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Published on September 6, 2007

The first question was why so few Univentures shareholders were interested in selling their shares through the tender offer of Adelfos.

Univentures CEO Ornruedi na Ranong did not admit this, though. She is confident Adelfos will achieve its goal of taking over the company.

Then she fielded this question: "Will that goal be achieved because Khun Kittiratt [na Ranong] is going to sell his shares to raise money for the upcoming election?"

It's no secret Kittiratt is interested in joining politics. Recently, he made headlines along with some other technocrats who formed the Ruam Jai Thai Group. The group includes well-known businessman-cum-politician Pradit Phatraprasit. From the beginning, it was expected that Kittiratt would be the deputy leader once Ruam Jai Thai was registered as a political party.

It's also no secret that politics requires money.

Former president of the Stock Exchange of Thailand, Kittiratt holds a 5.92-per-cent stake in Univentures, or 31.6 million shares. At the offer price of Bt2.04 a share, he would earn Bt64.5 million if he sold all his shares.

That should be enough for a start.

Ornruedi, Kittiratt's sister, did not directly answer whether such speculation was true. Instead, she hit the arm of the reporter who asked the question.

"I don't want to talk about that," she snapped. "Let's go back to the business of Univentures."

That was the end of the conversation about Kittiratt's political career.

Another puzzle: why did she not want to talk about it? Thai politics always involves money. Who can deny that?

achara_d@nationgroup.com