Former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra has petitioned the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) to rapidly conclude its investigation of the three cases brought against her involving her government's rice pledging scheme.
Former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra is seeking justice from the National Anti-Corruption Commission. (Bangkok Post file photo)
The first case involves the investigation of the missing 2.97 million tonnes of rice, now subject to argument between a sub-committee on closing the account of the rice pledging scheme, chaired by then deputy permanent secretary of finance Supa Piyajitti, the Public Warehouse Organisation (PWO), and the Marketing Organisation for Farmers (MOF).
The state-run organisations argued there is no missing rice.
The second point is the evaluation of the deterioration of the quality in the rice stock, as Ms Supha’s sub-committee and the Fiscal Policy Office still hold different comments.
The third point is the calculation of damages caused by the previous government’s rice pledging scheme. The former premier argued that Ms Supha’s sub-committee had applied the wrong criteria, resulting in a difference in the loss projection as high as 172.933 billion baht, according to the petition.
The petition was submitted by Ms Yingluck’s lawyer Norawit Laleang.
He said the three points were the core issues which the NACC had yet to finalise. The graft panel should come to a conclusion on these points. He expected they would conclude the accusations against Ms Yingluck of dereliction of duty in her role as chair of the National Rice Policy Committee were groundless.
She is accused of dereliction of duty by the NACC for allegedly failing to deal with corruption and heavy losses in the rice-pledging scheme.
The NACC ruled by a vote of 7-0 to forward the case to the Senate, recommending the impeachment of Ms Yingluck.
The petition submitted to the NACC on Tuesday also requested the panel to add eight more witnesses to give information to the NACC on the three topics.
They are: Chanutpakorn Wongseenil, PWO director; Prakorb Ratanapakdi, director of MOF’s rice business division in his capacity working on behalf of MOF’s director; Somchai Sajjaphong, director of Fiscal Policy Office; Bajr Anantasilp, a specialist from the Comptroller Generals’ Department and vice chairman of the sub-committee on closing the account of the rice pledging scheme; Sumeth Laomoraporn, chairman of CP Intertrade Co; Ampon Kittiampon, the cabinet’s secretary-general; Thawil Phuengma, chairman of a committee setting the quality and price of rice in the government’s stock; and Pichai Chunhavachira, an independent accountant.
NACC chairman Parnthep Klanarongran said the investigation panel will report the information gathered from four witnesses in this case to the NACC board in order to examine whether there was any aspect left for further investigation based on the principal of total justice.
Regarding the request to add more witnesses to the case, Mr Parnthep said the panel had to consider the significance of new witnesses to the case, not just to delay the investigation.