The Thai princess and her loo by the lake | New Mandala

The Thai princess and her loo by the lake | New Mandala
Mish Khan, 24 FEBRUARY 2016

When nature calls waste is no issue for a royal.

Thai Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, who is visiting Cambodia for three days this week, has had her own personal bathroom constructed for the one night she spent at Yeak Lom Lake on Monday.

The eight-square metre building lies on the shore of the popular lake and was constructed using imported materials from Thailand, and comes complete with its own air conditioning system.

It’s estimated to cost $40,000-$60,000 and took two weeks to build.

The manager of construction for the company tasked with building the Princess’ powder room, Mr Pursat, stated “I don’t know how much we spent for the bathroom… actually, I do know, but I’m not permitted to tell you.”

The Thai company received special design instructions from Bangkok, including a command that the toilet be thrown out after the Princess’s departure. Additional toilets were also constructed for the Princess’s delegation, despite public toilets being available in the area.

Critics have lashed out at what is perceived to be wasteful extravagance in a country where many lack access to adequate sanitary facilities — particularly since the cost of construction was estimated to be 66 times greater than the average yearly income. Others argue that the episode highlights a deep disconnect between Thai royalists and reality.

Mish Khan is New Mandala’s Associate Editor and a third-year Asian studies/law student at the Australian National University. This article is part of her regular Southeast Asian snapshots.

Why the NLD needs to look beyond city lights | New Mandala

Why the NLD needs to look beyond city lights | New Mandala
Nicholas Farrelly, 24 FEBRUARY 2016

This column was published in The Myanmar Times on Monday, 22 February 2016. 

Over the years, I have been lucky enough to visit most of the country’s major provincial hubs. From Kengtung to Myitkyina, Dawei to Sittwe, I find they each have a unique appeal.

With variations in local food, language and culture, these towns are excellent examples of Myanmar’s diversity. Sadly, they also showcase shared experiences of mismanagement during the decades of choking military rule.

Regional garrisons take up prime real estate and, in some towns, people lament that only the roads used by the local commander get first-class upgrades.

They hope that the National League for Democracy can offer better government. A whole new generation of legislators is expected to rapidly master official responsibilities. Tempered expectations are prudent but, in the long term, prosperous and peaceful provincial towns should be the priority for the NLD.

Why does this matter?

First, these towns all service vast hinterland regions. For the majority of Myanmar’s people, many tens of millions, they offer a rare window into rapidly changing economic and political conditions.

Bustling with commerce and energy, far from the razzle-dazzle of Yangon, or the uber-elite preoccupations of Naypyitaw, each presents a glimpse of what the country could become.

Thriving towns will have improved healthcare, education, communication and transportation. Everyone benefits when opportunities in provincial areas grow to match what is on offer in the cities.

Second, all the big towns see people on the move. Many are migrants from the countryside, hoping to exchange their sweat and toil for a regular cash payment. Others have made some money and are looking to get up the first entrepreneurial rungs.

Then there are those who use their time in the provinces to save and plan for the next journey toward social and economic success: Mandalay, Yangon or beyond.

This connective role becomes apparent when you spend an afternoon at a bus station, down by a river port, at a railway terminus or waiting for the next flight out of town. While journeys are long and often bumpy, there is no shortage of people queuing to get on the move.

Third, the major provincial centres are already hotspots of political intrigue. The stories do not always make the national news, but there is no doubting the level of local interest in electoral competition.

Under the 2008 constitution, it is the 14 state and region capitals that host the most accessible sphere of legislative action. In many cases, the hluttaws have taken up space in old State Peace and Development Council facilities.

After the 2010 election, meeting rooms of the dictatorship were retrofitted as legislative chambers. These are the same chambers that are now welcoming the“red wave” of victorious NLD politicians. They carry the hopes of local voters, fed up with the entrenchment of Tatmadaw interests.

Finally, and most importantly, many of Myanmar’s provincial hubs are directly adjacent to areas defined by long-term conflict. The first time I went to Kengtung in the early 2000s, I remember a friendly Shan intellectual offering a potted history of the region’s wars.

By his count, there were elements from 34 different armies and militias in the surrounding mountains. I still don’t know if that was an exaggeration.

With such troubled histories, the peace process will rely on life getting better in the major towns. Hpa-an is another good example. The last time I drove the road out to Myawady on the Thai border a handful of armed groups, including the Tatmadaw, sought to control the traffic and collect their fees.

Such low-level extraction fades into insignificance when we consider the super profits funnelled through towns like Lashio and Myitkyina. So much of Myanmar’s wealth is in the hands of those who call the shots in the provinces.

None of this will get any easier to manage, at least until the central government can generate unanimous support for a muscled-up federal model.

For now, there are already indications of direct challenges to the NLD, especially inRakhine, Shan and Kachin states. It is not obvious that Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s instinct for centralisation will offer the space for a new conversation with the provinces. Finding the right balance between local preferences and national politics will need goodwill on all sides.

As these stories develop, it is helpful that better information now tends to be available promptly.

When big news breaks in Sittwe or Dawei we usually hear about it before too long. Journalists can hunt around for local stories without much fear of official reprimand. Even foreign academics have succeeded in gaining long-term research access in important provincial towns.

This new knowledge of local politics and economies will benefit national decision-making and should also help to dilute the emphasis on Yangon, Mandalay and Naypyitaw.

Myanmar’s provincial towns will never get as much attention as their big-city peers. But their development should be watched carefully by anyone hoping to understand the next chapter of political and economic change.

Nicholas Farrelly is director of the Myanmar Research Centre at the Australian National University and co-founder of New Mandala. His column appears in The Myanmar Times each Monday.

Self-interest and the spectre of Beijing at Sunnylands | New Mandala

Self-interest and the spectre of Beijing at Sunnylands | New Mandala
Dr Mathew Davies, 22 FEBRUARY 2016

Human rights and democracy weren’t given a helping hand as ASEAN leaders met with US President Barack Obama on 15-16 February.

US-ASEAN summit shows that a new Cold War mindset is descending on Asia.

During the Cold War the US and its Western allies proved more than willing to put their commitments to human rights and democracy on hold in the name of self-interest and anti-communism.

In Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia, wherever there was superpower competition, there was the trumping of democracy by ‘the national interest’, a slippery term that usually just meant not losing to the presumed machinations of Moscow.

The Sunnylands Special Leaders’ Summit, held February 15-16 between ASEAN member states and the US, shows that China is viewed in much the same way as was the Soviet Union, and that the response from Washington is also going to be similar.

The Joint Statement released by the heads of state/government may not mention China, but it is all about Beijing.

Articles 7 and 8 refer to the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea, and particularly call out the right of freedom of navigation, overflight and unimpeded maritime commerce. All of these have been, at least to those attending the Summit, been jeopardised by Beijing’s increasingly hawkish claims in the South China Sea, most recently installing surface to air missiles on reclaimed islands – presumably to make navigation and overflight considerably less ‘free’.

Elsewhere the document talks of ‘ASEAN Centrality’ in the evolving regional architecture of the Asia-Pacific – all very neutral until we consider that China has its own dreams of ‘centrality’ in Asian institutions, be that through the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank that the US has not only avoided joining but is reported to have pressured its allies to decline membership, something that has been remarkably unsuccessful.

Beyond those references the remainder of the statement repeats traditional ASEAN mantras – strengthening commitments to economic development, enhancing collaboration, promoting sustainable growth. All laudable goals and all crucial if ASEAN is to play a role, as Washington no doubt hopes, as a growing counter-weight to China in the region, even if that role remains implicit.

The document also includes the words ‘human rights’. Article 4 talks of the need to ‘strengthen democracy, enhancing good governance and adherence to the rule of law, protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms’.

This is not enough, however, to meet the pressing need to promote these values in at least some of ASEAN’s members let alone the demands of some that human rights ‘top the agenda’. The partial but impressive democratic transition of Myanmar since 2010 has been paralleled by a decline in democracy in Thailand, and ongoing struggles in many other ASEAN states, perhaps most notably Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam.

The joint statement goes no further, in fact falls far short, of ASEAN’s own internal commitments to rights and democracy in the 2007 ASEAN Charter or the 2012 ASEAN Human Rights Declaration, both of which are weak documents widely violated by the very states that created them.

Compare America’s willingness in 2016 to put a narrow reading of its geostrategic interest over its values to the situation in the immediate post Cold War world. Then, in the early 1990s, it was the universal validity of democracy that strongly influenced US foreign policy in Southeast Asia.

With China’s growth only just starting to register, the US was a vocal critic of the so-called ‘Asian Values’ argument that saw many leaders in Southeast Asia claim that civil and political rights had to be truncated in the name of strong states and economic development. Today Cambodia’s Hun Sen, widely decried for his human rights abuses over a 30-year period in power, is posing for photographs with the US President.

Values are often the first thing to be squeezed out of the equation when geopolitical necessity is thought to be pressing. That the US-ASEAN Summit has unfolded the way it has suggests that Washington is now well aware of the immediacy and significance of China – no longer its rise but the consequences of it having risen. The Summit has served both to reinforce ASEAN as a diplomatic resource to marshal against Beijing where possible and to show that the US is more willing to talk ASEAN’s language than push its own beliefs in human rights and democracy.

This is unsurprising but regrettable, and perhaps even short-sighted. Unsurprising because that is what powers do when challenges, history gives us numerous examples. Regrettable because the US retains significant influence in the region to push a more ambitious agenda.

But it is the short-sightedness of it that worries me most. If the US and China are really moving towards a more openly aggressive relationship, then what sort of allies does Washington want to have on its side? The Europeans are a whole hemisphere away, internally divided with their own squabbles. We in Australia can offer little in terms of direct ability to face down Beijing. It is to the countries of the Asian rim – Japan and South Korea, with Taiwan lurking in the background – but also ASEAN and its members that US attention and expectation will ultimately have to rest upon.

An ASEAN disunited in its respect for the values the US seeks to promote is an ASEAN susceptible to division, an ASEAN capable of only the weakest of commitments, an ASEAN whose activities, diplomacy and support cannot be relied upon.

The long-term interests of the US are not met by relying too heavily on an ASEAN that does not share its vision of order and justice.

Whilst it was all smiles in Sunnylands, there remain many causes to frown.

Dr Mathew Davies is head of the Department of International Relations at the Australian National University’s Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs.

Najib and Malaysia’s road to redemption? | New Mandala

Najib and Malaysia’s road to redemption? | New Mandala
Dr Amrita Malhi, 19 FEBRUARY 2016

As leading party UMNO and its embattled PM desperately cling to power, there could be even darker times ahead for Malaysia’s democracy. 

The actions of Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak have been met with widespread disbelief from domestic and international observers.

For many, there seems to be no end to the series of scandals directly or indirectly linked to Najib and his associates, beginning with a financial investigation abruptly brought to an end by a newly-appointed Attorney-General, Mohamed Apandi Ali.

The investigation, concerning the alleged misappropriation of nearly US$4 billion through entities linked to a state investment vehicle, now continues in international jurisdictions, not in Malaysia. Najib is also being investigated in France in relation to an older scandal involving the payment of illegal commissions to a close associate, linked to Malaysia’s purchase of French submarines in 2002.

Public discussion of Najib’s credibility will likely continue, even though the Attorney General is considering amending the Official Secrets Act to impose severe punishments on those who leak to the media, along with reporters and editors who act on those leaks.

To date, media coverage of leaked documents has been a major source of information about the scale and severity of the allegations against Najib. If these amendments are enacted, this tightening up of information flows would come on top of travel restrictions preventing individuals from lodging crime reports against Najib in Europe and elsewhere in Asia. Nevertheless, it appears that international investor confidence in Malaysia is declining, regardless of any potential future restrictions.

Despite this decline, governments, including Australia’s, remain reluctant to criticise Najib, and public questioning about his administration has largely been confined toAustralian media outlets. This reluctance likely stems from Malaysia’s importance as a trade and regional security partner for Australia, and from the belief that Najib, who has been taking steps to shore up his political future, will lead the nation for some time to come.

At the same time, however, any observer with an interest in Malaysia would be advised to keep a close eye on the measures Najib is adopting. These measures are designed to protect his position, but they might also make for uncertain times in future.

Australia’s investment in Malaysia
Australia and Malaysia need each other, and each nation is on the other’s list of top 10 trading partners. Malaysians consume Australian food, raw materials, manufactured goods and education exports, sending ever large numbers of students who require more goods and services in our cities when they arrive. Malaysia is also a party to the Five Power Defence Arrangements and an important partner in counter-terrorism and migration surveillance.

For Malaysia, Australia is an essential source of education and training for its most productive economic sectors, and an important destination for thousands of migrants who leave Malaysia every year. In this sense, Malaysia’s strong relationship with Australia is also a useful pressure valve, as Australia now hosts debates about Malaysia’s future that engage its diaspora of students and professionals, effectively letting off domestic political steam.

Australia permits these debates without openly interfering, including rallies like Bersih last year, at which 5,000 people gathered in Melbourne to call for cleaner elections and transparent government. Malaysia tacitly permits them as well, usually allowing government critics to travel freely to speak to Malaysians and international lobby groups, albeit accompanied by expressions of disapproval aimed at domestic audiences.

Australia has also moved in subtle ways to signal its understanding that Malaysian society is politically divided, and even official functions and programs have begun to accommodate non-government actors. In August 2015, for example, Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop attended a function for women leaders that included Ambiga Sreenevasan, a prominent lawyer and Bersih leader. There have also beenexchange schemes involving staffers from opposition parties.

This form of quiet diplomacy creates options for Australia without causing a backlash, unlike the open intervention which triggered the deportation of South Australian Senator Nick Xenophon in 2013.

Australian engagement with non-government actors is unlikely to become more vocal or obvious, despite Najib’s approval rating having fallen to 23 per cent, as reported by the Singapore media based on Merdeka Centre polling from August last year. This is unsurprising, as there is no alternative government for Australia to establish more open links with, or, at present, for Malaysians to elect.

Based on current realities, this situation is likely to continue for the foreseeable future, although two years remain between now and the next election, and the contest for Malaysia’s future remains competitive and fluid.

Domestic political moves
The move to close down the corruption investigation has been one in a sequence of many, initiated by Najib and his supporters, to realign Malaysian politics in their favour between now and 2018. The aim is to reconstruct a strong Malay Muslim electoral bloc, led by Najib and his UMNO party, whose majority position cannot be challenged by a weak and divided opposition.

This is a tried and tested UMNO strategy, and if it is successful, the opposition will have been limited to a ‘Chinese’ group of naysayers stoked by a few ‘liberal’ Malay Muslim supporters. A successful realignment along these lines is intended to prevent a 2018 election victory from attracting the same criticisms as the contested 2013 result. It should appear more like a triumph for Malay Muslim unity and rural grassroots politics, and less like a product of the Malaysian electoral system.

This is why UMNO’s moves since 2013 have also included splitting up the opposition coalition, beginning with jailing Anwar Ibrahim a year ago for the crime of sodomy, based on charges that are widely believed to be politically-motivated. Additional moves have included hosting discussions on hudud laws that seemed to convince Islamist party PAS to leave Anwar’s rebranded coalition, now in a much weaker position than in 2013.

Now espousing an independent position after UMNO eventually declined to supporthudud, PAS has begun to extract important concessions from UMNO regardless, including a sharia index which is likely to trigger a new round of Islamisation in Malaysian politics. Such rounds are usually accompanied by debates about the position of liberal Muslims and Malaysia’s non-Muslim minorities, leading to fears that Malaysians’ famous tolerance might be stretched beyond its limits. Indeed, observers question whether Malaysia’s commitment to countering radicalisation is in reality undermined by its government’s willingness to Islamise public life.

Since 2013, government spokespeople have admitted to funding NGOs espousing precisely this aim, including ISMA and Perkasa, both of which advance majoritarian arguments that infuse Malaysian debates.

Other moves have included portraying last year’s Bersih rally as just another Chinese protest, a portrayal enabled by a government decision to declare the rally illegal,thereby preventing (mostly Malay Muslim) civil servants from attending. The ‘Chinese’ effect was also supported by the noticeable absence of PAS activists, after PASdeclined to mobilise to support the rally.

Najib has also moved to suppress rebellions inside UMNO, beginning by sacking the last Attorney-General, Abdul Gani Patail, who had been leading the investigation against him. He also sacked his high-profile former deputy Muhyiddin Yassin, who had openly cast doubt on UMNO’s future electoral chances. Since then, Najib has ‘oppositionalised’ figures linked to former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, an open Najib critic who even attended the Bersih rally in Kuala Lumpur.

In this vein, state parliamentarians apparently aligned with Najib recently managed to oust the former prime minister’s son, Mukhriz Mahathir, from his Chief Minister position in the Kedah state legislature. Mahathir has responded by declaring himselfpatron of a group of anti-Najib UMNO branch chiefs, drawing immediate criticism that they are ‘shit-stirrers’ whose agitation is likely to fail.

Not surprisingly, public mistrust has not abated through this sequence of extraordinary political moves. Set against a backdrop of financial scandal, they seem to only compound Malaysians’ misgivings over the state of the economy.

These fears are also being stoked by revelations of financial difficulties at Tabung Haji, a taxpayer-guaranteed entity through which aspiring Muslim pilgrims save for travel to Mecca for the Haj. The August 2015 poll by the Merdeka Centre found 78 per cent of Malaysians disapproved of Najib’s economic management, and that result is unlikely to have improved much in the months since.

No guarantees for anyone
UMNO continues to invest heavily in Najib, and its strategy of working to rally a Malay Muslim majority. Yet there remain serious questions around whether this strategy will work to deliver an election result that UMNO can defend at home and abroad.

If UMNO’s project of restructuring the Malaysian political contest fails to achieve its desired effect, the party’s popular vote could potentially fall again, shredding the legitimacy of a 2018 victory and raising more questions about Malaysia’s direction. The resulting damage to Malaysia’s image as a parliamentary democracy would inevitably affect Australia’s relations with a neighbour it relies on for Southeast Asian security and social cohesion.

Dr Amrita Malhi is a researcher and writer on histories and politics in Southeast Asia, especially Malaysia and its interAsian contexts. She is Secretary of the Asian Studies Association of Australia, and holds an affiliation with the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific at the Australian National University. Her website is www.amritamalhi.com. 

Shutting women out no path to peace in Myanmar | New Mandala

Shutting women out no path to peace in Myanmar | New Mandala
Jenny Hedström, 18 FEBRUARY 2016

Photo by UN Photo on flickr https://www.flickr.com/photos/un_photo/

Women’s experiences of conflict and violence critical to country’s democratic development, writes Jenny Hedström. 

Myanmar’s keystone Union Peace Conference (UPC), which concluded on 16 January, is one step towards ending decades of conflict and violence in the Southeast Asian nation.

With Myanmar’s women major stakeholders in peace, you could expect their voices to be an important part of this conversation. But where were they? Clearly not in Naypyitaw where 93 per cent of delegates attending the conference were men.

This, unfortunately, comes as no surprise. Women’s experience of and voice in transitions from conflict to peace are still systematically ignored, both in Myanmar and elsewhere.

Here, the ceasefire process underway since 2011, has been dominated by men in public office and in military uniforms, despite agreement urging the inclusion of women across negotiations teams and processes at a minimum 30 per cent. Worryingly, the military sent no female representatives at all to attend the UPC; the Government sent six women and 69 men. In other words, only eight per cent of the Government’s delegates were women. This also runs counter to Myanmar’s international obligations under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).

The women who did participate in the UPC report facing a variety of challenges. This included having their input removed from the meeting summaries to their presentations being cut short. These stark images paint a bleak picture for the prospects of an inclusive peace and widespread reconciliation in the country.

Without many more women in a diversity of roles, Myanmar’s peace process will be like so many others: exclusive and unsustainable. It will reinforce existing power inequalities rather than changing them for more inclusive and democratic arrangements. The voices and experiences of women will be missing from post-war initiatives and arrangements.

This is happening right now where the (partial) nation-wide ceasefire agreementdoes not adequately identify nor address the types of violence and insecurity women face. The exclusion of women is also problematic because it overlooks their role in violence. A recent study on women, peace and security undertaken by International IDEA shows that although men are the main perpetrators of violence, women also participate in violent conflict and uphold patterns of discrimination and violence. The same patterns also cause women to suffer from insecurity and violence in ways that are particular to women; in ways that are ‘gendered’.

Study after study affirms that women are important stakeholders in peace and conflict because they are impacted by and impact on violence in very specific and gendered ways. Peace negotiations must therefore include the experiences and the voices of women, or negotiations will be flawed. In short, women’s involvement in peace building is essential for sustainable peace.

Given that on average a country coming out of conflict has a 50 per cent chance of relapsing back into conflict within five years, more comprehensive peace-building strategies are essential. In Myanmar, women active in politics and civil society possess much-needed expertise that must be tapped in to for the peace process to be sustainable.

Through their work with the women, peace and security agenda on both a local and a global level, women from Myanmar have deep understanding of relevant international obligations, possess comparative knowledge from other countries going through similar transitions, and have skills essential to the flourishing of trust across political and ethnic divides. Women’s experiences can in this way enhance the viability and the legitimacy of the peace process, and decrease the risk of conflict breaking out again.

The proposals advanced by the women’s peace movement emphasise the importance of paying attention to human security and transitional justice, the rehabilitation and reintegration of both soldiers and refugees, and just land reforms and development initiatives that are inclusive of social-service needs. As Khon Ja from the Kachin Peace Network so recently and succinctly put it, without justice, there is no meaning of peace.

So how can women’s inclusion be increased?

A new policy paper from the Alliance for Gender Inclusion in the Peace Process (AGIPP) provides policy-relevant recommendations to enhance women’s participation, including quotas, gender audits, and the introduction of domestic legislation aimed at eradicating the violence and discrimination women face.

A new government was elected in November last year. This is an excellent opportunity for them to show that they are serious about the democratic transition. However, if the conversation continues to be as male-dominated and one-sided as it was during the UPC, opportunities to make the transition, and the peace process, both inclusive and democratic will be lost.

Jenny Hedström is a PhD student at Monash University and the editor of International IDEA’s report Women in Conflict and Peace, available in English and Myanmar (selected chapters). The views expressed in this article are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of International IDEA, its Board or its Council Members.

Survey of Thai Internet use and restrictions | New Mandala

Survey of Thai Internet use and restrictions | New Mandala

JAMES GIGGACHER, 

 16 FEBRUARY 2016 


Photo by Marcello Graciolli on flickr https://www.flickr.com/photos/marcelograciolli/

The survey is led by a team of researchers from the University of Washington who are studying how people use the Internet in Thailand. The research team is interested in all Internet users who spend at least one month in the country each year. Whether you are Thai or foreign, living in Thailand or living elsewhere, the team wants to hear what you think.

The survey is about 25 questions and should take less than 20 minutes to complete. Responses will help the team understand users’ concerns, desire, and opinions about the Thai Internet. Information collected will be used in an academic paper, which will be made publicly available. All responses are anonymous.

Readers are also free to pass the survey on, post it on social media and distribute it widely.

The survey can be accessed here.

And if you have further questions feel free to contact research team member Gennie Gebhart:

Gennie Gebhart
University of Washington
Information School / Department of Computer Science & Engineering
gennie@uw.edu

Life under Thailand’s 2016 constitution | New Mandala

Life under Thailand’s 2016 constitution | New Mandala
Khemthong Tonsakulrungruang, 5 FEBRUARY 2016

Constitution Drafting Committee head Meechai Ruchupan. Photo: Reuters

Rather than acting for the people, Thailand’s latest constitution drafting committee are the junta’s loyal servants, writes Khemthong Tonsakulrungruang. 

Thailand’s 1997 and 2007 constitutions both contained elaborate protections for the rights and freedoms of the people. The 2016 draft constitution represents a major overhaul in the in this area, often for worse. Meechai Ruchupan, the President of the Constitution Drafting Committee (CDC), has chosen a different path from his predecessors.

The most striking change is the general provision for the restriction of rights.  Normally, rights can be restricted only if the constitution has providedn explicit written ground for it — for example, concerns over public health, national security, or public morals. But the new draft allows the government to restrict rights and liberties even when the constitutional text is absent, provided that such restriction complies with the rule of law.

By citing the rule of law as a justification, the draft has broadened the government’s power beyond any imagination. However, the rule of law has never been concretely defined in Thailand. In the past, there are records of this term being abused to harass political enemies.

The draft imposes more restrictions on freedom of expression, under the broad idea that the expression shall not lead to hatred or division within society. Controlling hate speech is an admirable endeavour, long overdue amid Thailand’s conflicts. But how this new clause will play out in the country known for double-standards remains to be seen. Moreover, according to the new draft academic freedom, for the first time, must not be run contrary to citizens’ duty or public morals.

The draft’s stringent standards have severely limited political rights. The CDC demands that an MP must truly be the representative of the people and an honest man. A candidate must gain more votes than votes of abstention to win an election. Otherwise, that election is void. A re-election shall be held, but candidates of the first round will be disqualified. In the case of suspected electoral fraud, the Election Commission can ban that candidate for a year. If a candidate is found guilty, a ban from politics is extended from five to 10 years. Under this constitution, the life of a politician can’t be more perilous.

Less obvious is freedom of religion. While the draft recognises religious freedom for people of all beliefs, as always, the duty of the state has changed tremendously. Instead of promoting religious unity among Buddhism and other religions as the 2007 constitution did, the 2016 draft mandates the government to protect Buddhism from all forms of threats. Although the protection of religious freedom remains intact, the shift in religious policy should be red-flagged as it indicates less tolerance and more influence for radical Buddhist groups.

Absent as well is the right of individuals and communities to conserve a healthy environment. One of the most effective mechanisms of the 2007 Constitution, this right provided the ground for local communities to participate in the deliberation of policies that might be harmful to their well-being. Large-scale constructions had to carry out health studies and environmental impacts before they commenced. This clause did have any bite because it enabled individuals and communities to petition directly to the court and several projects were halted.

The 2016 draft does not recognise this right. Although the state still has the duty to exercise diligence in carrying out any project that might impact people, it is not the fundamental right of the people. It is not clear what this change means, but the level of protection is obviously reduced. The channel for direct petition to the courts is also taken away.

One improvement might be an upgrade of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC). The NHRC was created by the 1997 constitution as an independent agency but was downgraded in the 2007 constitution into the category of “Other Constitutional Agencies.” Meechai has returned the NHRC’s independent agency status.

But the body has the duty to defend the country in case a human rights report concerning Thailand is inaccurate or unfair. This new addition makes the NHRC more like a mouthpiece for the regime than a safeguard.

The CDC has also stood firm on not adding sexual orientation to the constitution’s equality clause. The previous draft claimed it was huge progress in LGBT rights when it decided to prohibit discrimination on the ground of sexual orientation. However, the term was taken down in the final draft of 2015, a disappointing defeat for LGBT advocates who saw the move as the triumph, again, of the conservatives.

Despite his protests, Meechai deserves his reputation as the junta’s lawyer.
Drafting committees for the 2007 constitution and the 2015 draft both expanded the protection of rights and liberties. This expansion was intended as a compromise. Previous drafters all hoped that more rights and liberties would appeal to wide array of interest groups including environmental, consumer protection, and energy activists to overlook an undemocratic or unstable political system.

But, Meechai has made no attempt at compromise. His draft accurately reflects Prayuth Chan-Ochan’s vision of how to run Thailand successfully. Economic growth is the priority so rights and liberties are considered an annoyance. Environmental protection must go. Dissent is not welcome. Academics are suspected of instigating the younger generation to rebel against the establishment so they shall be suppressed too.

For Prayuth, obedience is a virtue and strong government with full discretion is necessary. Ironically, this idea of government is contrary to what the draft constitution has designed the next government to be — a weak institution suffering heavy oversights.

Thailand’s junta does not seem concerned about a supposed referendum and its dwindling alliances. All mechanisms are work in unison to coerce approval. The Election Commission is planning to register persons who wish to campaign for or against the draft, probably for future prosecution.

Prayuth has already expressed his wish that the public accept the draft. Too vocal politicians were summoned for another round of attitude readjustment. Meechai threatened that any parties which contributed to the rejection of the draft shall be held liable. Obnoxious and condescending, he also reminded the public that this was not the worst yet for he could be harsher.

Drafting a constitution is all about power sharing. Unfortunately, all too often in Thailand the people are not involved in this process, and power is only shared by the military, technocrats, bureaucrats, judges, and business corporations. Meechai might be a loyal lawyer. But his loyalty extends only to his master, not the country as a whole.