Pracha statement convinced us to cancel rally, PAD says

Justice Minister Pracha Promnok announced earlier that fugitive Thaksin would not benefit from the draft Royal Decree seeking pardons for offenders on the occasion of His Majesty the King's birthday, so the PAD saw no point to continue with the rally, he said.

Pracha told a press conference on Sunday the draft Royal Decree for 2012 used the same wording as the decree enacted by former justice minister Piraphan Saliratwipak of the Democrat Party-led government a year ago.

Thaksin was sentenced to two years jail for abuse of power, for allowing his wife to buy a plot of land from a state agency at a price said to be below market value, but fled abroad to avoid having to go to jail.

“Convicts on the run will not be eligible,” Pracha said.

The PAD said it did not believe what Pracha said but as there was no clear evidence suggesting otherwise and no independent figure who had seen the draft, the PAD would give the government a chance to prove it was telling the truth.

If the document was submitted to the Council of State, the govern?ment’s legal advisory body, the PAD may have a chance to see the content of the draft to verify that Thaksin would not really benefit, Panthep said.

The PAD believed that Thaksin, Pracha and the government know very well that any move to help the former PM would trigger conflict within the country and that would eventually affect Yingluck Shinawatra’s government, he said.

Thaksin’s legal adviser Noppadon Pattama said Thaksin wrote an open letter asking the government not to seek a royal pardon for him, as he did not want to see any more conflict in the country.

The former premier might feel he did not receive fair treatment but he did not want his case to cause more conflict in the country either, Noppadon said.

Justice Minister Pracha said he had made clear to public that the royal pardon draft was never done for Thaksin. In fact the royal par?don for inmates on the good occa?sion of HM the King’s birthday should be done in quiet manner in order to protect prisoners but if the public questioned the move, the government needed to explain, he said.

“What I should tell the public, I have already said. The news (of Thaksin’s pardon) over the past days is absolutely your (media) imagina?tion. You dreamt about it and woke up to make noise,” Pracha said.

Opposition MPs intend to question the minister in the House of Representatives on the matter on Sunday and his alleged mismanagement of the distribution of survival packs for flood victims.