Govt may file civil suit in Admin Court to recoup rice scheme losses
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THE GOVERNMENT is considering filing a lawsuit with the Administrative Court over losses and alleged corruption in the rice-pledging scheme and government-to-government rice deals, Deputy PM Wissanu Krea-ngam said yesterday.
The Finance Ministry will be the plaintiff in the civil case against former PM Yingluck Shinawatra over her alleged negligence in failing to stop graft and losses in the rice-pledging scheme, which cost the state up to Bt600 billion.
The Commerce Ministry will be the plaintiff in the case against former Commerce Minister Boonsong Teriya-pirom over alleged corruption in the government-to-government rice deals.
Wissanu said civil cases were normally filed in the Civil Court, but the government was considering whether the cases should be filed as one civil suit with the Administrative Court, as they were related and a guilty verdict in one case would affect the other. He said under such circumstances the two cases may be filed at the Administrative Court, even though defendants in the cases include politicians, permanent state officials and private entities, plus officials of Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives.
“Normally, cases filed at the Administrative Court are against state officials. Suits against other people would be filed in a different court,” he said. “But if cases are filed at different courts, the courts would have to wait for rulings of other courts as the cases are related. So we may file these cases as one suit.”
If the suits were filed at the Civil Court they would also have a statue of limitations of one year, but if filed at the Administrative Court they would have a statue of limitations of two years.
Wissanu said although two ministries were plaintiffs, the suit would be filed in the name of the government and only one pubic prosecutor would oversee the indictment. He said a panel would be set up this week to determine the losses incurred from rotting rice in government stocks. The panel in charge of seeking compensation from civil cases would decide how much can be sought for damaged rice.
Wissanu said if the statue of limitations ran out, officials in charge of the indictment will be held responsible. The statute of limitations for both cases expires in February 2017.
