Court orders NACC to disclose details of probe into Prawit’s luxury watches
The Supreme Administrative Court on Friday ordered the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) to disclose details of its findings from the investigation into the more than 20 luxury wristwatches that Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan claimed to have borrowed from his wealthy friend.
Anti-corruption activist Veera Somkwamkid requested the details and won a decision from the official information disclosure committee on social matters for the requested information to be released under the Official Information Act.
The court ruled that the NACC office and its commissioners have to disclose the requested information to Veera within 15 days of the verdict or they would be deemed to have violated the law.
While serving as deputy prime minister and defence minister in the post-coup junta-led government of General Prayut Chan-o-cha, General Prawit was accused of failing to include the luxury watches in his financial report filed with the NACC.
Prawit reportedly was spotted wearing more than 20 expensive watches since the junta came to power in May 2014, many of them valued at millions of baht. He claimed that all of the watches belonged to his deceased friend, identified as Patthawat Suksriwong, and he had returned them all to his family.
In December 2018, the NACC decided by a majority vote that Prawit had no intention of making a false assets declaration by omitting the 22 luxury watches he had been seen wearing.
Meanwhile, the Democrat Party on Friday disputed Prawit’s claims in his recent Facebook post about uncertainties regarding the formation of the current coalition government.
In his ninth open letter released in the run-up to the May 14 general election, the leader of the ruling Palang Pracharath Party wrote: “[Democrat] Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva announced that he would not allow General Prayut Chan-o-cha to be prime minister again. But when the coalition government was being formed, the Democrat Party joined under a new leader. They let Abhisit resign and cited a lot of benefits for the public [from the Democrats’ participation in the coalition government].”
Deputy Democrat leader Ongart Klampaiboon said on Friday that Prawit’s remarks about his party were “inaccurate”.
He clarified that Abhisit had stepped down as the Democrat leader immediately after learning about the election results. His successor and the current party leader, Jurin Laksanawisit, took over from Abhisit two months later, Ongart added.
Almost three months after that, the party’s new executive board resolved to take part in a coalition government headed by General Prayut, the veteran politician noted.
“It’s not that the new party leader told Abhisit to resign so that the Democrats could join the coalition government,” Ongart said. “The Democrat Party hopes that General Prawit has a better understanding of the context regarding our participation in the coalition government in 2019.”
