choke the sidewalk to a vendors-only zone.

What's next, a resistance to the BMA clearing these walkways? I can see them (food vendors) saying they have the right and that the BMA is interfering with their rights to make a living.

What rubbish! Where is the law? Pedestrians are already forced to walk into the traffic to keep from being burned on the hot stoves. It is only a matter of time before someone is injured by a passing car, and then it will be the pedestrian's fault, with no action against the vendors - because if they were not allowed to be there, they would have been asked to move.

It is now time for pedestrians to take control of the footpaths!

Fed-up with vendors

Bangkok

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Is the Bank of Thailand governor asleep at the wheel?

Re: "Export fears as baht hits 9-yr high", News, November 30.

I enjoyed reading the front page story in The Nation about the surging baht. So please forward my congratulations to your reporter, Anoma Srisukkasem. Yet I am very puzzled by two quote from Tarisa Watanagase, Bank of Thailand governor. She said that Thailand's foreign reserves were "not as high as other countries'".

Thailand's foreign reserves in strong currencies go up every time the BOT sells baht and, for example, buys dollars, pounds, euros or yen. So why does she cite foreign reserves as an obstacle to keeping the baht from going too high?

She is also quoted as saying there are costs for foreign-exchange intervention. What are they? If any, are they as high as the loss of trade by Thai exporters? Does she not know that the baht is rising against all its Asian competitors? Does she care?

Anyone thinking of trying to export and sell Thai products abroad should be put off by comments like hers.

Dan Swift

Chiang Mai

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Baht strength hits Thailand's exporters where it hurts

I'm an exporter, so I should be complaining about the strength of the baht. That puts me at odds with importers, who prefer a stronger local currency - and that's why we all look to the Bank of Thailand for wisdom. The BOT, however, keeps deflecting the issue with pronouncements about the weakness of the dollar (not the strength of the baht) and the relative strengths of other Asian currencies.

It's time to stop pulling the wool over our eyes. In our company we monitor (on a daily basis) the relative value of the currencies of our main customers and of competing suppliers.

I can understand that after the last fiasco with pegging the baht to the dollar, the BOT now wants to risk fiddling with the exchange rate only with a ten-foot pole. Other central banks obviously have different ideas and probably think that saving exporters is worth the risk.

Please explain to me why Thailand attracts so much foreign exchange that the currency market is always churning away. Are we such great exporters, or do we have so much foreign direct investment than we can't handle it? Or are the financial institutions doing what the Bank of Thailand doesn't dare to do - speculate?

Our customers are tired of us having to increase prices with every new contract. We've reached the stage now of being unable to export without hedging all the dollar proceeds. Who knows what the dollar will fetch in a few months' time? Hedging every contract has now busted our banking limits. So the first thing we tell every export customer who walks in the door is, "We don't accept dollars. Got any baht?"

Suthep Kittikulsingh

Bangkok

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Deputy PM should go now for past errors, not present ones

Re: "Pridiyathorn, bruised, will need to mind his step", Opinion, November

Thanong Khanthong is of the opinion that Pridiyathorn of the Finance Ministry is "bruised" from so many missteps he has made after only two months in office. The bruises may indicate severe haemorrhaging or systemic internal dysfunction. It is not a grave mistake for him to introduce a bill to legalise Thaksin's lotteries, but to defend Pojaman's land grab and to try to support the Revenue Department's decision to approve Thaksin's scheme of tax evasion is beyond questionable.

Pridiyathorn might have performed adequately during the Thaksin regime, but he has more than outlived his usefulness. A case can be made that either he is still part of the Thaksin regime or his judgement is fatally flawed. If Pridiyathorn does not resign, there should be a reshuffle to leave him out of the Cabinet. General Sondhi and General Surayud, it is your call and you must act decisively.

Netirat Intira

Bangkok