Auditor-General Pisit Leelavachi-ropas said yesterday that the Office of the Auditor-General will soon forward its investigative report on them to the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) so that criminal proceedings can go ahead.

The Bangkok Light of Happiness project had set up a temporary decorative lighting show for New Year festivities at the cost of Bt39.5 million amid criticism from various sides.

The probe by government auditors has found grounds to believe that the project was mired in corruption and nine officials including Sukhumbhand might have been involved.

The eight other suspects are the director of the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration’s Culture, Sports and Tourism Department, the tourism director of the department, the director of the BMA’s Budget Department and five members of the committee preparing the project’s terms of reference (ToR).

“We will ask the Bangkok city clerk to start disciplinary probes against the officials too,” Pisit said yesterday.

The harshest disciplinary punishment is dismissal.

If convicted of bidding collusion, they will be liable to five years in jail or a maximum fine of Bt400,000.

Pisit said Sukhumbhand had never testified to the Office of the Auditor-General in person, even though it summoned him twice. A deputy governor showed up on the governor’s behalf on both occasions.

The two deputy governors told the auditors that they implemented the project in response to Sukhumbhand’s policy. Pisit said several suspicious points were identified in the project’s implementation.

“The emergency budget was used to fund this project in a questionable manner. In fact, the emergency budget should be spent in the case of emergencies only,” he said.

None of the bidders in the project had experience in lighting installations and all of them prepared business-objective papers to cover lighting service around the time Sukhumbhand introduced the policy to brighten up a corner of Bangkok with colourful lighting.

“None of the bidders, including the winning firm Curio, have a solid profile to claim the project, but their qualifications matched its ToR,” he said.

The NACC will also take action against the companies that were suspected of violating laws in regard to the project, he said.

He refused to coment on whether Sukhumbhand should step down in the wake of this scandal was up to him.

“He’s a senior figure. He definitely doesn’t need my advice,” Pisit said.

“But if the NACC finds him guilty, he will need to stop serving as the Bangkok governor.”