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***สื่อนอกแนะ รัฐบาลทหารไทย ‘คืนอำนาจ’***
ไฟแนนเชียลไทมส์แนะทหารไทยรีบคืนอำนาจประชาชน ชี้ไล่ล่าอดีตนายกรัฐมนตรีดูเป็นการแก้แค้น เตือนเขียนกติกากีดกันนักการเมืองประชานิยมไม่ให้ชนะเลือกตั้งจะไม่ได้ผล
เมื่อวันอาทิตย์ เว็บไซต์ของหนังสือพิมพ์ไฟแนนเชียลไทมส์ เผยแพร่บทบรรณาธิการ ชื่อ “นายพลไทยควรกลับกรมกอง” ระบุว่า ในปีหนึ่งๆ เมียนมาร์มีการเลือกตั้งหลายครั้ง ทั้งที่ครั้งหนึ่งเคยเป็นประเทศเผด็จการ เวลานี้ ประเทศไทยควรถูกจัดให้มีสถานะเช่นนั้น บรรดานายพลไทยเข้ายึดอำนาจด้วยข้ออ้างเพื่อสร้างความสามัคคี เวลานี้ เป็นที่แจ้งชัดแล้วว่า บรรดาผู้นำการรัฐประหารเป็นส่วนหนึ่งของปัญหา ไม่ใช่ทางแก้ปัญหา
http://news.voicetv.co.th/thailand/164817.html
Credit Phattita Cheraiem
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Thailand’s generals should stand aside
Pursuit of former prime minister looks like a political vendetta
General Prayuth Chan-ocha and his fellow military men have imposed a dictatorship only too willing to use the powers of the state to silence critics. True, his regime may not be killing people. But its attempts to quash the social forces unleashed more than a decade ago by the deeply flawed but still-popular Thaksin Shinawatra, former prime minister, are doomed to fail. Only a commitment to restore the country to representative government can begin to heal the deep social divisions that are eating away at Thailand’s body politic.
Sadly, this seems to be the last thing on the junta’s mind. Rather, the suspicion is it wants to stay in power long enough to oversee the delicate business of royal succession when King Bhumibol Adulyadej, ailing and 87, eventually dies. At the very least, it seeks to recast the rules such that politicians it considers irresponsibly populist can never be elected again. It is a vision of “managed democracy” that the harder-line generals in Myanmar would fully understand.
In a combative press conference, Gen Prayuth, head of the so-called National Council for Peace and Order, could not disguise his hatred of dissent. When one journalist asked about the detention of critics for “attitude adjustment”, he thundered back that it was inappropriate to challenge his “full power”. The journalist would be “summoned too if you keep asking questions like this”. If this is the junta’s public face, one hates to think what goes on in private.
The junta has also stepped up its war on Yingluck Shinawatra, former prime minister and sister of Mr Thaksin, a populist leader whose election in 2001 ended with a 2006 coup. The subsequent struggle between his supporters, many from the historically poorer northeast, and the urban elites and their allies triggered a political crisis still being played out.
The latest instalment came when the puppet parliament impeached Ms Yingluck and banned her from politics for five years. She faces up to a decade in prison for alleged criminal negligence over a rice subsidy scheme, which the junta says was a vote-buying ruse.
However wrong-headed the attempt artificially to prop up rice prices, the military government has dealt in anecdote and innuendo. So far, it has not proved the scheme was anything other than a policy it did not like. This looks like political vengeance, not the rule of law.
The government has support among the elite and business community who argue that it has restored stability. But stability built on repression is no stability at all. Western powers should now step up pressure on Thailand to hold elections as soon as possible. Daniel Russel, the top US official for east Asia, has made a start by delivering a sharp message to the junta. Thailand, he said, was losing credibility by not moving more quickly to end martial law.
The generals’ hopes to influence the course of future democratic exercises through fixing the rules are shabby and unworkable. The sooner they hand over power the better. Then it is for politicians to make their case — and for the people to decide.
