Bangkok governor Chadchart Sittipunt is seeking an additional 32 billion baht from the Bangkok Metropolitan Council (BMC) to settle outstanding debts for operating and maintaining the extended sections of the Green Line electric skytrain.
Mr Chadchart, along with executives and councillors from all 50 districts, yesterday attended the fourth ordinary session of the year at the BMC chaired by Viput Srivaurai, a Bang Rak councillor from the Pheu Thai Party.
High on the agenda was Mr Chadchart’s proposal to seek 32.6 billion baht to settle the longstanding debt with the Bangkok Mass Transit System Plc (BTSC). He said the funds would be drawn from Bangkok’s accumulated reserves as a special expenditure.
As of Tuesday, which marked the end of the previous fiscal year, the BMA had debt obligations from 192 projects worth 75.7 billion baht.
The 2025 financial report shows the BMA’s reserves fell from 83.6 billion to 33.7 billion baht after deductions and allocations under the Act on Rules for Public Administration of Bangkok Metropolis.
The issue stems from unpaid costs for train operations and maintenance (O and M) on extensions one and two of the Green Line, some of which are under Administrative Court review while others are overdue, all incurring heavy interest.
The BMA’s business arm Krungthep Thanakom (KT) was instructed to negotiate directly with the BTSC.
The deal reached was that the BMA must pay debts directly to the BTSC by this month, with interest temporarily reduced from the Minimum Loan Rate +1 to the MLR, saving 286 million baht.
The Central Administrative Court ordered both the BMA and KT to pay 11.07 billion baht in arrears from June 2021 to October 2022 in line with earlier rulings by the Supreme Administrative Court which required payment of 14.5 billion baht, Mr Chadchart said.
He insisted the BMA would not appeal, covering all debts until August, totalling 32.6 billion baht including interest.
The BMA collects only 2.4 billion baht annually from fares on the Green Line, far below the 8.4 billion baht running cost, resulting in subsidies of around 6 billion baht. This is unfair on people who do not use this line, said the governor.
Three measures are planned to fix this: fare adjustments closer to real costs, initial central budget support and additional budgets for fiscal years 2026 and 2027.