Parliament votes to retain Cabinet's charter amendment clause

In the second reading, senators and members of Parliament voted 346-134 not to change the wording in Article 291/1 of the original draft that passed the first reading in late February.

Opposition MPs – mostly from the Democrat Party – and a number of senators failed to convince the majority of the Parliament to increase the number of elected CDA members from 77 in the original draft. They said that a higher number, such as 150, would better represent different groups of people and could help prevent attempts to influence the election results.

In the Cabinet draft, every of the country’s 77 provinces are to elect one CDA member regardless of the province’s size. Opposition MPs and some senators said this is unfair to provinces with larger population, such as Bangkok, Chiang Mai, and Ubon Ratchathani that deserve to have more representatives in the CDA. 

The 22 other CDA members who are experts in law, political science and related fields are to be appointed by the Parliament.

Opponents to the original draft pointed out that the government would be able to influence the selection of the 22 experts due to its majority control in the Parliament. Opposition Democrat MPs and some senators also said they expected results of the CDA member election to be similar to those of the general elections last year. Therefore, it was likely that most elected CDA members would be people close to the ruling coalition parties. 

The meeting chair, Somsak Kiartsuranond, adjourned the meeting shortly before 1 am on Friday and scheduled the second reading to resume at 9 am.