Govt agrees to withdraw bill - if rejected by Senate

Pheu Thai Party secretary-general Phumtham Wechayachai announced yesterday that if the Senate, which convenes on Monday, kills the bill, the Pheu Thai-led government will not seek to make any revision to the bill and resubmit it. Moreover, it will also withdraw all six amnesty draft bills.
“The government is willing to heed public opinion,” he said at the press conference yesterday.
Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said later that if the Senate votes against the amnesty bill, the government would not attempt to revive it during the rest of its term. She was in Chanthaburi on a trip.
Public dissent is intensifying against the amnesty bill. Ahead of the Senate’s vetting on Monday, the private sector is planning to stage a big rally on Silom Road again today. The Democrat-led protesters in Rajdamnoen Avenue planned to cover more road space. Yesterday, former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra issued a statement, saying that that he respected different opinions of Thais “but I cannot accept the use of false information to distort the issue and frame me and my family”.
Before the Pheu Thai announcement, the opposition Democrat Party had suggested revision of the bill while some businessmen have called for scrapping of the bill.
Earlier in the day, chief opposition whip Jurin Laksanawisit said the government should make it clear that it would not revive the amnesty debate. He urged Yingluck to reaffirm that the government would not introduce any draft on amnesty and that it would not grant political clemency by issuing an executive decree.
A source from the Democrat Party, who asked not to be named, said he believed the ruling Pheu Thai Party had a strategy. They wanted to convey to intellectuals and businessmen who are also protesting against the bill that the Democrats had an agenda to overthrow the government, the source said.
He said the government estimated that many of the anti-bill protesters would stop rallying after Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra signalled to the Senate to reject the bill. However, the strategy failed because the PM’s retreat seemed to be too late.
“We had to monitor the government action and change our plan every two to three hours. We wanted to confirm to our protesters that we were a strong force that could make the government withdraw the bill,” the source said.
He said the key word, which the Democrats would communicate to demonstrators, is that people could not trust the Senate and the government, until the six amnesty drafts in the House are out of Parliament.
Another Democrat source said Suthep and his fellow-protest leaders would not be happy if the Dharma Army joined the Democrats’ Rajdamnoen rally site. He said it would be better to fight separately. Moreover, their aims were different.
Suthep turned down a request from Khunying Kalaya Sophonpanich, who asked if speakers from Dharma Army could take the Rajdamnoen stage. Suthep feared that with the Dharma Army’s aim to bring down the government, the Democrat Party might face a party dissolution case because of that.
Before the announcement, a number of coalition and opposition MPs made a bipartisan stand, urging the Senate to revise the amnesty bill instead of killing it. The senators should vote to pass the first reading of the bill so that they could vet and remove contentious amnesty provisions, Democrat MP Alongkorn Ponlaboot said.
The other options include an outright rejection of the bill but this would allow the House to reactivate the amnesty debate in 180 days.
“Should the Senate vote for the bill’s first reading, it would have the opportunity to fix the bill,” Alongkorn said, calling for the adoption of the original draft designed to absolve protesters only.
Pheu Thai MP Chavalit Wichayasuthi said he agreed with Alongkorn’s proposal.
Revising the bill instead of discarding it would mean the legislative procedures for amnesty would not be in vain, he said.
Pheu Thai MP Samart Kaewmechai said the bill should be salvaged by allowing the upper chamber to revise controversial provisions as deemed necessary.
“Defeating the bill would not result in ending the differences over amnesty, hence revising the bill to suit society is a better option,” he said.
He reminded the senators that should they defeat the bill, the House would still be obliged to reactivate the amnesty debate in six months as per the Constitution.
Jurin said sponsors of the six remaining bills related to political clemency should withdraw them in order to show good faith for ending the amnesty push once and for all.