99 days wasted, says abhisit

The government has wasted time that should have been spent working for the people's well-being and addressing such urgent national problems as the higher cost of living, Democrat Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva said yesterday.

He said his party would have done better over the past 99 days if it had been in power.

"Over the past 99 days under Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej's leadership, the government has not only wasted the country's opportunities, but also led the country into a political trap," Abhisit said. "It was only for the benefit of a single person but has caused the ongoing confrontation between people."

Abhisit, who is also the opposition leader, also called on Samak to prove he was "the real prime minister" and not a nominee of any politician, as had been alleged.

"It's still not too late now for the prime minister to review the way he is running the country and shift to the correct way of doing it. This would prove he was the real prime minister," Abhisit said.

The Democrat leader was speaking at a press conference entitled "99 Days of Lost Time and Potential Opportunities" at party headquarters. He said if the Democrats had been running the country, many of its urgent policies would have been implemented and yielded results, such as a policy of allowing free education to all students from kindergarten to high school.

Abhisit said the government should not have focused too much on political matters like attempting to amend the Constitution, but instead should have concentrated on addressing economic problems and expediting logistics projects that would benefit the country.

These include building more dual-track railways and creating a land bridge linking shipping traffic between the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand.