Court revokes order for Yingluck to pay Bt35bn compensation for rice scheme
The Central Administrative Court on Friday revoked a Finance Ministry order demanding that former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra pay Bt35 billion in compensation for her government’s rice-pledging scheme.
The ministry had earlier ordered Yingluck to pay compensation for overseeing rice-scheme corruption that caused financial damage to the state.
On Friday, the court ruled the compensation order was invalid, reasoning that Yingluck was not the only person with administrative control over the scheme, which was also managed by the Cabinet and National Rice Policy Committee.
The court added that Yingluck had disclosed she knew about the government-to-government (G-to-G) rice contracts but not about the corrupt sales of rice under the contracts to private companies.
In 2017, the Supreme Court sentenced Yingluck to five years in jail in absentia for mismanagement of the rice scheme. Yingluck had already fled the country, fearing that the military regime that ousted her government in 2014 would seek a harsh sentence.
On Tuesday, the Central Administrative Court upheld an order for five former Yingluck government officials, including ex-finance minister Boonsong Teriyapirom, to pay Bt14.4 billion in compensation for the fake G-to-G rice contracts.