Thaksin merely visiting his own party: Chuan

By Thai Newsroom Reporters

FORMER PRIME MINISTER Chuan Leekpai said today (Mar. 26) it would certainly be no surprise to see de facto Pheu Thai boss-cum-convict on parole Thaksin Shinawatra visiting the headquarters of the ruling party which is simply known as his own.

“That is just his own party. So he has the right to be there,” the straight-faced Chuan told reporters referring to Thaksin’s visit to the Pheu Thai headquarters today.

The former prime minister/former House speaker/former Democrat leader declined to comment whether such a move on the part of the de facto Pheu Thai boss could probably be viewed as an act of illegal dominance over the party’s rank and file.

Thaksin’s daughter/Pheu Thai leader Paetongtarn Shinawatra had reportedly recommended her father visit the ruling party’s headquarters to see Pheu Thai MPs and others rather than be visited by them at his Chan Song Lah residence.

Nevertheless, Chuan said the Pheu Thai-led government as a whole has been held accountable either for negligence over the alleged legal loopholes and double-standard privileges evidently granted to Thaksin to the extent that he not been literally put behind bars to otherwise serve a curtailed, one-year jail sentence and instead been given a private ward at Police Hospital to stay for a six-month period until he was granted parole last month.

Thaksin today visited the Pheu Thai headquarters where he met with Pheu Thai MPs and others among the ruling party’s rank and file.

Kasetsart University’s Political Science Association head Thanaporn Sriyakul said the de facto Pheu Thai boss-cum-convict on parole has obviously made his presence felt since he was granted parole to manifest his sustained powers when he visited his northern home province of Chiang Mai and the Pheu Thai headquarters.

Thaksin has not only been eagerly welcomed by the Pheu Thai rank and file but high-ranking government officials who have evidently attached themselves to the old-time, sprawling bureaucratism, Thanaporn said.

“There is no denying that everybody practically sees Thaksin as the Pheu Thai big boss who has simply returned to his turf,” he said.

Those senior government officials had scrambled to see the de facto Pheu Thai boss wherever he may have been in conspicuous, flamboyant manner despite his being legally held as a convict on parole, Thanaporn said.

Those prominent figures ranged from cabinet members and ministerial undersecretaries to departmental directors-general and an embattled deputy police chief Pol. Gen. Surachate Hakparn, he commented.

Whilst Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, quietly pushed to rise to power following last year’s election by Thaksin’s sister/former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra, would perform his daily tasks in public, the de facto Pheu Thai boss would manipulate things in behind-the-scenes fashion, according to the Kasetsart academic.

CAPTIONS:

Top and Front Page: De facto Pheu Thai boss Thaksin Shinawatra being welcomed upon arriving at Pheu Thai Party headquarters today.

Insert: Former prime minister Chuan Leekpai. All photos: Matichon

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