The blame game

The Bangkok Post
By Veera Prateepchaikul

The Surayud government did not sign a document officially pledging support for Cambodia's temple listing bid. In any case, there is no law which states that the Samak government must follow all decisions made by its predecessors.
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Veera Prateepchaikul is Deputy Editor-in-Chief, Post Publishing Co Ltd.

My sympathies are with Surayud Chulanont, the privy councillor.

The retired general should have been left to live a quiet and peaceful life after spending almost two years as a lame duck prime minister in the military-installed government. Suddenly out of the blue, he is rudely dragged into today's hottest political controversy, the Preah Vihear temple issue, thanks to Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama.

The embattled foreign minister told the Constitution Court on Friday that it was the Surayud government which committed itself to support Cambodia's bid to list the ancient ruins as a World Heritage site during a meeting of the World Heritage Committee held in Christchurch, New Zealand last year.

In other words, Mr Noppadon has blamed the Surayud administration for the blunder by the government of Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej for its signing of the joint communique with the Cambodian government pledging Thailand's "active support" for Cambodia's unilateral bid to inscribe the temple as a World Heritage site.

What a surprise! The Samak government has followed in the footsteps of the Surayud government which it has held in contempt for being a puppet of the military dictatorship.

Is the Surayud government now a convenient scapegoat? And will that mean Mr Noppadon and the Samak government will not be held accountable if Thailand is put at a disadvantage or its territorial sovereignty is in the future put at risk should Cambodia succeed in its listing effort?

But wait. Even if the Surayud government actually committed itself to supporting Cambodia's listing bid, the incumbent government cannot escape blame. There is no law which states that the Samak government must follow all decisions made by its predecessors.

And, in this particular case, the Surayud government did not sign a document officially pledging support for Cambodia's temple listing bid.

The Samak government is completely free and fully authorised to make its own decisions. After all, no one put a gun to the head of Mr Noppadon and forced him to sign the joint communique.

So if the government had the best interests of the country in mind, it should have made the right decision and not put itself in hot water.

Finger-pointing now will not improve the situation, but will only further cast the government in a bad light. What the government needs to do is to accept the mistake in stride and to try to rectify it to mitigate the negative consequences which could arise in the future.

Asking the World Heritage Committee to postpone consideration of the temple, as the government plans to do, is moving in the right direction, although the Cambodian side must be given a clear explanation of the government's sudden about-face.

As far as Cambodia is concerned, it is determined to go ahead with the application to list the Preah Vihear temple even without Thailand's support. Which should not be surprising. After all, the temple issue has been politicised by all parties in Cambodia, especially Prime Minister Hun Sen's party, in the runup to the July 27 election.

Given the national sensitivity over the temple issue both in Thailand and Cambodia, and the potential that dangerous nationalist sentiments can be fuelled by provocateurs for political gain, it would be wise and reasonable for the World Heritage Committee to put on hold Cambodia's bid to list the temple until the next meeting.

The temple issue has been politicised more than enough in this country to the extent that the good neighbourly relations between Thailand and Cambodia are now at stake.

Likewise, I hope that Cambodian politicians will not whip up anti-Thai sentiment after the July 27 election if the World Heritage Committee does not rule in its favour. For this will not help improve the strained relations either. It's time for cool heads from both sides of the border.