By Thai Newsroom Reporters
THE RUAM THAI SANG CHART currently remains dissatisfied with the Pheu Thai, core of the current coalition government, over the latest cabinet lineup in which the former had not been given part of the defence portfolio, according to a partisan source.
The fourth largest coalition partner under de facto Ruam Thai Sang Chart boss Prayut Chan-o-cha had desperately sought to take control, albeit in partial fashion, of all the armed services ranging from the army to the navy and the air force under care of the Ministry of Defence but had been unexpectedly denied by the core coalition partner under de facto Pheu Thai boss Thaksin Shinawatra.
Quietly connected with the de facto Ruam Thai Sang Chart boss, who staged the 2014 coup as army chief and named himself prime minister of a military-installed government, members of the Ruam Thai Sang Chart rank and file had looked frustrated and shared the sentiment of remaining under sustained pressure from the de facto Pheu Thai boss-cum-convict on parole, according to the partisan source who only spoke on condition of anonymity.
Prayut, named a privy councillor shortly after he was succeeded by Pheu Thai-attached Srettha Thavisin as head of the Pheu Thai-led, post-election government, would hold grudges over Thaksin’s hush-hush manipulation and power play which had resulted in last month’s latest cabinet lineup which saw former deputy army chief Nattapon Nakpanich nowhere on the list.
Nattapon, invariably viewed as a close protege of Prayut’s, had been earlier anticipated to be given a cabinet seat as deputy defence minister to otherwise assist Pheu Thai-attached Defence Minister Suthin Khlangsang in looking after the armed services.
Since Suthin could run the Ministry of Defence without a deputy defence minister to assist him ever since the Pheu Thai-led government took office over the last several months, Thaksin had deemed him capable of doing it alone on a continual basis, the source said.
The Ruam Thai Sang Chart frustrations over Nattapon having been denied the ministerial seat have apparently augmented with a surprise resignation of Krisada Chinavicharana as a Ruam Thai Sang Chart-attached deputy finance minister.
Krisada was said to have been disgruntled over the cabinet reshuffle in which five out of six agencies under his control had been taken away, prompting him to call it quits in sort of a protest, the partisan source said.
Thaksin had allegedly looked to keep all ministerial seats in the finance portfolio occupied only by Pheu Thai-attached Julapun Amornvivat and Paopoom Rojanasakul both as deputy finance minister besides Pheu Thai-attached Finance Minister Pichai Chunhavajira and no longer participated by the Ruam Thai Sang Chart or any other coalition partners, the source said.
Thaksin and Prayut, among other elements of the powers that be, had allegedly mutually struck a “secret deal” under which Srettha was given overwhelming yea votes from most of the 250 junta-named senators alongside those of a majority of MPs after the Move Forward had been dumped from the Pheu Thai-led coalition and the likes of the Bhumjaithai under de facto party boss Newin Chidchob, the Palang Pracharath led by former deputy prime minister Prawit Wongsuwan and the Ruam Thai Sang Chart had joined instead.
Under the “secret deal”, the de facto Pheu Thai boss who had been earlier sentenced to a royal pardon-curtailed, one-year jail term for his court-convicted misconduct perpetrated during his previous premiership had been allegedly granted the contentious double-standard privileges at Police Hospital where he had stayed for mystery-shrouded “illnesses” for six months until he was released on parole last February.
From a private ward at the hospital, Thaksin had allegedly played a role in the power play by setting up a jaw-dropping coalition of what could be virtually viewed as such unlikely bedfellows as the Pheu Thai and the so-called Uncles’ Camps, referring to the Palang Pracharath and Ruam Thai Sang Chart, and the allocation of portfolios among the coalition partners.
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Top and Front Page: De facto Ruam Thai Sang Chart Party boss Prayut Chan-o-cha at a meeting before last May’s election. Photos: Thai Rath
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