Doubts voiced over complex Super-Committee

THE JUNTA government’s freshly established Super-Committee, overseeing a range of issues from reforms to reconciliation, plus long-term national strategy, claims it will not only integrate administration work, but also try to achieve a “rounded democratisation” with a new society – dubbed Thailand 4.0 – as its first and foremost goal.
However, the gigantic model, the outline for which was finished just over a week ago, does not spell out clearly yet how it will practically and efficiently integrate these issues, without possible civil service redundancies, experts in public administration said.
Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha last Tuesday, in his capacity as junta head, invoked his power under Article 44 under the Interim Charter to set up the Super-Committee, otherwise known as the administrative committee for reform, reconciliation and national strategy. Prayut himself sits as its chairman alongside various deputies, ministers, experts and representatives from 12 public-private-Pracharat committees.
Nominees from the civil sector have not been named yet, but prominent civil society figures such as Poldej Pinprateep or Prawet Wasi could be possible candidates.
The Super-Committee will oversee four committees. The first, functional committee would work on strategic administration. This has been dubbed as a mini-Cabinet, while the latter three focus on preparations for reforms, 20-year national strategy, plus unity and reconciliation, respectively. 
These four committees are also headed by Prayut, with one or two of his deputies as vice chairmen.
Top parliamentary figures from the National Legislative Assembly and the National Reform Steering Assembly also sit on all committees except the mini-Cabinet. 
Meanwhile, the PM’s Delivery Unit (PMDU), mocking the Britain unit, is planned to help track the committees’ performances, as well as creating relevant public information. 
The Super-Committee and its four underlings will be coordinated by PM’s Office Minister Suvit Maesincee, as secretary. He will play a key role in targeting and achieving these goals.
At the heart of this effort is the newly grouped 10 strategic plans squeezed from five main steering agendas towards the new society of Thailand 4.0. They include creating “21st century citizens”, community-based businesses, innovation-based industries, provincial cluster empowerment, and global connections.
During an exclusive interview with The Nation, Suvit explained that the Super-Committee would help integrate these 10 strategic plans under the mini-Cabinet with 37 reform issues drawn from the previous work of the National Reform Council and National Reform Steering Assembly to push the Thailand 4.0 goal. 
The goal is designed to advance the country’s capacity and competency in modern global arena through enforcement of innovation, digital technology, and last but not least, developing workers with knowledge to that they strengthen the community, and industry, and develop global links later on. 
To achieve this, Suvit said it was crucial to create steady ground, which was why reconciliation was part of the agenda. But unlike previous efforts in that direction, which focused on getting the two conflicting political camps to resolve their differences, this time they would seek to resolve the true root cause of the problem – inequality. And to achieve this, the committees concerned were eyeing “economic democratisation”, he said, or simply put, giving every citizen the equal right to prosper. 
So, instead of discussing solutions for political goals or conflicts among concerned parties, the committee concerned would invite them to come up with ideas on 10 national goals that are root problems obstructing growth and national development, such as land problems, or inequality.
The committees would give politicians a chance to help resolve problems impeding development and fuelling conflict. But he declining to say if political problems need definite solutions at this time.
“People will not be willing to compromise if their pockets are still left empty,” the PM’s Office Minister said. “Political and economic agendas have to go along with each other, naturally. This is why we came out with this model to move all issues forward under mutual strategies,” he said.
Suvit dubbed the committee’s approach as “democratisation”, both in political and economic ways, to prepare the country not only for next year’s general election, as designated by the government’s roadmap, but also for long-term sustainability.
Although the government may only have another year or so in office, Suvit ensured that development of both “democratizations” will be in parallel with each other. For instance, while the reconciliation committee should produce an “agreement of truth” to be signed by several political blocs after a few months, some flagship projects to help create economic freedoms could also flourish. For example, key herbs would be looked at as a basis for an industry to generate jobs and income based on traditional knowledge the country has, he said.

‘Doubts on overlapping procedures, redundant workloads’
However, Arunee Santhitiwanich, a lecturer on public administration from Ubon Ratchathani University, feared that attempts to integrate |all goals together would create more procedures that would overlap, and redundant workloads among |agencies. 
The Super-Committee’s structure dispersing goals to its underlings, she said, could render ministries less efficient. For example, no permanent secretary of a ministry were on top ranks of any committee despite being the best experts on their own bodies. There were places for ministers |but the academic they seemed like political goals.
“In fact, this is a core problem of the Thai bureaucratic system. Less attention is paid to each individual body,” she said. 
The concept of integration, while attempting to drive everything in the same direction, however could create a power loophole. “Even integration among provincial authorities is hardly possible,” she said. “In practice, the powerful provinces will influence over all.”
Meanwhile, all Cabinet members have responsibilities in the new committees, but it was not clearly spelt out as to whether Cabinet itself would have to receive proposals from the Super-Committee. 
“If that is so, it would mean that the Cabinet would have to screen even more issues and use up more time doing that,” she said. “This could affect strategic drives in practical terms as other bigger problems may get sufficient time.” 
Arunee said justice, legislative, and parliamentary mechanisms already exist, which are capable of dealing with reform issues and long-term strategy goals. “It raises questions why deputy prime ministers are assigned to look over these issues,” she said. “One possibility is to prioritise tasks based on political reasons.”