Legal experts correctly question whether the justice minister should recommend that His Majesty the King approve Thaksin’s request for a second royal pardon. As lawyer Chao Meekhuad noted, “Pardons exist for those who show genuine remorse, not as a passport for repeat offenders who refuse to respect the court’s verdict.”
In his previous 14th-floor saga, Thaksin had confessed to corruption, professing remorse. On that basis, His Majesty graciously pardoned him and reduced his sentence to a year.
But instead of turning over a new leaf, the convict immediately engaged in a year-long fraud to deceive the entire nation, including the King, of his “life-threatening illnesses” — as painstakingly proven by the Medical Council of Thailand. Additionally, genuine remorse requires making the injured party whole by returning all ill-gotten gains and repaying profits made.
Despite his 67.97 billion baht in net assets, Thaksin has not voluntarily returned any of the purloined money, let alone profits therefrom.
This is not remorse in any shape or form. Thumbs down to the unrepentant fraudster.
Burin Kantabutra
CO2 tax madness
Re: “No to carbon tax”, (PostBag, Oct 3).
I really like the relative newcomer to this column, Anna Aarts. She suggests Pigouvian CO2 taxes should be considered only with broad international cooperation.
Social engineering based upon taxation, subsidies, regulation, or cap-and-trade schemes is always a slippery slope, but taxing CO2 is never going to achieve universal international acceptance, and even if it did, it would be wrong in implementation and insane in conceptualisation — as Anna described well.
We now have voluntary carbon trading, which should be enough to satisfy those zealots who truly believe CO2 is somehow bad for the planet.
Michael Setter
Ganja grievances
Re: “Weed ruins lives”, (PostBag, Oct 2).
I’m sure I’m not the only reader who wonders what it is about Jason Jellison’s letters that endears him to the PostBag editor. I would have thought that Tarquin’s remark that we have well and truly registered that Khun Jason is anti-ganja-so-move-on said it all. Apparently not!
Today, Mr Jellison is again given the right of reply by proposing that he has just listened to a recent performance of a favourite song, performed seven years ago, with a virtuoso solo on the organ by a talented violinist! What made this performance so remarkable, apparently, was that none of the 100 musicians was stoned.
I leave it to readers to make what they will of the 7th-grade event Mr Jellison subsequently recounts. Along with the recent story of a female British tourist collapsing at his feet, joint in hand, on a local trip to the shops, he seems cursed to encounter the evils of marijuana way beyond my experience in London and Sydney in the 70s and 80s.
Ray Ban
Let facts speak
Re: “Thamanat defends role in cabinet”, (BP, Oct 1).
Yesterday and again today on TV, I watched Capt Thamanat Prompow vigorously defend his reputation and threaten to sue for defamation if anyone called it into question. Having no wish to run the risk of being found guilty under Thailand’s draconian defamation and libel laws, I will adhere to known facts and offer no opinion or comment on them.
Fact 1: In Australia in 1993, New South Wales police charged Thamanat for his involvement in importing 3.2kg of heroin to Australia.
Fact 2: He pleaded guilty in the NSW District Court to conspiracy to import a commercial quantity of heroin with a street value of A$4.1 million, according to media reports, including The Sydney Morning Herald.
Fact 3: He was found guilty as charged and spent four years in jail. He was deported on his release from Parklea Prison.
Fact 4: Australia’s customs officers and police have the ability and the technology to determine the difference between flour and heroin.
Let the facts speak for themselves.