Wider World by CS

Things I learned from the Pracha censure

Tulsathit Taptim
tulsathit@nationgroup.com November 30, 2011 3:05 am

Sunday morning is for world boxing championship fights only.

• It's a bad time (for the opposition) to launch a censure debate. On the other hand, since the government can benefit from hangovers, shopping activities and people's simple need to relax, we will see more and more Sunday censures in the future.
• When you were resigned to the inescapability of a Sunday censure and started to think "How bad can it be?", you found out that our honourable law-makers couldn't agree on whether the Flood Relief Operations Command, set up by the prime minister and manned by government officials, is even a government unit.
• If you are a censured minister, you must act bored and patronise your attackers. Pracha Promnok showed us he is getting close to perfecting the art.
• Pracha's best self-defence move, however, was when he said that human beings make mistakes. For a moment there, he seemed like a breath of fresh air.
• Pracha's worst defence was his claim that the previous government also overspent money on relief supplies. So much for a breath of fresh air.
• While we struggled to come to terms with what our honourable MPs were saying sometimes, the sign-language team (bottom right of TV screen) never seemed to have a problem. Without the briefest of pauses, they kept on and on no matter how complicated the issues or arguments.
• Many MPs protest for protest's sake.
• It's time we told the MP-protesters that their acts are unwise. It draws unnecessary media/public attention to an otherwise boring debate that the audience is yawning at.
• You don't miss the water till the well runs dry. A bad metaphor, given the circumstances, I know, but Chai Chidchob, please come back.
• Social media are big, shameless spoilers. Ninety-nine per cent of clips and photos shown by the opposition had been put on "walls", tweeted, shared, liked and YouTubed a million times. (And with the most politically incorrect comments or feedback for extreme entertainment as well.)
• Many speakers on the House floor apparently assume that the audience is stupid.
• The opposition's best moment: Jurin Laksanavisit asking Pracha if he was justice minister for all of Thailand or for just one man.
• The government's best moment: Nothing inspirational. But strategically speaking, government MP-protesters did well in making viewers ask themselves, "What in the name of God am I doing here?"
• The opposition's worst moment: One Democrat - I can't remember who - must have been thinking he was unleashing a sharp blow when he said that political interests were dictating how the floodwaters flowed. (I heard "Oh Yeah?" even before the government side actually said it.)
• The government's worst moment: Pracha showing a photo of Democrat leader Abhisit Vejjajiva distributing relief bags bearing the name of the Energy Ministry was not just a low blow, but also a foolish low blow. (Did he mean to say that all relief supplies should to be distributed by pro-government politicians and that flood victims had to wait until MPs were ready and came their way?)
• Pracha must have had bad advisers, or, worse still, those "advisers" must have hated him. When the debate was drawing to a close, he displayed meaningless video clips of ex-prime minister Abhisit attentively taking part in water management planning, and comparative graphics meant to raise the question why Abhisit did not care about dam waters this year. We could almost hear the Democrats whooping with joy at this point. If you missed it, Pracha suggested that Abhisit let the dams swell as soon as he dissolved the House, knowing he was going to lose the election, and counted on overflowing dams and big storms that he (Abhisit) knew were coming, to take out his enemies.
• Chuwit Kamolvisit, who happened to be caught often on camera, half-naked in flood waters, helping the victims, doesn't like what he calls "flood politics".
• Like a mean dog, Chalerm Yoobamrung can be hated by all the neighbours, for all his master cares.
• According to Pracha, Bangkok would have been two metres under water but for Pheu Thai's Karun Hosakul and Surachat Thienthong. Take that, all you Karun-haters out there.
• Soldiers, the heroes in this flood crisis, are part of the government, too. Exactly why Pracha tried to stress this point, I'm not quite sure.
• Whether you are red, yellow, multi-coloured or neutral, if you felt proud of Thai politics after watching the debate, and want your kids to become politicians, then we weren't watching the same debate.
• The most ignored, useless, desperate statement, repeated by those guys who took turns chairing Sunday's House session: "We are on TV, people."