Senate picks turn farcical

The nepotism and cronyism involved in the appointment of 250 senators have already eroded the public's trust in the neutrality of the Upper House. But the latest revelation that six of the 10 all-male senator selection committee ended up being senators themselves makes a mockery of the entire process.

The National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) appointed the committee last December. But it never revealed who was on the panel, making the selections a highly secretive process.

According to Deputy Prime Minister Wissanu Krea-ngam who revealed the names of the committee members to the public on Wednesday, the panel was later reduced to nine members because one of them, former National Legislative Assembly president, Pornpetch Wichitcholchai, quit. Mr Pornpetch is now the Senate speaker.

Under the 2017 constitution, three groups of senators are to serve in a five-year transition period. The first comprises 194 members selected by the NCPO from a shortlist proposed by this committee. The second consists of 50 senators chosen by the NCPO from a list of 200 people picked by professional groups. The remaining six seats are reserved for the three armed forces leaders, the supreme commander, the defence permanent secretary and the national police chief.

When the list of senators was revealed last month, many were perplexed not only because most member are allies and family of members of the NCPO and the military government, but also because 104 of them are from the military and the police force. That already made the Senate a chamber of NCPO representatives.

But few of them would have thought that the committee members would be picked for the jobs they were recruiting for. This kind of hiring process would never be tolerated by anyone in either the corporate or public sectors. But it was sanctioned by the NCPO.

Mr Wissanu clarified that the six men did not pick themselves for their roles, but their peers in the committee did it for them. This in itself speaks volumes about the cronyism that started right at the beginning of the process.

It demonstrates clearly that the selections were entrenched in conflicts of interest, something that the regime vowed to eliminate from politics after it staged the 2014 coup. The man who should face the most questions over the conflicts of interest in the process is NCPO leader Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha, who is a direct beneficiary of the senators' vote in parliament for him to become premier.

The selection now risks being challenged in the Constitutional Court. Pheu Thai MP Chousak Sirinil has questioned whether the committee appointments were constitutional, given that the charter requires the members to consist of people with diverse expertise who have demonstrated political neutrality. All nine of them are either members of the NCPO or the military government.

The senator selection stands as a reminder of how this and the electoral processes have been manipulated and rigged to ensure the military regime prolongs its stay in power in both the Senate and the government. For instance, the Election Commission has made many decisions that helped secure victory for political parties that support Gen Prayut. These include the controversial allocation of party-list seats to small political parties.

We will soon have an "elected government" up and running. But we should not kid ourselves that the Senate and the government are the products of a democratic and transparent processes. They are not.