CDC yet to decide on electoral system changes

THE Constitution Drafting Commission (CDC) has temporarily skipped its review of a section in the charter draft on how parliamentary members will be qualified to hold office, and deal instead with the contentious issue closer to the March 29 deadline, CDC spokesman Amorn Wanichwiwatana said yesterday.

A discussion about how members of Parliament – both MPs and senators – would be elected or appointed was supposed to be reviewed early this week. But the CDC has delayed this because of differences in opinions expressed by concerned agencies, and the drafters have not yet figured out how to best deal with the issue, Amorn said.

In their first draft, drafters stipulated that members of the House of Representatives would be elected via a single-ballot system, with the number of party-list MPs also determined by the single vote. Senators were to be elected by 20 different groups from across society, with each group cross-electing candidates from another group to discourage collusion. However, that framework was not very popular and sparked fierce public controversy.

Two of the five “rivers of power” – the National Legislative Assembly and the National Reform Steering Assembly – proposed that the new constitution bar party-list MPs because they tended to be financiers who would seek to profit from politics after investing in elections. The two assemblies also suggested that senators should be appointed. Amorn said the CDC would soon go on another retreat to deliberate on the final draft ahead of the deadline at the end of this month in preparation for the referendum that is scheduled for near the end of July.

In the meantime, the CDC has gone rather quiet about their task. Daily press briefings have been curtailed and the commission’s public relations team has said spokespeople will only hold briefings on issues that have been settled and are not subject to change.