NACC defends probe into compensation for riot victims
Sansern Poljiak, secretary-general of the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC), yesterday defended the NACC’s ongoing proceedings against former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra and her Cabinet over the political victims compensation scheme and said it had nothing to do with the case over the rice-pledging scheme.
Sansern spoke on Thursday after the NACC revealed that it was investigating a case filed in 2015 in which Yingluck’s Cabinet was found to have allegedly violated the budget bill by approving compensation to political victims in 2011 without proper legal grounds.
The NACC is expected to indict her in the case in September.
The NACC’s announcement came as the former premier was due to hear on August 25 the final verdict on her alleged mismanagement of her government’s rice-pledging scheme.
Rights lawyers are concerned about the impact of the NACC’s announcement on Yingluck.
However, Sansern said the two were separate cases and that the NACC was only carrying out its duties.
The rice-pledging scheme was among 13 cases the NACC had probed against Yingluck before it indicted her in the rice-pledging case and forwarded it for legal action to the court.
The NACC is currently probing 10 other cases involving Yingluck.
The other case that the NACC dismissed was the one calling for Yingluck’s impeachment for not following the Cabinet’s resolution that governmental agencies needed to record their procurement information online.