Party-list MPs should be scrapped: Seri

THE National Reform Steering Council (NRSC) panel on political reform will suggest that the charter drafters drop party-list MPs and design a voting system with larger constituencies, its chairman Seri Suwanpanon said yesterday.

The subcommittee is due to meet members of the Constitution Drafting Commission (CDC) tomorrow to submit its proposal – aimed at curbing vote-buying and electoral fraud, Seri said. 

“First of all, party-list MPs should be abolished and we should only have constituency representatives because we have lost the spirit of the 1997 Constitution,” he said.

He added that, “Originally, the party-list was for decent, capable people who were not very good at running elections to become MPs. But later, it has turned out to be a list of fat cats aspiring to be ministers. It became a merchandise.”

It was a source of corruption, he said. Individuals who had invested wanted to gain profit from having a political position, Seri said. So, the party-list MPs should be scrapped, he said. 

Another proposal would be that electorates cover a larger geographic area, he said. It could be that one province was one constituency like how the Senate election was in 2000, he explained.

Each eligible voter could cast a ballot for one representative, as per the ‘One man, one vote’ system, Seri said. This would make vote-buying tougher than the ‘One constituency, one representative’ system, he said.

“In a bigger electorate, the competition would not be as fierce as in a small one. The so-called ‘One man, one vote’ system would give underdog runners a better chance of gaining an MP seat. Also, no ballots would go in vain. Each group could have their man become an MP,” he said. This system would also yield a better chance of reconciliation because no party could monopolise an electorate.

“This way, Pheu Thai Party could win an election in the south. The Democrat Party could as well win in the Northeast,” the chairman of the NRSC panel on political reform said.

However, he stressed that these were only ideas of his panel that would be presented to the CDC. It was not predetermined that the drafters must accept these proposal as they could cause a conflict, he said, adding that a lot of thought needed to be directed at serious punishment to counter electoral fraud. 

In a related development, CDC spokesman Chartchai Na Chiangmai also revealed that the drafting panel had set up a subcommittee to study reform issues – to look at approaches as well as the details concerning reforms planned and put forward by the now-defunct National Reform Council, as well as the NRSC.

The panel would work to figure out how the reform agenda should be written into the charter draft to ensure the NRC’s and NRSC’s plans were completed and inclusive. 

However, drafter Udom Rathamarut said that personally he felt the new charter draft should include only crucial reform points. They should also consider how the plan would affect the political systems, as well as how to make sure the charter was well respected as a supreme law. 

Udom stressed that considering all the reform agenda involved fairness and disparity. The CDC had to look at the agencies enforcing the law. If they had problems, then the reforms would not be carried out well, he said. 

However, he said the drafters would work to make sure they could work. And they would try not to set up new agencies.