CDC member Lt-General Navin Damrigan: Why I support the MMP

According to Constitution Drafting Committee (CDC) member Lt-General Navin Damrigan, the 

mixed-member proportional (MMP) system is a better reflection of the people’s will, as it is based on the proportion of seats each party is allocated in Parliament. 

Navin spoke at a King Prajadhipok’s Institute (KPI)’s international forum on “The Path to a New Constitution for Thailand”.

Navin, along with other charter drafters including CDC chairman Borwornsak Uwanno and CDC spokesman General Lertrat Ratanavanich, visited Germany recently to study its political and electoral systems. After the trip, they began voicing support for introducing the MMP system in Thailand.

“In the last election, under the MMM [mixed member majoritarian] system, the largest party with 44.47 per cent of the votes was given 54.6 per cent of the legislature seats, while the next largest party with 31.88 per cent of the votes got 30.4 per cent of the seats. This lopsided proportionality translates to 38 MPs too many for the largest party, with smaller parties suffering the most,” Navin said. 

“MMP will address this disproportionate seat allocation through a com-bination of 250 constituency seats 

and 200 party-list seats, calculated at the national level but allocated at the regional level. The final seats in the House of Representatives will closely mirror the preference of the voters,” he said.

“While it is true that MMP may lead to a coalition government, history tells us that a parliamentary dictatorship is neither preferable nor desired. Germany learned this lesson before us. Parliamentary dictatorship disempowers the opposition, which then takes to the streets to force political redress through unrest. 

This cycle perpetuates and has been our legacy for the past decade. To 

mend the political rift, and consequent national rift, we need reconciliation and dialogue. We need political parties to talk, not fight for domination.

“Party lists and rankings, once controlled solely by political parties, will now be placed at the voter’s discretion. The party list will now be ‘open’, meaning that when a voter votes for their preferred party, they also have the right to select their single preferred party-list candidate. More votes will move the candidate up the party list or vice versa,” he explained. 

“This empowers the citizens to take authority and redo the list to match 

their preferences. It also does away with symbiotic capitalists and allows for the election of truly professional lawmakers that have a good track record.”