Forums on dams, flood scheme start in 2 weeks

Large-scale public forums will be held to sound out opinions and get approval from residents living in 36 provinces affected by dams and projects in the government’s Bt350-billion flood and water-management scheme.

The meetings will begin in two weeks – on October 15 – and a survey conducted to get opinions of Thais living in 41 other provinces. Both steps are compulsory under a Central Administrative Court order before various projects under the scheme can commence.

The first forum will be held in Lamphun, at Jakkhamkhanathorn School, and this step would end by December 6, Natural Resources and Environment Ministry deputy permanent secretary Suphot Tovichakchaikul said yesterday. 

The survey of opinions would be conducted via pollster Suan Dusit, after a public education campaign to explain the scheme to the public, via television programmes, ads in major papers and documents, he said.

The survey has been chosen as a means under PM’s Office Ministry regulations to seek public opinions. Both the forums and the survey will be conducted with a Bt184-milllion budget approved by the Cabinet for this. The survey questionnaire will be published after the “orientation process” is completed, he said, and distributed through schools, local administrative bodies and provincial offices of the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation.

On the outcome of the survey, Suphot said: “It is not that if the results are against the water scheme in a large percentage, it will not commence. The disapproval reflected must have good reasons going with it. We will utilise these reasons to adapt the projects, to [minimise] the impacts on them.” He did not elaborate.

“After the completion of both the public forums and the survey, deals could be signed with four contractors by late January next year, or early February, before the nine project modules commence,” said Suphot, acting director-general of the Office of the National Water and Flood Management Policy.

Suphot said the prospective format of the questionnaire would not require people to say “Yes” or “No”, but include questions on what respondents think about the entire scheme. “There will be boxes for respondents to check their approval ratings, such as ‘totally agree’, ‘partly agree’ or ‘totally disagree’.”

There would also be details on nine individual project modules so respondents can give approval ratings in the questionnaire, which would contain about two to three sheets, Suphot said. Suan Dusit Poll would take around 15 days, after December 6, to process raw data from the questionnaire and announce it by December 22 at the latest, he said.

Committees would be set up in charge of each of the nine modules to compare positive and negative outcomes from the questionnaire about the project modules. The panels would consider further outcomes using the opinions to finalise what extra measures need to be adopted to lessen impacts on local people, he said.

 

Mandatory under the Constitution 

Forums with local people affected by the projects and an assessment of public opinion is mandatory under the Constitution and required under a Central Administrative Court ruling. The court ruled in favour of a network of environmentalist groups who lodged a complaint to order the government and relevant agencies to comply with these compulsory steps.

Suphot said the current heavy flooding in Prachin Buri was a situation occurring under different factors and would require separate solutions not included in the entire scheme. “But areas in the Chao Phraya basin, and near Angthong province, will not be flooded anymore [after the scheme is complete].”

Asked about the five years it will take to complete the scheme, Suphot said not all projects would take that long. “For example, the communal database for forecasts and warnings could be done in one year, and the building of small-sized dams or dredging of canals and waterways could take as short [a time].

Speaking on the current flood situation, Suphot the floodwater volume was one third of that during the massive flood in 2011. But the public was worried as a result of negative comments by academics and news coverage showing images of high-level inundation. 

He said water from the North and the Central regions could have reached Rangsit if there were no preventive measures using the Bt120 billion budget made available.