Scandal, not censure, main threat to Govt

Problems within the coalition and the economic crisis are bigger threats to Abhisit Vejjajiva's government than the opposition censure motion - and could bring it down, academics said yesterday.

After only two months in office, the government faces a number of fiascos such as the rotten canned fish and bad milk for school children.

These scandals have discredited the government, said Prayad Hongtongkham, a veteran political scientist. And unfortunately [for the government],the scandals affected people mostly in the South - the Democrat's stronghold.

"They have proved that the Democrat-led government has not the efficiency to handle such problems," he said. "The party has no unity and there are disputes within."

Many troubles of this kind are likely to bring pressure on the government around the time the opposition censure motion opens in March, he said.

The motion itself would not hurt the government but the economic downturn and the political difficulties might force the prime minister to dissolve the House of Representatives, Prayad said.

Political scientist Kanin Boonsuwan said the government basically faces structural political instability due to the rift in Thai society.

A lot of scandal, the burden of its proximity to the street protesting People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), and the economic crisis, would be good ammunition for the opposition to attack the government, he said.

Dissatisfaction among the coalition parties over budget allocations could be another threat to the government. "It is possible the coalition parties might vote for the opposition after the censure debate," Kanin said.

Jade Donavanik, dean of the faculty of law at Siam University said the cloning of Thaksin Shinawatra's populist policy is the most serious problem for the Democrat-led government.

The Democrats could not explain why they had brought what they had called "a vicious policy" to the people, he said.

"The way the Democrats applied the policy is worse, since it gives free money, while Thaksin gave money with conditions for people to create economic activities," he said.

"Of course, there was some corruption around Thaksin's policy, but grassroots people got benefits too," Jade said.

If the Democrat's populist policies fail to jumpstart the economy they will be compared to Thaksin's, he said.

"If the economy does not recover within one or two quarters from now, people will draw the conclusion that the Democrats have failed," he said.

Jade saw no problem with the close relationship between Democrats and the PAD. If the government performed, such a burden would disappear, he said.