Sonthi dismisses opposition attacks as 'political rhetoric'
The chairman of the House committee on national reconciliation yesterday shrugged off the opposition attack directed at him as "political rhetoric" aimed at undermining his credibility.
General Sonthi Boonyaratglin, in an interview with Nation News Agency, said that he was not startled when he was mobbed by senators and MPs demanding that he explain about the report by his panel submitted to Parliament for deliberation.
He explained that he intended to give an explanation but, being a novice MP, he did not know exactly about the debate etiquette. “I had to wait for my turn to speak. I didn’t know exactly when I should take the floor,” he said.
During the parliamentary debate on Tuesday on the Sonthi panel’s controversial reconciliation report, the opposition Democrat MPs focused their attacks on Sonthi, who was ironically defended by MPs of the ruling Pheu Thai Party throughout the turmoil-marred session. The opposition MPs repeatedly asked him to tell the House on the record that the report had received his panel’s proper approval.
After four hours of tension, the House of Representatives voted 348-162 to begin discussions on the report. The Democrats insisted that the report should not be deliberated because it had not been properly approved by Sonthi’s committee.
When he was the Army chief, Sonthi in September 2009 led a coup that overthrew the government of Thaksin Shinawatra.
Sonthi said yesterday, “The opposition’s pressure on me to explain the process of the committee’s work was just political rhetoric. The genuine intention was to test my public speaking ability. If I could not, my political future would have been doomed. But I happened to be able to do it.”
He considered Tuesday night’s turmoil as “nothing unusual for an administrator like me, who ruled people in time of peace and war. I used to rule people who carried weapons. It was worse than this,” he said. Sonthi also noted that he got moral support from many Pheu Thai MPs and senators in the form of applause. When asked if he had noticed any signs of disappointment in his ex-colleagues in the armed forces, the former Army chief said he had read their interviews and that military leaders backed efforts for reconciliation.
