The people's constitution of 1997
1997 "The People's Constitution"
The increasing desire to develop a democratic system of government resulted in political reform, which opened the door to the drafting of a new constitution. The representatives who drafted the Constitution were elected by the people, so this Constitution is popularly called "The People's Constitution," and it was been in effect from 1997 until 2007.
The 1997 Constitution included many other significant principles. It is the first constitution with provisions for the protection of human dignity and religious freedom. It is also the first constitution to stipulate that there be an independent state organization to allocate frequencies for radio, television, and other telecommunication broadcasting.
In addition, the 1997 Constitution dealt with other matters, such as education, the preservation of local wisdom, and the protection of children and the elderly. This is the first constitution that stipulates that the state must provide at least 12 years of quality, basic education, at no charge and countrywide. It is also the first constitution that gives the right to local communities to preserve local art, culture, and wisdom.
The last important point is that the 1997 Constitution gave importance to the setting up of organizations to inspect and provide checks and balances, such as the Election Commission, the Inspectors of State Affairs of Parliament, the National Human Rights Commission, and the National Counter-Corruption Commission. All these organi-zations help to make the selection of people for political work more transparent.
The 1997 Constitution made some significant changes concerning Parliament, particularly the new party list system. The Constitution stipulates that the House of Representatives must have 500 members, 100 of which were to be from the party lists and 400 from constituency elections. As for the Senate, this is the first time that the Thai people have elected the Senate. The Constitution stipulates that 200 senators must be elected, and the provincial districts must represent the constituencies.
Furthermore, the Constitution also stipulated that voting is a duty, and this change has really helped to develop the Thai democratic system. This Constitution was the basis of the election of the senators in the year 2000 and of the general election in 2001. About 70 percent of the people used their right to vote.
The 1997 Constitution's unexpected, and undesirable, consequence was a strong government under an autocratic prime minister, controlling a quiescent cabinet and a majority-holding political party as never before encountered. The governing political party held absolute control in the Parliament to result in the legislative - executive checks and balances mechanism skewed and thrown off balance. In September 2006 a group of top military officers overthrew the caretaker Thaksin administration in a non-violent coup d’etat, repealed the 1997 constitution, and dissolved both houses of parliament. The coup leaders promulgated an interim constitution and appointed Surayud Chulanont as interim Prime Minister. In a national referendum in August 2007, a majority of Thai voters approved a new constitution drafted by an assembly appointed by the coup leaders.
These two points were achieved in their first announcement. Beyond that, they don't seem to have had much planning at all. General Sonthi admitted that subsequent coup announcements were improvised on the fly. The course of events since suggests they had little idea on the follow-through.
The point is, there were two points, not one. The overthrow of Thaksin was only half the goal. The other half was the abolition of the 1997 constitution.
Of course, this second point was technically necessary, since the coup was illegal under the 1997 charter. Section 63 states that nobody can overthrow the democratic regime or acquire power by methods other than those prescribed in the charter. Section 65 gives people the right to resist any such unlawful seizure. But the coup-makers could easily have finessed these provisions by temporarily suspending the 1997 constitution until they had given themselves an amnesty and made a few amendments. Instead, they ripped up the constitution as soon as possible. That is very telling.
The 1997 version was the fourth of Thailand's great reform constitutions. The first in 1932 lasted six months. Those in 1946 and 1974 were both shredded within eighteen months following a military coup. The 1997 charter did much better. It was ripped up just eight days short of the tenth anniversary of its approval in parliament with not a single vote cast against.
Why was this shredding point two on the coup plan? Just recall the massive opposition against the 1997 charter. The military chiefs played a very prominent part in this opposition. They objected specifically to two provisions.
The first was the "right to resist a coup" enshrined in Sections 63 and 65 mentioned above. A prominent general objected strongly to these clauses, and joked that the charter should instead have a clause guaranteeing the military's right to stage coups.
The military's second objection was to Section 40, which declares that "transmission frequencies for radio or television broadcasting and radio telecommunication are national communication resources for public interest", and mandates a commission to MANAGE these resources "to utmost public benefit". This clause threatened to destroy the military's octopus-like control of Thailand's broadcast media. This control delivers a large income, both official and unofficial. It allows the military to put out a constant stream of propaganda on its own importance. It was justified by an argument about "national security" which had lost any meaning since the collapse of any communist threat, internal or external. Hence it was very vulnerable to challenge.
The military chiefs were not the only powerful group that was horrified at provisions in the 1997 charter. The Ministry of Interior was opposed to decentralisation. Bureaucrats in general were irked by the freedom of information law. Police disliked granting rights to suspects. MPs grumbled about the separation of powers that would deny them access to becoming a minister. And so on. Most of all, there was a general conservative horror at a constitution which gave the people such a long list of rights and freedoms (40 clauses) and which introduced some tentative elements of direct democracy, such as the right to introduce a bill or impeach a politician with the backing of enough signatures.
Since the introduction of the 1997 constitution, there has been a massive effort to sandbag its more ambitious clauses. The Ministry of Interior has slowed down decentralisation. The police have simply ignored constraints on their mode of operation. No people's bill has passed through parliament. The Freedom of Information Act delivered only minor triumphs. Most of all, the military fought a brilliant rearguard action against the 1997 constitution's intention to liberalise the broadcast media.
These various campaigns of resistance show the strength of the conservative hatred of the 1997 charter. This hatred explains why its shredding was point two of the coup plan. It also explains why the interim charter gives the coup group an iron grip over the drafting of a new constitution.
Of course, the 1997 constitution is wide open to the criticism that it failed to deliver on the hopes it generated. It opened the way for the expansion of executive power, which Thaksin gleefully exploited. It failed to check corruption and the abuse of power. But those who are arguing that it would be better to reform the 1997 draft rather than starting again are missing the point. The people now in charge want to start again.
Their ideal would be a return to something like the "semi-democracy" of the Prem era in the 1980s. Power restored to the senior ranks of the bureaucracy. A discreet oversight role for the military. Politicians allowed to go through all the democratic motions without much real power. Popular participation through representational bodies under strict bureaucratic MANAGEMENT. And a massive propaganda campaign to persuade everyone that this is "democracy".
But this ideal form is almost certainly unattainable. The massive 1986-96 economic boom has changed Thai society in extraordinary ways. There are many more interests to protect and promote. There are much sharper conflicts raging. The country needs a more complex political system to balance competing interests and resolve cross-cutting conflicts. In recent weeks, the Surayud government has been pole-axed by its growing realisation that this society is no longer MANAGEABLE through bureaucratic paternalism alone.
The old politicians have noticed the government's gloom, and have begun to exert themselves. They will probably be able to influence the constitution that eventually emerges. In that case, we may return to the early 1990s, with some sharing of power between politicians and bureaucrats, though probably with the division better structured than before.
Either way, those aspects which made the 1997 draft deserve its title as the "People's Constitution" will have disappeared, and point two of the plan of September 19 will have been achieved.
The Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand, Buddhist Era 1997 was a constitution of Thailand enacted on 11 October 1997 to replace the 1991 Constitution and was widely hailed as a landmark in Thai democratic constitutional reform. The Constitution was repealed by the Council for Democratic Reform on 19 September 2006 following a successful military coup and was replaced by the 2006 Constitution on 1 October 2006.
The 1997 Constitution was the first constitution to be drafted by popularly-elected Constitutional Drafting Assembly, hence was popularly called the "People's Constitution". The 1997 Constitutio