Justice Minister Paiboon Koomchaya, who was to chair the meeting, said he did not know why Finance Ministry representatives failed to attend.

“I do not know why the ministry did not come. We could not carry on the meeting without a key agency such as the Finance Ministry,” Paiboon said after learning about the absence.

The meeting chairman and other participants waited for almost an hour in a meeting room at the Justice Ministry.

In his capacity as head of the Anti-Corruption Operation Centre (ACOC), Paiboon said yesterday that the next meeting had not yet been scheduled.

He added that the centre would ask the Finance Ministry permanent secretary in writing why his agency did not send representatives to attend yesterday’s meeting, which had been called at the instruction of the Cabinet.

He also said the ACOC was supposed to report to the prime minister at the weekly Cabinet meeting today about the results of the meeting.

“It had been widely known that there would be a meeting. The media also knew about this,” he said.

Paiboon’s attempt to convene the first meeting of relevant agencies was in response to a Cabinet resolution instructing the agencies under the ACOC to jointly investigate cases in connection with the corruption-plagued subsidy programme.

Former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra has been held responsible for Bt35.7 billion, or 20 per cent of the estimated total damages of Bt178 billion, allegedly incurred by the rice-pledging schemeduring her administration. She is also charged with negligence of duty for allegedly failing to stop corruption involved in the scheme.

The Finance Ministry is supposed to issue an administrative order seeking civil damages of Bt35.7 billion from Yingluck, who has strongly opposed the measure. The ex-premier has called on the government to pursue a civil case against her in the Civil Court.

The ACOC is tasked with determining whether other people should be held responsible for the remaining 80 per cent of damages associated with the project.

The agencies that were supposed to attend the meeting were the Public Sector Anti-Corruption Commission, the Office of the Auditor-General, the National Anti-Corruption Commission, the Anti-Money Laundering Office, the Department of Special Investigation, the Finance and Commerce ministries, and the Prime Minister’s Office.