Yuwadee – known among reporters as ‘Jae Yu’ (‘Older Sister’) – succumbed to internal bleeding, which deprived her of oxygen to the brain and her kidneys failed.

The veteran news lady was admitted to the intensive care unit at Phramongkutklao Hospital last Friday, after falling ill. A reporter in the field for almost 50 years, she was 71.

Yuwadee’s funeral will be held from tomorrow till March 17 at Soamanas Temple, with a royal-sponsored cremation to take place on March 19. She is survived by her husband, General Sirichai Tunyasiri, a former permanent secretary to the Defence Ministry, and their son.

Deputy Prime Minister Wissanu Krea-ngam, who was secretary-general of Cabinet for several governments, said he was helped by Yuwadee when he was appointed deputy premier in the Thaksin and Prayut governments. Yuwadee was a bridge linking governments and junior reporters, he said, helping communications and making both sides understand each other better.

Deputy Premier Prawit Wongsuwan said: “I want to offer my condolences |to her family. It’s a great pity to lose her. She contributed so much to the |country.”

Journalists and veterans of various generations also expressed their grief.

“A sharp tongue with kind heart,” is how Khao Sod’s senior journalist Sumontha Boonkhum described her.

“She was always on the front whenever there was an issue at Government House. She might also be loud and straightforward, a bit scary to young journalists. But she never had ill-intentions to anyone,” Sumontha said of Yuwadee.

Her colleague on the political beat and editor-turned-charter-drafter Pattara Khumphitak said: “She was living proof that honest work can give one obvious honour. Not all seniors are generous and respectful to other workers regardless of their ages, but she was.”

Yuwadee left a legacy as a straightforward journalist who constantly |questioned officials and ministers from more than 20 governments she saw through her career.

Her reporting career started in 1968 at the then-Bangkok World newspaper, which offered her a permanent job after she left Thammasat University. The publication was later purchased by the Bangkok Post, where she served as a field reporter until her retirement.

“The journalists’ image wasn’t so good back then, I have to say. I often got asked: ‘Are you going to be one of those journalists, sitting on stairs?’” she said in an interview last year with the Thai Journalists Association |(TJA). “Adventure loving as I was, |I gave it a go.”

A journalist’s life back then was not easy, Yuwadee often said. With no portable telephone or computer, she made dozens of trips between reporting assignments and her office to type the news on paper. Conditions improved with successive, more democratic governments and a pressroom, nicknamed “Sparrows’ nest”, was built to facilitate journalists including Yuwadee.

From the “Sparrows’ nest”, which has now expanded to three, she observed one coup after another. The latest was in 2014 by junta head General Prayut Chan-o-cha, who also became premier.

It was also during Prayut’s ruling that Yuwadee was, for the first time, banned from entering Government House last November, given to her lack of affiliation. Since then, she had used the TJA office as an alternate workplace.

“It’s a pity that journalists nowadays tend to do less investigative reports and more routine ones,” she said in a later interview. “The main tasks of journalists are to report facts and scrutinise what can go wrong.”