I have been living in LOS for 12yrs.
I have been a member of Thaivisa & Teakdoor – now resigned.
Reasons – abuse, inconsitency in treatment of members.
As I am 66yo, I say this in good faith.
I seek contact with other farangs etc.
For Peter Cohen:
You may be interested in what I wrote about Amrozi in the Fairfax press on 10 November 2008:
“The Indonesian media called the bombers “Amrozi and the others”. This made sense, not because Amrozi was the key player in the Bali operation, far from it, but because his quirky personality best met the criteria of celebrity status.
So great was the “disconnect” between his daily behaviour and his crime, he should probably have pleaded insanity. Amrozi joked and wisecracked his way through the six years that followed his capture. When he was caught, he said: “Gee, you police are smart after all!” In one of his interrogations, he boasted that he had been kicked out of high school for chasing girls. On being sentenced to death, he made a victory salute.
Appearing as a witness in the trial of his spiritual mentor, Abu Bakar Bashir, Amrozi chatted gaily with the judges and asked for a cup of coffee. He even threw some romance into the plot by remarrying his first wife. Amrozi said he already had his eye on a third woman (he kept his current wife after his remarriage), whom he would marry were he not to be executed.”
Hamish McDonald has pointed out inconsistencies in the Indonesian justice system. Legal consistency is a sign of a developed culture. Abolition of the death penalty is another. The latter has occurred in Australia since the days of Sir Henry Bolte. The United States, where even innocent people are executed, appears to be going backwards. As for inconsistency though, it’s hard to beat the big fuss from Australians about the imminent execution of Australians for crimes committed in Indonesia, when they couldn’t give a damn if it happens to anybody else there.
I would point out that Indonesians (and others from Southeast Asia) who dispense drugs in Australia are also afforded the best lawyers that ideological influence can buy. Human rights lawyers flock to such convicted drug dealers like flies on fly paper, while I have seen very few of such lawyers in Jakarta, as of late. Australia indeed may be far less financially corrupt than Indonesia, but I see no evidence that it is not as ideologically corrupted as Indonesia (review the recent Jake Lynch and Col Richard Kemp incidents at Sydney University).
Let’s not forget to point out the inequality of defence also, the foreigners have the benefit of intense lobbying from their governments and the finest legal council money can buy. Justice is a joke in Indonesia to be sure.
Amazing what gymnastics the elite have to perform in order to pull the wool over the eyes of less privileged Thais,and all in order to entrench their own position with a phony intellectual veneer.It is all so obvious, it is quite laughable! Next you will have alpha, beta and gamma persons, but that actually already exists.
I would give all the “law scholars” playing around with the meaning of words and texts (or making daring proposals to rewind history to pre-2006) for just ONE RESEARCHER with their head firmly planted in EMPIRICAL REALITY.
Lack of transparency and accountability to the public, is the empirical reality of Thailand’s legal system, police have almost all the power, prosecutors have little or none and what power they do have is dependent on the police (e.g. Red Bull heir case).
Contrast this with prosecutors in Japan who actually can have police powers (See The Japanese Way of Justice: Prosecuting Crime in Japan by David T. Johnson, Oxford University Press, 1996).
Engaged citizens who demand transparency and accountability from their police and the police reform this entails are OBVIOUSLY NEEDED if the country is going to progress, rather than blind followers of the sort of 2003 mass media exortations to extrajudicially kill, kill, kill that we all experienced firsthand from that former Prime Minister who started on his road to billionaire champagne & caviar dreams, starting from his shady IT deals in the police department as a police colonel, who will remain nameless…
We learn here that “the Constitution is invading people’s forum internum. The people have to think the right thoughts and do the right tasks.” Well, I would hope so, for their own sake. But what a ultimately meaningless pitter patter of legal terminology.
If a country does not even have RULE OF LAW, what good is it to refine and refine scholarly textual analysis of the law in some ideal sense. And ultimately, what good is yet another constitution text full of abstract words divorced from empirical reality. Next to useless, probably.
You underestimate Amrozi’s role in terrorism
in Indonesia. Irrespective of his execution, his role was more prominent than you realise. You will note, however, that Abu Bakar Ba’asyir, former Head of Jema’ah Islamiyah, has not been schedule for execution.
[…] April 2012, Cambodian environment activist Chut Wutty was shot and killed while taking two journalists to visit and photograph an illegal logging site in […]
It may be that the Indonesian judicial system discriminates against foreigners on trial for drug offences, or it could be that those unable to pay appropriate bribes are penalised, regardless of whether they are foreigners or not. Even outside drug trafficking or possession cases, Indonesian courts often bring down quite inconsistent and unpredictable verdicts. This was clear in terrorism trials, for example. It was quite puzzling, for example, that Amrozi, the ‘smiling terrorist’, should have been executed, given his rather limited intellectual capacity and obvious inability to play a decision-making role in the Bali bombing.
It would be interesting to know the evidence for this author’s claim that Fabius’s statement prompted Prasetyo or somebody else to grant Atlaoui a temporary reprieve. This may not be the case.
But his judgement that the executions will not reflect well on Indonesia is surely correct.
Jokowi came to office determined to reassert what he has called Indonesia’s ‘pride and dignity’. His insistence on having selected drug traffickers shot, for which he bears full responsibility no matter what encouragement he has received from equally morally-blind figures such as Megawati, will not contribute to the accomplishment of this goal.
Many thanks to Nich for highlighting a crucial bread and butter issue and the anomalous tide that lifts some boats higher than others. Notwithstanding the welcome news of a pay rise and Shwe Mann’s boast, the disparity between military and civilian salaries of similar rank is seen as yet another example of one rule for them another rule for us. Besides the widening gap between senior commanders as well as senior civil servants and other ranks can hardly be overlooked.
The two-tiered system in healthcare, education, transport and communications, above all rule of law, makes Burma a country of two nations, the division only deepened by the overarching interests of capitalist globalisation in action.
For one thing printing money, like the digital age QE, is likely to feed into inflation. The increasing cost of living compounded by periodic electricity price hikes will find both the policy makers and the public at the receiving end going round in a vicious circle.
The haemorrhaging of able personnel with the opening up of the country in recent times follows decades of brain drain. The military rulers never seem to care perhaps because they only want people who follow orders without question.
Unfortunately fair pay including minimum wage is rather a big ask from people who have never been satisfied with the lion’s share, who would only leave scraps for the rest, and who address the public as parents but treat them like wayward children with a liberal use of the cane to boot.
Thank you for the kind words. I’m glad to see that Nick Nostitz is back on FB. It seems that Andrew MacGregor Marshall also had is FB account closed for a short period.
One tradition is Satuditha or feeding of all comers, Mohinga often on the menu, in addition to the sweet floating rice balls called Mont Lone Yay Paw which literally means floating rice balls.
Garden hoses and night time drenching have always been the case in Rangoon whereas Mandalay has observed a more sedate and traditional Thingyan keeping the nights dry and highlighting the entertainment, but also being subjected to commercialisation pressures nowadays.
Seems to me the drafters are attempting to institutionalize the NCPO’s practice of “attitude adjustment” into basic law.
The acclaimed journalist Peter Gourevitch argues that “power is the ability to get others to inhabit your version of reality.” Although one type of submission to reality grows out of the barrel of a gun, other types demand legitimate ideological support alongside broadly accepted narratives. The NCPO may think itself effective as it wields the former but it seems hopelessly ineffective and powerless to wield the latter in the long run.
Khemthong’s piece above lays bare the limited power of the NCPO and its allies to shape a permanent political reality for Thailand.
The primary purpose of the new constitution is to institute an appearance of electoral democracy, while denying the elected representatives the power to make any substantial decisions or institute changes without the approval of shadow power brokers.
This will allow the unelected elites to retain full control, without having any accountability or scrutiny by the public for their actions.
The “independent agencies” are created with the whole purpose of allowing the elite channels of direct action for controlling the elected representatives.
They are by no means designed to do what their titles imply and provide independent oversight of government actions. Those functions fundamentally depend on transparency and public oversight, and cannot be done by small unaccountable cliques appointed through opaque process by the shadow power brokers.
That the “spirit” of the constitution is paternalistic/moralistic is exactly what had been intended. The commissions are important, because they are to control the parties and the interests of the people (the paternalistic aspect), by maintaining a kind of “democractic” facade (the moralistic aspect). Crucial is the question, who is selecting the members of these commissions. Is it like in the older constitution that the members of the commission select themselves?
Yes, this page at New Mandala remains blocked. The transparent proxy redirects to http://blocked.ict-cop.com, This is one we haven’t seen before. The title bar reads “Blocked, yeah!” and the screen features a foreign female singer and noting in Thai that all artists return happiness to Thai people…in HD. (WTF?!?)
I am most saddened to report that obviously nobody’s ever read The Devil’s Discus! Udomsak Wattanaworachaiwathin sold photocopies of р╕Бр╕Зр╕Ир╕▒р╕Бр╕гр╕Ыр╕╡р╕ир╕▓р╕И at Sondhi Limthongkul’s early PAD rallies at Lumpini Park. However, Udomsak was not arrested immediately; police waited until February 11, 2014 to charge him for such a criminal act on May 2, 2006. (What is the statute of limitations?)
In 2006, the 1941 Printing Act was still in force and The Devil’s Discus (read that closely) was a book officially banned by listing in the Royal Gazette. Udomsak was busted eight years after the fact using a law which is no longer…the law! (Military history buffs may recall the 2006 junta promulgated its own new, improved Printing Act in 2007.)
(An interesting legal wrinkle to all this is that only The Devil’s Discus in English was banned as of February 2006; р╕Бр╕Зр╕Ир╕▒р╕Бр╕гр╕Ыр╕╡р╕ир╕▓р╕И was not banned until May 31, 2006, perhaps because Udomsak was selling it. So he was convicted nine years after the fact using a law which is no longer…the law for a book which was not banned when he sold it! Did Udomsak’s lawyers seek to bring this up??? The rule of law is necessarily very specific.)
I found it quite remarkable to find someone selling Discus and so I had a long discussion with Udomsak at the time. He apparently had not read the book and was surprised to hear what was written in it from me.
Udomsak was acquitted by the lower court. (Was this trial held in camera?) However, their decision was appealed by the public prosecutors. It appears Udomsak was acquitted of the 1941 Printing Act charges. The prosecutors apparently had him recharged using Article 112 (confirm, please). Thus, the Appeals Court convicted him of lèse-majesté. The 66-year old was sentenced to three years in prison, reduced to two years for his cooperation.
For a book!
This case is complete Swiss cheese! In addition to the above, an accused under one law cannot be charged again, especially on appeal, using a completely different law due to the legal principle of double jeopardy.
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V-Day resistance to the junta’s coercive regime
I have been living in LOS for 12yrs.
I have been a member of Thaivisa & Teakdoor – now resigned.
Reasons – abuse, inconsitency in treatment of members.
As I am 66yo, I say this in good faith.
I seek contact with other farangs etc.
I lived in CNX for 12yrs. Now residing in Fang.
Indonesia: the quality of justice
For Peter Cohen:
You may be interested in what I wrote about Amrozi in the Fairfax press on 10 November 2008:
“The Indonesian media called the bombers “Amrozi and the others”. This made sense, not because Amrozi was the key player in the Bali operation, far from it, but because his quirky personality best met the criteria of celebrity status.
So great was the “disconnect” between his daily behaviour and his crime, he should probably have pleaded insanity. Amrozi joked and wisecracked his way through the six years that followed his capture. When he was caught, he said: “Gee, you police are smart after all!” In one of his interrogations, he boasted that he had been kicked out of high school for chasing girls. On being sentenced to death, he made a victory salute.
Appearing as a witness in the trial of his spiritual mentor, Abu Bakar Bashir, Amrozi chatted gaily with the judges and asked for a cup of coffee. He even threw some romance into the plot by remarrying his first wife. Amrozi said he already had his eye on a third woman (he kept his current wife after his remarriage), whom he would marry were he not to be executed.”
Indonesia: the quality of justice
Hamish McDonald has pointed out inconsistencies in the Indonesian justice system. Legal consistency is a sign of a developed culture. Abolition of the death penalty is another. The latter has occurred in Australia since the days of Sir Henry Bolte. The United States, where even innocent people are executed, appears to be going backwards. As for inconsistency though, it’s hard to beat the big fuss from Australians about the imminent execution of Australians for crimes committed in Indonesia, when they couldn’t give a damn if it happens to anybody else there.
Indonesia: the quality of justice
I would point out that Indonesians (and others from Southeast Asia) who dispense drugs in Australia are also afforded the best lawyers that ideological influence can buy. Human rights lawyers flock to such convicted drug dealers like flies on fly paper, while I have seen very few of such lawyers in Jakarta, as of late. Australia indeed may be far less financially corrupt than Indonesia, but I see no evidence that it is not as ideologically corrupted as Indonesia (review the recent Jake Lynch and Col Richard Kemp incidents at Sydney University).
Indonesia: the quality of justice
Let’s not forget to point out the inequality of defence also, the foreigners have the benefit of intense lobbying from their governments and the finest legal council money can buy. Justice is a joke in Indonesia to be sure.
Pol-la-muang: The making of superior Thais
Amazing what gymnastics the elite have to perform in order to pull the wool over the eyes of less privileged Thais,and all in order to entrench their own position with a phony intellectual veneer.It is all so obvious, it is quite laughable! Next you will have alpha, beta and gamma persons, but that actually already exists.
Pol-la-muang: The making of superior Thais
I would give all the “law scholars” playing around with the meaning of words and texts (or making daring proposals to rewind history to pre-2006) for just ONE RESEARCHER with their head firmly planted in EMPIRICAL REALITY.
Lack of transparency and accountability to the public, is the empirical reality of Thailand’s legal system, police have almost all the power, prosecutors have little or none and what power they do have is dependent on the police (e.g. Red Bull heir case).
Contrast this with prosecutors in Japan who actually can have police powers (See The Japanese Way of Justice: Prosecuting Crime in Japan by David T. Johnson, Oxford University Press, 1996).
Engaged citizens who demand transparency and accountability from their police and the police reform this entails are OBVIOUSLY NEEDED if the country is going to progress, rather than blind followers of the sort of 2003 mass media exortations to extrajudicially kill, kill, kill that we all experienced firsthand from that former Prime Minister who started on his road to billionaire champagne & caviar dreams, starting from his shady IT deals in the police department as a police colonel, who will remain nameless…
We learn here that “the Constitution is invading people’s forum internum. The people have to think the right thoughts and do the right tasks.” Well, I would hope so, for their own sake. But what a ultimately meaningless pitter patter of legal terminology.
If a country does not even have RULE OF LAW, what good is it to refine and refine scholarly textual analysis of the law in some ideal sense. And ultimately, what good is yet another constitution text full of abstract words divorced from empirical reality. Next to useless, probably.
Indonesia: the quality of justice
Ken,
You underestimate Amrozi’s role in terrorism
in Indonesia. Irrespective of his execution, his role was more prominent than you realise. You will note, however, that Abu Bakar Ba’asyir, former Head of Jema’ah Islamiyah, has not been schedule for execution.
Chut Wutty: Tragic casualty of Cambodia’s dirty war to save forests
[…] April 2012, Cambodian environment activist Chut Wutty was shot and killed while taking two journalists to visit and photograph an illegal logging site in […]
Indonesia: the quality of justice
It may be that the Indonesian judicial system discriminates against foreigners on trial for drug offences, or it could be that those unable to pay appropriate bribes are penalised, regardless of whether they are foreigners or not. Even outside drug trafficking or possession cases, Indonesian courts often bring down quite inconsistent and unpredictable verdicts. This was clear in terrorism trials, for example. It was quite puzzling, for example, that Amrozi, the ‘smiling terrorist’, should have been executed, given his rather limited intellectual capacity and obvious inability to play a decision-making role in the Bali bombing.
It would be interesting to know the evidence for this author’s claim that Fabius’s statement prompted Prasetyo or somebody else to grant Atlaoui a temporary reprieve. This may not be the case.
But his judgement that the executions will not reflect well on Indonesia is surely correct.
Jokowi came to office determined to reassert what he has called Indonesia’s ‘pride and dignity’. His insistence on having selected drug traffickers shot, for which he bears full responsibility no matter what encouragement he has received from equally morally-blind figures such as Megawati, will not contribute to the accomplishment of this goal.
Indonesia: the quality of justice
Very sad to see that this part of the law have sense to divert away from the locals
All should have been treated the same because of their involvement
Indonesia: the quality of justice
Hamish,
From the Merchant of Venice, shouldn’t it be “The Quality of Mercy” ? How much flesh does Indonesia REALLY need, anyway ?
Fair pay for Myanmar’s civil servants
Many thanks to Nich for highlighting a crucial bread and butter issue and the anomalous tide that lifts some boats higher than others. Notwithstanding the welcome news of a pay rise and Shwe Mann’s boast, the disparity between military and civilian salaries of similar rank is seen as yet another example of one rule for them another rule for us. Besides the widening gap between senior commanders as well as senior civil servants and other ranks can hardly be overlooked.
The two-tiered system in healthcare, education, transport and communications, above all rule of law, makes Burma a country of two nations, the division only deepened by the overarching interests of capitalist globalisation in action.
For one thing printing money, like the digital age QE, is likely to feed into inflation. The increasing cost of living compounded by periodic electricity price hikes will find both the policy makers and the public at the receiving end going round in a vicious circle.
The haemorrhaging of able personnel with the opening up of the country in recent times follows decades of brain drain. The military rulers never seem to care perhaps because they only want people who follow orders without question.
Unfortunately fair pay including minimum wage is rather a big ask from people who have never been satisfied with the lion’s share, who would only leave scraps for the rest, and who address the public as parents but treat them like wayward children with a liberal use of the cane to boot.
Thailand’s social media battleground
Thank you for the kind words. I’m glad to see that Nick Nostitz is back on FB. It seems that Andrew MacGregor Marshall also had is FB account closed for a short period.
Surviving Thingyan
In recent times alcohol consumption especially among the young has rocketed in a devoutly Buddhist country while older people still visit the temples and observe sabbath.
One tradition is Satuditha or feeding of all comers, Mohinga often on the menu, in addition to the sweet floating rice balls called Mont Lone Yay Paw which literally means floating rice balls.
Garden hoses and night time drenching have always been the case in Rangoon whereas Mandalay has observed a more sedate and traditional Thingyan keeping the nights dry and highlighting the entertainment, but also being subjected to commercialisation pressures nowadays.
Pol-la-muang: The making of superior Thais
Seems to me the drafters are attempting to institutionalize the NCPO’s practice of “attitude adjustment” into basic law.
The acclaimed journalist Peter Gourevitch argues that “power is the ability to get others to inhabit your version of reality.” Although one type of submission to reality grows out of the barrel of a gun, other types demand legitimate ideological support alongside broadly accepted narratives. The NCPO may think itself effective as it wields the former but it seems hopelessly ineffective and powerless to wield the latter in the long run.
Khemthong’s piece above lays bare the limited power of the NCPO and its allies to shape a permanent political reality for Thailand.
Pol-la-muang: The making of superior Thais
The primary purpose of the new constitution is to institute an appearance of electoral democracy, while denying the elected representatives the power to make any substantial decisions or institute changes without the approval of shadow power brokers.
This will allow the unelected elites to retain full control, without having any accountability or scrutiny by the public for their actions.
The “independent agencies” are created with the whole purpose of allowing the elite channels of direct action for controlling the elected representatives.
They are by no means designed to do what their titles imply and provide independent oversight of government actions. Those functions fundamentally depend on transparency and public oversight, and cannot be done by small unaccountable cliques appointed through opaque process by the shadow power brokers.
Pol-la-muang: The making of superior Thais
“Article 26 has transformed Thais from pra-cha-chon (people) to pol-la-muang (citizens)”.
Same semantic shade as between “subject” and “citizen” ?
Pol-la-muang: The making of superior Thais
That the “spirit” of the constitution is paternalistic/moralistic is exactly what had been intended. The commissions are important, because they are to control the parties and the interests of the people (the paternalistic aspect), by maintaining a kind of “democractic” facade (the moralistic aspect). Crucial is the question, who is selecting the members of these commissions. Is it like in the older constitution that the members of the commission select themselves?
The Devil’s Discus – in Thai
Yes, this page at New Mandala remains blocked. The transparent proxy redirects to http://blocked.ict-cop.com, This is one we haven’t seen before. The title bar reads “Blocked, yeah!” and the screen features a foreign female singer and noting in Thai that all artists return happiness to Thai people…in HD. (WTF?!?)
I am most saddened to report that obviously nobody’s ever read The Devil’s Discus! Udomsak Wattanaworachaiwathin sold photocopies of р╕Бр╕Зр╕Ир╕▒р╕Бр╕гр╕Ыр╕╡р╕ир╕▓р╕И at Sondhi Limthongkul’s early PAD rallies at Lumpini Park. However, Udomsak was not arrested immediately; police waited until February 11, 2014 to charge him for such a criminal act on May 2, 2006. (What is the statute of limitations?)
In 2006, the 1941 Printing Act was still in force and The Devil’s Discus (read that closely) was a book officially banned by listing in the Royal Gazette. Udomsak was busted eight years after the fact using a law which is no longer…the law! (Military history buffs may recall the 2006 junta promulgated its own new, improved Printing Act in 2007.)
(An interesting legal wrinkle to all this is that only The Devil’s Discus in English was banned as of February 2006; р╕Бр╕Зр╕Ир╕▒р╕Бр╕гр╕Ыр╕╡р╕ир╕▓р╕И was not banned until May 31, 2006, perhaps because Udomsak was selling it. So he was convicted nine years after the fact using a law which is no longer…the law for a book which was not banned when he sold it! Did Udomsak’s lawyers seek to bring this up??? The rule of law is necessarily very specific.)
I found it quite remarkable to find someone selling Discus and so I had a long discussion with Udomsak at the time. He apparently had not read the book and was surprised to hear what was written in it from me.
Udomsak was acquitted by the lower court. (Was this trial held in camera?) However, their decision was appealed by the public prosecutors. It appears Udomsak was acquitted of the 1941 Printing Act charges. The prosecutors apparently had him recharged using Article 112 (confirm, please). Thus, the Appeals Court convicted him of lèse-majesté. The 66-year old was sentenced to three years in prison, reduced to two years for his cooperation.
For a book!
This case is complete Swiss cheese! In addition to the above, an accused under one law cannot be charged again, especially on appeal, using a completely different law due to the legal principle of double jeopardy.
Read more here:
Political Prisoners in Thailand
https://thaipoliticalprisoners.wordpress.com/decidedcases/udomsak-wattanaworachaiwathin/
Prachatai
http://prachatai.org/english/node/4986