By Thai Newsroom Reporters
THE SENATE WAS today (July 2) petitioned to put forward a fresh impeachment lawsuit against the newly-named Culture Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra after she has been already ordered by the Constitutional Court to stop running the country as head of government pending a court verdict on basis of allegations that she has perpetrated a severe breach of the ethical code whilst handling Thai-Cambodian border conflict.
Political activist Tul Sitthisomwong filed the impeachment case in pursuit of an ouster of Paetongtarn as culture minister by the Constitutional Court by lodging the case with the Senate with the hope of a minimum of one-tenth of all 200 senior lawmakers quickly forwarding it over to the Constitutional Court.
Paetongtarn, daughter of de facto Pheu Thai boss Thaksin Shinawatra, has been suspended by court from doing her executive duties as prime minister pending the court ruling, largely anticipated in about a couple of months or sooner, on the highly contentious act on her part allegedly perpetrated in severe breach of the ethical code and lack of evident honesty whilst communicating in a leaked telephone chitchat with Cambodian leader Hun Sen a couple of weeks earlier.
Tul insisted that Paetongtarn who is scheduled alongside other newly-named members of cabinet to attend oath-taking rituals in a royal audience tomorrow (July 3) should by no means assume any ministerial seat whereas the court has not yet handed down a ruling on such severe misconduct charges filed against her as head of government.
However, Paetongtarn contended that she took the culture portfolio so she could manage to “export” Thailand’s soft power to the world though she is being suspended from work as prime minister.
A group of 36 senators had earlier forwarded an impeachment lawsuit against Thaksin’s daughter to the court, resulting in her being currently suspended from prime-ministerial duties, thus apparently prompting her to strive with the legal battle by yet continuing to be part of the Pheu Thai-led cabinet.
In another development, the mega-billionaire, power-playing Thaksin today (July 2) attended a second day of a court trial on the lese majeste lawsuit filed against him after he had mentioned the monarchy for alleged involvement in the 2006 coup which deposed him from power during an interview with a news agency in Seoul, South Korea in 2015.
Nevertheless, cases in court involving the draconian lese majeste law better known as Section 112 of the Criminal Code could possibly become a matter of years because either the plaintiff or the defendant may file an appeal to the Appellate Court and finally to the Supreme Court. The de facto Pheu Thai boss who has categorically denied the charges is more or less expected to fight it until the end.
Meanwhile, Thaksin is simultaneously facing one other legal battle in the Supreme Court’s division of criminal lawsuits against persons in political positions pertaining to the allegations that he had staged a six-month-long fakeout as a “critically ill” patient at Police Hospital to literally avoid spending a curtailed, one-year time behind bars at Bangkok Remand prison after he had been sentenced in absentia to an eight-year jail term on counts of misconduct perpetrated during his previous premiership over the last couple of decades.
CAPTIONS:
Newly-named Culture Minister Paetogntarn Shinawatra. Top photo: Thai Rath, Front Page photo: Naewna
First insert: Political activist Tul Sitthisomwong. Photo: Thai Rath
Second insert: De facto Pheu Thai boss Thaksin Shinawatra. Photo: Thai Rath
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