Among the reforms the National Reform Council (NRC) is expected to design is a new election system that will help Thailand mitigate the influence of vote-buying.
I've heard many ideas bandied about, but the direct elections of the prime minster and cabinet, in particular, is an option that is receiving much attention. The NRC is also looking into redefining the Constitutional Court's scope of authority and may even propose a reduced term limit, from nine years down to six, to prevent judges from becoming entrenched.
The much-maligned Election Commission (EC) is also getting a makeover, and may find its powers to ban politicians from the electoral process being transferred to the courts.
The details of these proposals by the NRC have yet to be set in stone, so we shall have to wait until the fog of reform subsides before things become clearer. However, in my humble opinion, I hope the NRC and the junta don't end up with a knee-jerk reform plan. If this is to be Thailand's Great Reformation then it must be done with the public interest in mind and not merely serve as an elaborate plan to prevent Thaksin Shinawatra from weaseling back into power. Therefore, an emphasis on implementing a "Thaksin-proof" constitution will not only be futile, but it will be doing our country a huge disservice.
What the NRC should do is set itself a much larger goal of designing a system where each institution within the state knows exactly what its job description is and the parameters within which it has to function.
This is the key to uncovering the mother lode of Thailand's problems. After all, if our institutions had functioned properly even under the last few constitutions, I believe we would not be the "sick man of Asean" we are today.
For example, if the Constitutional Court had in 2001 upheld a previous ruling in the infamous Thaksin asset concealment case, instead of voting 8 to 7 to acquit him, we most probably would not have seen Thaksin dominate Thai politics thereafter.
This was a case that defied reason. Hundreds of millions of baht worth of undeclared assets concealed in the names of maids and drivers, and eight judges believed this could have been done unintentionally. So to all those Thaksin haters, including the PAD and the PDRC, look no further for someone to share the blame for the rise of Thaksin.
The EC is another body that needs to be reformed. I'm sorry, but there have been recent elections in Afghanistan better organised than the ones we witnessed under the EC. The EC is even worse at conflict resolution, which it attempted during the PDRC protests to no avail — a role it had no lawful justification to be involved with in the first place.
Political parties and parliament in general, even under the 1997 People's Constitution, saw Thailand elect hundreds of representatives who turned out to be staunch defenders of the rich and powerful, lining their own pockets, instead of dedicating themselves to promoting the interests of the people that put them in office.
Thai politicians have been a despicable embarrassment to the concept of representative democracy. On this I think most Thais will agree. But to reform politicians we must make sure the way political parties field candidates is also drastically revised. Otherwise it will be the same story all over again, where only big financial donors and those with the deepest pockets are chosen to run for public office.
Therefore, it's high time that political party reform should also include a serious independent review of how parties are funded and an in-depth study of how the influence of money can be eliminated from our political process altogether.
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) is an organisation that has been a huge letdown for failing to defending freedom of expression. The NHRC also seems unperturbed that The Human Rights Watch website to this day is still blocked by the junta.
Unfortunately, nearly all our institutions consistently abdicate their responsibilities.
The NRC must find a remedy for this deeply damaging affliction. Because what is the point of having a Constitutional Court that refuses to uphold constitutional law? What is the use of having representatives in parliament who don't represent the interests of the electorate? And what does the public gain from a National Human Rights Commission that doesn't care about human rights?
Songkran Grachangnetara is an entrepreneur. He graduated from The London School of Economics and Columbia University. He can be reached at Twitter: @SongkranTalk