Thailand’s anti-corruption body opens new probe into embattled Move Forward party
“We have started calling relevant individuals to hear the facts,” its deputy secretary general Sarote Phuengrampan told Reuters.
“This step is to collect evidence, but no one has been charged yet.”
Under its procedures, if the panel finds sufficient evidence of unethical behaviour, it would then charge people, who can present a defence before a decision is taken on whether to prosecute them in court.
If the Supreme Court finds they committed the offence, they could be banned from politics for life, the same fate suffered last year by a Move Forward politician who made social media posts that were deemed disrespectful to the monarchy.
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Thailand’s reformist Move Forward political party dissolved under lèse-majesté law
The latest case was brought by conservative activists in February, two days after the Constitutional Court ordered Move Forward to drop its campaign to change the lèse-majesté law.
Move Forward’s anti-establishment policies including military reform and undoing business monopolies, earned it huge urban and youth support, but clashed with powerful interests in Thailand, as showed when lawmakers allied with the royalist military blocked it from forming a government.
Senior People’s Party lawmaker Sirikanya Tansakul said she was preparing a legal defence and was not worried about the threat of a lifetime ban.
“What’s more concerning is that [an unfavourable] decision would set a new precedent: trying to amend can mean a serious ethical violation,” she said.
“Amending section 112 or any law would be impossible.”