Senate officially names chairman of NBTC superboard
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The Senate yesterday officially named General Thavatchai Samusakorn as chairman of the five-member "superboard" charged with evaluating the performance of the 11-member National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC).
The five members of the superboard convened to select the chairman on April 11, and the Senate secretariat confirmed yesterday that Thavatchai had the post.
The other four members are former senator Pichai Utamapinun; Amornthep Jiratthiticharoen, a lecturer at Mahanakorn University of Technology; Prasert Apipunya, acting deputy secretary-general of the NBTC: and General Boonyawat Kruehong, a former director-general of the Defence Budget Office at the Defence Ministry.
All are obliged to resign from their current posts. However, last week NBTC secretary-general Takorn Tantasit asked the commission’s board if it should approve Prasert’s resignation to become superboard member. He said that under NBTC rules, Prasert needed to give the commission 30 days’ notice of his resignation. Prasert did not tender his resignation until April 17.
The board told Takorn this was not a matter for the board but the secretarial office had to deal with it on its own. The board also questioned how Prasert could know in advance whether he would be appointed to the superboard and tender his resignation with sufficient notice under the 30-day rule.
An NBTC source said that during Takorn’s consultation with the board on Prasert’s resignation, some of its members took the view that if it ruled against him, it could be criticised for trying to block the formation of the superboard.
Moreover, the Senate examined Prasert’s qualifications before appointing him as superboard member.
The secretarial office recently set up a new panel to probe whether Prasert had breached NBTC discipline when as acting director of the human-resources department, he approved payment of a staffer’s salary during her leave to study abroad.
