Elected province governors

The issue why the province governors are all appointed officials sent by the Ministry of Interior and not elected directly by the citizens of the respective province - like it is the case in Bangkok since 1972 - has come back into discussion as it is one of the campaign topics by the newly founded "Future Forward Party" for the forthcoming long-delayed election, as it is mentioned in this interview with the party founder.

The website isaanrecords has already followed up this interview with two articles on this topic. First, the summary of a talk by Tanet Charoenmuang given in Maha Sarakham in April, describes the history of the local governments in Thailand compared to the centrally controlled administration. Tanet was a strong proposer of elected governors for many years, and I really should get back to read more of his book "Thailand - A late decentralizing country" which contains his old publications on such topics.

In "Core arguments for and against elected governors", an anonymous author again states the administrative history of the provinces vs. the local governments by municipalities. Sadly, there is no comment possible at that posting, so I have to place my nitpicking here. The article states that from 1972 till 1994 there one one municipality in Thailand - which is wrong as there were already 119 municipalities in 1972. However, what is true is that Chiang Mai was the only municipality of "Thesaban Nakhon" level after Thonburi and Phra Nakhon were merged, and until Nakhon Si Thammarat was upgraded to this highest municipal level. The other odd statement in the article is that BMA is responsible for four provinces, but in real it is only responsible for the special administrative area of Bangkok, which is something like a province.

Whereas in Tanets talk the Provincial Administrative Organizations are mentioned, both articles don't mention that these local administrations were changed into fully elected bodies after the 1997 constitution. The the issue of elected vs. appointed province governors was in the political debate in the 1990s, yet the powerful Ministry of Interior at that time was able to block these proposals, and to get the topic from the agenda it gave the electorate these rather powerless local governments in parallel to the centrally controlled province administration.

Elected village leaders

Yesterday, a very interesting article was published in The Nation, basically a rant of a spokesman from the provincial administration bureaucracy on the suggested changes by the National Reform Council. As the whole piece is worth reading, it wasn't easy to pick few main parts to quote

Any attempt by a future government to abolish the system of the Interior Ministry appointing village representatives up to provincial level - and replacing it with the election of local leaders - will be vehemently opposed, the influential Governing Officer Association of Thailand (GOAT) said yesterday.
[...]
Surasak warned that Thailand would disintegrate and be replaced by "many pockets of small states" if governors were elected along with others like village headmen.
The Nation, 2011-06-16, Elected village leaders could lead to 'disintegration of the country'

It is basically the same thinking as shown in the proposal of a half-appointed parliament by the PAD and their New Politics Party - the citizen are too stupid to choose their right representatives, so any decentralization and democratization at local levels will bound to fail. Better stay with the well-known and claimed-to-be successful bureaucratic polity, the system already described by Fred W. Riggs in his 1967 book "Thailand: The Modernization Of A Bureaucratic Polity".

It is of course not surprising to read such a conservative statement by someone from within the provincial administration bureaucracy, it would be interesting to see if the winner of the forthcoming election will dare to change anything in this system, implementing some or all of the proposals of the National Reform Council. Too bad I haven't yet found a good English description on what the actually propose for the provincial and local administration. It already took me quite some time to find the Thai name of this association with the strange acronym - สมาคมนักปกครองแห่งประเทศไทย.

But there is one thing I real wonder about in the article, and especially the headline. The article suggests that right now all of the administrators - from provincial governor, district head officer, subdistrict headman and down to the village headman are officials sent from the Ministry of Interior. While this is true for the two higher levels, the headmen are and always were a thing in the middle. The Ministry has to approve them, and they are under strong control of the Ministry and the higher administrative levels, but they are and as far as I know always were elected by the local population. And since 1997 every five years, and not for life (till retirement age actually) as in the past. I can only guess that the article was written by a Bangkokian, who never lived in any village outside the town and thus never experienced the election of a village headman.

Decentralization - or not?

Last week had two interesting new article on a single day, both around the buzzword decentralization.

At first, the opposition Phuea Thai party has announced her Thaksin-approved election program, and among utter nonsense like a town on land reclaimed from the sea (to be drowned with global warming) one point they kept from former member and leader Chavalit is the idea of giving the three southern Muslim dominated provinces some kind of autonomy or increased self-government.

Pheu Thai MP for Yala Sukarno Matha said yesterday the party would go ahead with the policy of establishing a Pattani City - as well as pushing for the drafting of a Pattani Bill to set up a new administrative zone covering the border provinces of Yala, Pattani, and Narathiwat.
He said the proposed law would allow local residents to elect their provincial governors and give more power to local administrations.
[Source: The Nation, April 27 2011, "Pheu Thai to retain Pattani City plan"]

As usual, the newspaper article does not contain any hard facts on what is actually meant by this, whether it means just an elected province governor, a change of the whole province administration into something like the Bangkok city administration, what this means to the already existing local government units like PAO, TAOs and municipalities. And to me the main question - why should only the three southernmost provinces get an improved local government - only because the insurgents shed the light on the lack of any powerful local administration?

This is where the second article comes in, same newspaper, same date.

A plan to decentralise local administration - proposed recently by the National Reform Committee led by former premier Anand Panyarachun - met fierce opposition and outrage from the Government Officers Association of Thailand yesterday.
They said if such reform was carried out, Thailand would cease to exist as a unitary state and collapse and lose its sovereignty.
[Source: The Nation, April 27 2011, "Strong opposition to reform plan"]

Now it is not that much surprising that the existing bureaucracy is quite happy with the status quo and don't want any loss of their powers towards local administrations. And quite some more interesting quotes from the same article.

Kamol said the proposed reform did not make sense, as local people would not be ready even "50 years from now".

Reminds me on what I read about the start of Thai democracy after the 1932 coup, with the parliament having appointed members until the voters get mature enough to choose correctly.

Senior members of the association claimed the plan would see an end to the role of the Interior Ministry in appointing village headmen, kamnans, as well as district chiefs and provincial governors.

Strangely, both village headmen as well as kamnan are elected, and that for a long time already. Its only that as they serve as subordinate within the central administration, they have to confirmed by the Ministry of Interior. Might be too much condensed writing in the article which lost this detail, but also distorted the facts then.

The association, which met and discussed the matter, concluded that local people were not ready to elect representatives at all levels and they had concerns that people running for local polls were corrupt. Local people needed to be supervised by the Interior Ministry's appointed officials, they argued.
[...]
"The worst thing would be to abolish [the appointed] village headmen and kamnan who are local representatives [of the Ministry]. Are those elected representatives really representing the people? Those who voted for the Tambon Administrative Organisations (TAO) chiefs were told they had already received money [for voting for a vote-buying candidate] so they couldn't make any demands [for assistance] afterwards. Our kamnans and village heads are different, however."

The appointed headmen are immune to vote-buying unlike the elected local administration? Well, at first the headmen are elected as well, and of course there have been (see e.g. the book Democracy, Development and Decentralization in Provincial Thailand by Daniel Arghiros) and with all likelihood still are illegal activities in these elections. Besides, it's a strange viewpoint to think of the cash given for votes being the only thing a politician is doing for his electorate, in a normal democracy someone is elected for the things he will do in the upcoming term in office.

It will be interesting to see if all the discussion around decentralization will continue after the next national elections are done, or if it was just empty promises to get more votes in the elections.

Administrative Reform through Decentralization and Community Empowerment

On the Inside Thailand news feed from the Public Relations Department of the Thai government, an article with the lengthy title Administrative Reform through Decentralization and Community Empowerment was posted yesterday. Though it does not have much hard facts in it, some parts are still worth quoting.

The Government is pushing for issuance of laws to promote decentralization of administrative power and empower the community. The administrative reform will enable local organizations to play a greater role in the management of local affairs.
[..]
He [Prime Ministrer] cited the move to upgrade Mae Sot district in Tak province into a special administrative zone as an example of decentralization of administrative power. The Cabinet has already given the green light to the legislation on the Mae Sot special administrative zone. The legislation is pending consideration by Parliament. Once approved by Parliament, Mae Sot will be granted new powers and responsibilities, and laws and regulations introduced by the special zone should override those of the central administration. It will become a model for other towns planning to enjoy true decentralization of power.

This confirms the status I knew about this project, and since now parliament is busy with the preparations of house dissolution and the laws necessary for the election under the amended constitution, it's unlikely this law will be considered in parliament in this term anymore.

Dr. Prawase Wasi, Chairman of the National Reform Assembly, also called for decentralization and community empowerment in his keynote address on Thailand Reform in early March 2011. He said that centralization of power would lead to dire consequences. For instance, it weakens communities, making them unable to handle local affairs. Centralization also leads to conflicts between local culture and central administration, weakens bureaucracy, paves the way for rampant corruption and a substandard political system, and makes it easier to stage a coup d’état. Decentralization of administrative power will make it difficult for any group to seize administrative power.
[...]

I have a posting on Prawase's keynote half-finished, but sadly still don't know what he actually suggests as measure to move to a more decentralized country. All I read so far was that he suggests to strengthen local administration in village councils and the TAO, not really unexpected for something named decentralization to mean giving more power to local administration.

Myth and Realities: The Democratization of Thai Politics

I am currently reading the book Myths and Realities: The Democratization of Thai Politics by Yoshifumi Tamada, which is on the development from Black May 1992 to the 1997 constitution until Thaksins win in the 2001 general election. Though not directly on the topics of this blog, a very interesting read due to the similarities with the current political situation as well as the differences, and also as the massive changes in this time are one reason for the return to the old style of Thai politics in 2006.

The 1990s have been the start of the decentralization, most notably by the upgrade of the Tambon Councils to Tambon Administrative Organizations, the upgrade of the sanitary districts to municipalities and also changes in the Provincial Administrative Organizations, all now elected local government bodies. Therefore these changes are also a minor topic of the point, though the most detailed on it is only found in footnote one of chapter three. I am quoting it completely:

In the early 1990s, both the budget and the number of local government employees accounted for less than 10% of those of the national government. Interior Ministry officials, including the provincial governors, played the key roles in this centralized system of local administration. One of the main aims of the decentralization campaign was to replace provincial governors appointed by the Interior Ministry with popularly elected local government heads. However, the provincial governor's offices were very important within the Interior Ministry bureaucracy, being equal in rank and prestige to the ministry director's post. Thus for many Interior Ministry officials, such an appointment is the highlight of their career. It was only natural, therefore, that the ministry should stubbornly resist. Furthermore, decentralization was not only a problem for the Interior Ministry, but would affect almost all of the ministries and departments of the central government. Although some ministries actually welcomes the prospect of less supervision by the Interior Ministry officials, they attempted to protect themselves from the waves of decentralization by delegating authority to local agencies (deconcentration). Many party politicians were not very enthusiastic about decentralization, either. One reason was that they had long relied upon the cooperation of bureaucrats in elections. More importantly, though, decentralization would reduce the powers of ministers, and thus the vested interests of party politicians. As a result, a compromised form of decentralization was agreed upon in 1994 that was to upgrade about 7000 small administrative wards (tambon) throughout the country to municipal government status. The Tambon Council and Tambon Administrative Authority Law came into force on 1 March 1995. Further decentralization occurred thereafter. Prior to these changes, rural areas other than cities and sanitary districts had been governed by the province as local administrative units. Since rural areas came under the governance of tambon administrative authorities, the provincial governments were reorganized (on 1 November 1997) to preserve themselves. Also, based on the provisions concerning decentralization in the 1997 Constitution, there was a wholesale revision of related laws and regulations on local government.

Sadly, the two references which are quoted then are in Japanese only, so even less accessible than Thai source. The provincial governments mentioned are the PAO, which had overlapping responsibilities with the TAO and therefore needed a thorough revision.

New steps towards decentralization

In the agenda for the latest cabinet meeting on September 7, item 37 sounded interesting. Submitted by the Ministry of Interior, it is titled "ร่างกฎหมายที่เกี่ยวข้องกับการกระจายอำนาจให้แก่องค์กรปกครองส่วนท้องถิ่น รวม ๔ ฉบับ" (Bill about decentralization and local government, issue 4). However the transcript of the cabinet meeting does not contain it, not sure if it was moved to a later meeting, or is simply missing from the transcript.

So far I don't know what are the actual items to be changed with this amendment of the local government laws, as these should be quoted in the cabinet meeting transcript, and the only recent thing in English is a rather general statement, in which the prime minister claims the government's commitment to decentralization: Decentralization of Administrative Power: An Important Factor for Thailand Reform.

What I found however are the decisions on the same bill in June last year, then it was issue 3. These then became part of the amendment 13 of the municipality act, amendment 6 of the TAO act and amendment 12 of the local administration act, all published in the Royal Gazette end of last year. I'll of course keep you updated as soon as I find out details on what is in the discussion this time, hopefully that will be before the amendments are published in the Gazette.

Province level decentralization

In the article "Problems with Decentralization" by Michael H. Nelson (found in the KIP yearbook 2001) I learned about another planned administrative change which wasn't done. The 1997 constitution, which mandated the parliament to decentralize the administration, included the following clause in section 78, point 3

as well as develop into a large-size local government organization a province ready for such purpose, having regard to the will of the province in that province.

Now, I knew the election of provincial governors was discussed in past, but obviously not done, except in the special administrative area of Bangkok. Though the article does not go into the details of what was actually planned - maybe it was never explicitly stated anyway - this in effect would have meant something like a merge of the PAO with the provincial administration by the Ministry of Interior into a single entity, with an elected council and governor. Quite similar to what was done when the special administrative area of Bangkok was created in 1972. This new kind of provincial administration was set to be tested at a few provinces at first, among them Phuket.

Now after reading this, the reference to a special administrative status for Phuket I found earlier makes much more sense. Unlike what is apparently planned for Ko Samui and Mae Sot, the plan for Phuket referred to there was not about special municipalities modeled after Pattaya, but instead a province administration modeled after the special administrative area of Bangkok. But it seems both the rather centralist Thaksin administration as well as the abolish of the 1997 constitution after the 2006 coup have shelved any such plans. The only resurfaced in some of the proposals for solving the insurgency in the deep south.

Pattani autonomy in discussion again

The idea of solving the problem with the insurgency in three southern-most Muslim-dominated provinces by giving the area some kind of autonomy has made it into the main news again this week, after opposition leader Chavalit Yongchaiyudh publicly proposed this approach.

Puea Thai Party chairman Chavalit Yongchaiyudh is proposing the establishment of a special administrative area comprising the three troubled provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat.
The former prime minister said he would put forward the idea at meetings with local leaders during his trip to the far South, which begins tomorrow.
[...]
He was proposing the three provinces form a self-administration area. As in other special administrative areas, legislation would have to be passed to enable it, he said.
Bangkok Post, November 2 2009, Chavalit pushing special zone for South

When this idea was first picked up by a leading politician in January 2008, it was quickly denied. Interestingly in June this year prime Minister Abhisit himself proposed some kind of autonomy without going into any details, but now the idea was brought up by the opposition he has to deny it.

However as usual the articles around this issue fail to deliver to tell what is actualy meant by this "autonomy", which responsibilities of the central administration should be transferred to the newly created body. It somehow seems that since some of the articles call about a "Pattani city" it means something modeled after the central administrative zone Bangkok, where the elected administration has many of the responsibilities otherwise in the hands of the centrally appointed provincial administration. A small quote from another article indicates that Chavalit thinks about more decentralization

On Tuesday, Gen Chavalit defended his "Pattani City" model, saying that all he meant was a form of local government not an independent Pattani state, as it was being interpreted by the government. (Bangkok Post, November 4)

I don't know whether the decentralization of the second half of the 1990s with the creation of the TAO, new tasks for the PAO, upgrade of the sanitary districts to municipalities did fulfill the expectations, but continuing the decentralization at province level only in the deep south does not make sense for me, why shouldn't the other parts of the country not deserve elected province governors or a really powerful provincial parliament instead of the weak PAO.

The central point of the very recommended book Tearing apart the land : Islam and legitimacy in Southern Thailand by Duncan McCargo is that the insurgency is mostly caused by a lack of legitimacy of the administration, so a decentralization may help. But why the previous steps of decentralization did not prevent the violence to erupt after many years of relative peace.

Decentralization problems

Today I noticed an article from The Nation of last week titled 'Irreconcilable' powers holding on a seminar held in Bangkok on August 26. While it has no details on this seminar, the article gives some interesting quotes from participants on the state of decentralization in Thailand.

Overall, the comments collected in the article are quite negative, all having failures in the decentralization of the late 1990s which led to the creation of the Tambon administrative organizations (TAO) and increased powers to the Provincial Administrative organizations (PAO).

According to Nakharin Mektrairat (นครินทร์ เมฆไตรรัตน์)

The existing system had been established on "an old school of thought", which does not correspond with the rapid expansion and development of today's urban communities, he said.

Searching for some more information on Nakharin, I found one of his papers in English in a Japanese symposium transcript. I have only scanned the document so far and have to read in in detail. It's a pity he did not publish much in English.

Another interesting quote is from Prakaipharb Chaum (ประกายภาพ ชะอุ่ม) from the Saen Suk municipality (เทศบาลเมืองแสนสุข) in Chonburi.

[...] said local bodies were linked to national politics through the longstanding patronage system. "Budgets have been allocated to local levels by national politicians through favouritism."

Thailand : a late decentralizing country

Google made me discover an interesting source again - the Thailand office of the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (named after the first chancellor or Germany after World War II) is funding projects on democratization, especially at the local level. There are several interesting seminars - though likely in Thai, and of course a bit far away for me to attend - as well as publications on political topics sponsored by them. Again most of these publication seem to be in Thai only.

But there is one which caught my attention, the 2006 book Thailand: a late decentralizing country by Tanet Charoenmuang (ธเนศวร์ เจริญเมือง) (ISBN 9789747811483). Professor Tanet is working at the Faculty of polical science and public administration of Chiang Mai University. Googeling for his name I can find he has published several interesting articles and books on local administration, however again most in Thai. Among other things, this search also made me find the Informal Northern Thai Group, where he just today gave a talk on "The Administrative Structure of Chiang Mai Province". I am looking forward to see the transcript of that meeting on the website of the INTG.

Back to the book. As there is so few in English on the local government structures, this book would be a great resource. But there are only very few hits on the web for it, and none of the online book sellers has it in its catalog. And if I had seen it in any of the bookstores in Bangkok I probably would have bought it directly. I already tried to contact the KAS, but they only only have one copy for documenting their funding of the project. So, if anyone can help me to obtain a copy I would be grateful.