Chalermkiart most favoured as next police chief by unofficial survey
Deputy Police Commissioner-General Pol General Chalermkiart Sriworakhan emerged the most favoured candidate for the post of police commissioner-general in an unofficial opinion survey by the Royal Thai Police.
The survey, that has no role in the actual selection of the next police chief by the Police Commission, is being carried out by the Royal Thai Police without a set closing date.
The current national police chief, Pol General Chakthip Chaijinda, will retire at the end of September 2019.
So far, only 127 respondents have taken part in the survey, with 36.2 per cent of them voting for Chalermkiart to replace Chakthip.
The survey asked respondents to pick the national police chief from among the current five deputies.
Pol General Rungroj Saengkram came second with 24.4 per cent of votes, Pol General Weerchai Songmetta came third with 16.5 per cent, Pol General Srivara Ransibrahmanakul came fourth with 15 per cent and Pol General Dejnarong Sutthicharn Bancha came fifth with 7.9 per cent of votes cast.
The largest group of respondents, at 37 per cent are non-commissioned policemen, followed by deputy inspectors and inspectors at 33.1 per cent of the respondents. The group of deputy commanders and deputy commissioners constituted 16.5 per cent of the respondents, while the general public made up 12.6 per cent.