• Thailand's rising tide of problems ( catch22 )
• The avoidable cost of progress ( catch22 )
• Timesonline refuses to release Thaksin interview tape to Thailand ( catch22 )
• How To Get Rid Of The Poor?....Just Bury Them! ( catch22 )
• Yuri - Abhisit Why Me? ( catch22 )
• Genuine software ( Tow )
• Meet the Gods (5. Zeus) ( yabua )
• Meet you when the country needs you. (พบกันเมื่อชาติต้องการ) ( Pomjuk )
• Amnesty International : Two Faced and Hypocritical !! ( Hermano_Lobo )
• The Democrat Party - Too predictable ?? ( Hermano_Lobo )

more

A Man's Random Walk

politik, economik, foreign affairs
Permalink : http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/ginola

Posted by Ginola , Reader : 668 , 07:09:57  
Print

The Thai Parliamentary meeting on January 22 was ended prematurely after the opposition requested a quorum count and it turned out that only 219 MPs were at the House meeting, 9 short of the required minimum of 228. During the house meeting, the PueaThai-led opposition deployed the tactic of frequently requesting quorum count, something that any MP has the right to ask for. The process of counting MPs took as long as 45 minutes each time. This tactic, aimed at disrupting the government's ability to work, was employed by the Democrat Party when it was the opposition as well. During the House sessions last week, the opposition also took the opportunity to fiercely attack the government on issues such as the government's special relationships with the PAD. The opposition also accused the House Chairman, Mr.Chai Chidchob, of illegally authorizing the change of venue for the government's policy address when it could not use the parliament surrounded by the red shirts. It is clear that revenge is the name of the game in the parliament these days. There appears to be little friendship or respect between government and opposition MPs as partisanship is the order of the day. Looking back to the last few years of Thai politics, it is not hard to understand why the opposition party wants revenge and wants to fiercely attack the government. However, given the country's grim economic conditions, the opposition's tactics of disrupting the House sessions are not beneficial. It is also unlikely to gain public support. While I view the rise to power of this government as undemocratic, the opposition should not spend the house's precious time criticizing the government on its rise to power. Instead, the opposition should do the job that it's supposed to do: checking the progress of government policy in various fields. For example, the opposition should be reviewing and criticizing the government's economic stimulus package or even the expired canned fish scandal. Making a fuss in the parliament about the government's rise to power or links to the PAD is more likely to do more harm than good to the opposition. After all, a lot of people have been talking about this and the public knows very well how this government has come to power. People can think for themselves about the legitimacy of this government. If the opposition does its job of checking the government well enough by presenting to the public some evidence of the government's policy errors and corruption cases, then this could boost the opposition's reputation, something that has deteriorated following the last two unpopular PMs. If the opposition wants to seek revenge, it should do so by exposing the policy wrongdoings of the government, not by requesting frequent quorum counts or by fuming about the past. Sometimes, acting in the contrary to what your instinct tells you to do can actually be good!

Read comment

comment 15 AussieObserver date : 28/01/2009 time : 15.11 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/politics

ooopppss I missed the second article reference http://www.nationmultimedia.com/2009/01/27/opinion/opinion_30094207.php

comment 14 AussieObserver date : 28/01/2009 time : 15.09 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/politics

reading the Nation report on the quorum calls... its seems the government has a problem getting its members to attend the parliament.. http://www.nationmultimedia.com/topstory/30094338/Pheu-Thai-focuses-on-quorum-counts and this article says that apparently some government MPs and not happy and are not turning up in parliament on purpose this government may think that the army is guaranteeing their place but still its the duty of MPs to attend parliament even under the military 2007 constitution! so, back to Chris-TH Comment 1!

comment 13 vetopower date : 28/01/2009 time : 13.50 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/veto

It seems the opposition's game plan is to always ask for a quorum count. It's curious they haven't chosen a leader yet? Is they good? or just a group of malcontents?

comment 12 Ian date : 28/01/2009 time : 11.00 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/anterian36

comment 11. "how would we know" that is the entire problem with Thailand summed up in one short phrase. Without transparency nations become dictatorships.

comment 11 AussieObserver date : 28/01/2009 time : 09.01 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/politics

Ginola, I have just realised... of course the (scared) pro-military media are painting the opposition in the worst light they can... how would we know, maybe they are trying to be constructive and the quorum calls are only a sideline that is beaten out of perspective????

comment 10 AussieObserver date : 26/01/2009 time : 13.36 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/politics

Ginola, good post... its always better to be constructive.. and particularly now for the opposition I note that Thaksin seems to always have constructive comments to make about how to run the country as his main theme the opposition should recognise this is his talent and aim to emulate him

comment 9 Chris-TH date : 26/01/2009 time : 12.19 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/Chris-TH

C5, You are sing the same old song. "It also happend with the former administration" OR "It happened during the previous administration". What can I say to that??? That the new administration is neither better or worse than the previous????? Bye.

comment 8 Ian date : 26/01/2009 time : 11.58 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/anterian36

peacefulness, comment 7. Would you care to name these other bloggers that you regard as, "stupid, ignorant and biased". Does it simply mean anyone who does not accept your narrow view of events? Even so I would like you to name names, just for the record.

comment 7 peacefulness date : 26/01/2009 time : 11.50 Nationmultimedia.com

Ginola-- the more u write , the more rubbish will be. it also expose ur stupidity, ignorance, Bias into the public same as other bloggers.

comment 6 sul date : 26/01/2009 time : 11.47 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/sul

House meeting almost collapsed twice By: BangkokPost.com Published: 26/01/2009 at 11:13 AM House Speaker Chai Chidchob had to call a House of Representatives meeting twice on Monday morning after the number of coalition members of parliament was inadequate to proceed with the first meeting. Out of approximately 600 members, only 200 registered to attend the first House meeting, which started at 9.30am. As a result, the meeting was adjourned. Mr Chai called another meeting at 9.50am and about 320 attended, allowing the session to continue. The House Speaker said if the lack of quorum happens three times, the government can dissolve the parliament and hold a general election. However, he urged the government to prevent this problem from reoccurring and called on the opposition not to request for a quorum count frequently. The session will discuss agreements to be signed during the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) summit, scheduled to be held in Hua Hin from February 27 to March 1 as well as the mid-year government supplementary budget.

comment 5 peacefulness date : 26/01/2009 time : 11.41 Nationmultimedia.com

Ginola---U SING THE SAME OLD SONG, AND DANCE TO THE SAME OLD TUNE, MY COMMENT WL ALSO BE MORE OR LESS THE SAME WITH MY PREVIOUS COM. TO UR BLOGS .. 1, lack of quorum is a normal happening in thai parliament session, it happened a couple of times s s s s during thaksin’s administration both in the first term and 2nd term with 377 seats in the parliament one party controlled government. And it happened in every government before that. 2, the opposition pty’s mps of “puea pty”are more cunning , more elusive , out-smart than U ginola, pls refrain from offering advices to all these political parasites in the parliament. 3, the legality of moving the venue to the foreign affairs of this government’s inaugural policy speech on 30dec09 is now under the utmost discretion and judgment of the constitutional court. Pls just wait and see. 4, friendship and respect not to be found in thai parliament, it should not be found when doing their respectable duties for the people and the country. Don’t u ever know that Ginola????????????????????? 5, the rise of power of abhisit’s government is legally selected/appointed in the parliament acrdg to thai constitution 2007 , section 172/174/175/180/182 and all related. Should not be any untoward accusation of this government. lastly, i do not think that the opposition mps need any advice from U ginola, reasons as mentioned above. good day.

comment 4 Ian date : 26/01/2009 time : 11.08 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/anterian36

The true role of an opposition is to be the public's eyes and ears on the doings of the elected government, it is the people's watchdog. The media should also be the same. The problem in Thailand is that very few people, including many politicians simply do not understand what democracy means. In Britain this is made clear by the words we use, we refer to the party in power as "Her Majesty's government" and the party not in power as "The Loyal opposition".

comment 3 Plaadip date : 26/01/2009 time : 09.55

So how many opposition MPs was in the meeting? They are in disarray, so they can't do anything effective as opposition. I think that is the real picture. Yeah, I agree to your opinion. They should not have piked up the PAD issue, because it looked like a rush job, a repetition of an old story, which people start losing their interests in.

comment 2 Ginola date : 26/01/2009 time : 08.52 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/ginola ginola

Chris, you're right, and I think the government will be much more careful now about having enough MPs in the house. But at the same time, if the opposition requests the count every time the House meets (and several requests in a day), then it's really a waste of time. What the opposition should do is to have someone count the MPs and then report to the public, without having to request the official quorum count. That way, the house can spend time discussing important things while the public is also kept informed about how many MPs attend each house session.

comment 1 Chris-TH date : 26/01/2009 time : 08.42 http://blog.nationmultimedia.com/Chris-TH

Well Ginola, in my opinion a majority backed Government should never experience a qourum problem. The MPs are being paid for their job and have the responsibillity of showing up at scheduled sessions. It is not like they are have sessions 8 hours a day 5 days a week. Comparing the votes for the PM and the quorum count, there was some 20% of the MPs missing from the coalition. In my company that would be quite unacceptable on our monday meetings.

Comment

"If you are not member, please register to comment. It take only a few steps." member sign in   |   member register Username: Password:

name :
email :
website :
comment :
		back top

<<	January 2009					>>
s	m	t	w	t	f	s
				1	2	3
4	5	6	7	8	9	10
11	12	13	14	15	16	17
18	19	20	21	22	23	24
25	26	27	28	29	30	31