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As we know Thaksin ruined the country through his populist policies (while still often balancing the budget) which, to quote The Nation in an editorial "pandering to the unprincipled wants and needs of the attention-deficient, politically apathetic masses" (yes, this is a real quote).* This was all part of a socialist and communist plot to overtake the country, aka the Finland Plot, which as explained by Wikipedia:
So even after Thaksin with his 30 Baht healthcare scheme and various other welfare programs, was Thailand a socialist utopia under Thaksin? Have governments been forced to spend large amounts of money on social welfare programs? No. Marwaan in IPS:
BP: Below is a chart from WHO:
BP: Well, you can see the spending as % of GDP it went up only marginally. From the World Bank site, for public spending as % of GDP, BP can't find 2000 figures, but as % of GDP between 2002-2006, it was around 2.3% of GDP. But on some other social welfare schemes, the government spends only a small amount of money:
BP: Of course, Thailand has just now introduced a social pension scheme paying 500 Baht a month and the above would not include pension for government employees, but Thaksin has hardly turned Thailand into a welfare state where the government budgets are overburdened by social welfare programs - whether a good thing or not well is up to you to decide. By any measure, they still make up a smaller percentage of the budget than in many comparable countries. btw, if anyone can produce any fancy charts, e-mail BP - gave up on the World Bank statistics site after trying. *Argh, the good old days.
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I am not an economist, but it would seem if these figures are acurate, you could maintain that he did a lot of "right things", but from what appears to be the "wrong reasons". I do have one other point on this, but wasn't ther a lot of discussion about much of the government spending being "off the books" to make the budgets appear balanced?
How could the govt spending be off the books? thaksin was funding it himself?
Good point. A lot of people do believe this was what happened. I have talked to several Thais who really do believe HE funded the THB30 Scheme, the Village Funds and so on, out of his own pocket.
BP: "Off the book"" means outside of government budget. It is practically the PM's slush fund without accountability to the parliament or indepenndent auditors.
Black Swan - Well if wealthy ppl want to do that then good on them - given the size of the schemes it is impossible. Anonymous - Well then they are still in the govt budget.
Agreed,that it would be just about impossible for "wealthy ppl" to fund such schemes, but I have been told by Thai people - many who you would think would know better - that Thaksin used his own money to fund these "welfare" initiatives - believe it or not. I will let Anonymous respond on the explanation of "off the book" again, but I think you will find the figures you used do not include these "off the book" items. From what I know this is not an uncommon practise in some governments around the world and his also used in business accounting.
Swanny - Do they then believe then that Thaksin is some benevolent individual? Or do they believe that he was using his money to make the government look better?
These people couldn't care, whether, or not the government looks good, all they care(d) about is/was getting the "trinkets" being given out, as they saw it, by Thaksin. So yes, in my opinion, it would be fair to say, they looked and still look on him, as the only person who has ever cared about their welfare. I dare say, in some ways his "largess" campaign was so successful, it even rode over "someone else", when it came to creating a sense of "loyalty".
I should add, it would be quite concievable, this smudging of the line between what the government gave and what he gave, was intentionally left in a state of confusion, for this very reason. This is one reason why the current government is having such a hard time getting its own version of "pork barrelling" across. If nothing else, he is a master at PR. But, I think I am going over old ground here - time for Christmas ! Happy Holidays
I love the quote from the Nation, cliched to suggested it might as well come from Not The Nation? "pandering to the unprincipled wants and needs of the attention-deficient, politically apathetic masses"
BP: It was Thaksin's personal slush fund to do whatever he wanted, not anywhere close to budgetary process. Is it clearer to you now?
"pandering to the unprincipled wants and needs of the attention-deficient, politically apathetic masses" That's a little harsh on these people, but in essence it is what he did and continues to try and do. There is a great sense of practicality in all this that the Nation's quote ignores. From my observations "these people" have had to put up with being like chickens being fed in the farmyards of Thailand for so long, by the local puu yi, that when Thaksin came along with his shiny new feeding machine, they jumped at it. Cynical? Yes. Unprincipled? No - they've gotta live. Attention-deficient? Definatley not - otherwise how would they know who to vote for? Politically apathetic? Yes, but they don't want to bite the hand that feeds them, do they?? HoHoHo
Apart from fixed items like govt salaries the biggest slice of the government budget during Thaksin years was given to "central fund", managed solely at the discretion of the PM. Much of it was spent on various "populist" programs, basically MPs requests for funds to keep voters happy. Roads, canals, hospitals, that kind of thing. Using this fund Thaksin was able to address urgent electoral needs in selected areas, building an image of a government that really cares, and that TRT politicians could really deliver. His famous remark that he would give funds to provinces that voted for him first was simply an acknowledgement of the way the government has been operating under his command, he just forgot he was not supposed to say so in public. Democrats are probably doing the same thing now, though I think the "central fund" was cut considerably after the coup.
StanG. As BP has been good enough to produce a story with facts and data, could you do the same? Can you provide, for example, percentage figures for the "central fund"? Could you provide information on the decline of this fund post-coup? Did it get redirected to the military's increased budgets and their secret fund? It'd be good to be able to put figures on such matters. On so-called populist programs, I was always under the impression that these were major projects like 30 baht health care rather than local MPs use of funds or requests (these long pre-date Thaksin by the way).
From memory, the central fund ballooned to 300 billion baht in 2005. By comparison 30 baht system cost 60-70 billion. I have never seen translations of Thai government budget on the internet, but even if there were - central fund expenditures have never been itemised, never passed through the parliament and no one will ever know how exactly it was spent. Another "off the book" tactic was to assign various government projects to separate entities. Debt suspension was given to Bank for Agriculture and Cooperation, for example, the bank had to take on the losses, not the government. TAMC was also never put on government's tab, and it spent some 700 billion on bailouts for non-performing loans.
There are some numbers in this article. In 2006 central fund was 243 bil, Surayud's government wanted to cut it to 193 bil in 2007 budget. Then there was this proposal to cut PM's powers to use central fund but I don't know what happened to this Budgeting Act. This is a comment on a blog entry, not a research paper, don't expect too much.
Thanks Stan G, this gives creditability to my comments. As pointed out before, it is not unusual for governments all over the world to use such mechanisms.But, that these were used to cover the real story to the world and make it seem to the masses,they had found the "messiah", is more often than not, the work of those who conduct their "business" in somewhat despotic form. The lack of transparency, is obvious.
Black Swan - Meanwhile, military spending doubled and the budget deficit approached 200 billion. Basic details of the 2006 and 2007 central fund are here (PDF). The full budget in Thai has more details. Stan G - Take your point, but the government has to fund the BAAC, which is a state enterprise, and the Democrats are using the state banks for the "debts outside the system". If TAMC needed government money, it would still create liabilities. They can't just print the money. There is a point about transparency in the government budget and Thailand scores relatively badly on this. Central Fund or not, to be honest don't see that much difference. Do we really know that military is doing with that extra money? No. Meanwhile, those talks of cutting the central fund from the hands of the evil one from 240 billion baht to 200 billion baht, but a mere 8 months later in July 2007, we have this: "The government is set to spend Bt1.66 trillion in fiscal 2008, of which Bt245.77 billion is earmarked for the central fund." The cut only lasted long enough to attack Thaksin before they quickly hiked it up again. Argh...
Thanks BP. Again you are able to come up with data that proves that a lot of memories are faulty or politically jaundiced. Much appreciated.
Thanks for the research BP, but I am not sure what it proves, except that it would seem, funds for the Military (in particular) are as "cloudy" as ever. But, my comments were about there being, a very also "cloudy" line, between what was sold as being money given out of the "goodness" of one man's heart as opposed to in reality being government funds, either from a budgeted/transparent source or some "cloudy" central fund. I am not trying to say this still doesn't go on. I am just saying, when in government, Thaksin was using some excellent PR (some might say "smoke & mirrors")to make it appear, he was giving the money himself. Politicians do that worldwide - it's why they get re-elected. However, with him, the ethics could be at question, more than for a lot of others. |
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