Citing the white paper submitted to the government, Patai Padungtin, president of Thailand Start-up Association, said the country needed to quickly develop the tech start-up sector with various measures.

The industry believes that once the country has a number of high-value start-ups, with a minimum of three $1 billion-or-more start-ups, it will be able to create an estimated 10,000 positions for high-skill workers.

It said the start-up sector would then have the potential to create revenues of at least Bt8 billion per year plus create value chains in each business worth Bt50 billion in total per year. This will also attract overseas investment worth an annual Bt3 billion, it said.

“For start-ups, it’s a do-or-die time. But the government is trying to push the sector forward quickly to create a new generation of economic warriors. Therefore, we recently submitted a white paper to develop the start-up ecosystem,” said Patai.

According to the proposal, the industry has urged the government to overhaul rules and regulations by amending laws and promoting start-ups with tax benefits and other policies.

For example, the industry believes it’s necessary for Thailand to reduce its capital gains tax to attract more start-up funds since the tax in Singapore and Hong Kong is zero.

It said the government also should offer tax incentives for related start-up businesses with a corporate income tax allowance.

Thai start-ups should also be allowed to issue convertible notes so investors could invest conveniently in these operations.

For investors and personnel, the government should set up committees to vet qualified investors and start-up entrepreneurs so they could be given privileges properly.

The industry said both the convertible debt instrument and the employee stock option should be promoted as tools to develop the sector.

In addition, start-ups should be allowed to do international money transfers via Internet banking like in Hong Kong.

To attract talent, the industry said the government should make it easier to get work permits, while the Securities and Exchange Commission should amend its regulations to promote the option of initial public offerings for tech start-ups.

Tax privileges for start-ups

Due to unfavourable conditions in Thailand, more Thai start-ups do IPOs in overseas markets, such as through the Australian Securities Exchange, than here.

The government should also promote the setting up of matching funds for investment in start-ups, while offering seed money to students at qualified educational institutes to build new start-ups.

There should be tax privileges for related start-up businesses such as co-worker space as well as for businesses that use start-up services.

Thailand should also have a national incubator or accelerator programme to drive start-ups during their initial stage and help them get grants worth Bt300,000-Bt500,0000 for each project.

Last week, the Finance, and Science and Technology ministries jointly announced new incentives for tech start-ups and venture capital funds to invest in the sector.

The move also aims to stimulate investment in the government’s 10 clusters of technology-based businesses, developing the capital market and enhancing the country’s competitiveness. Recently, the government introduced two new laws under Royal decree: the Revenue Code’s tax-exempt issue No 597 and issue No 602. These make technology start-ups and venture-capital business investors exempt from taxation when their ventures are tied to one or more of the government’s 10 clusters of technology-based businesses.

These sectors include automobiles, smart electronics, bio-tech, food and agriculture, and healthcare.

They have the potential to attract investors around the world and will play an important role in driving Thailand’s economy in the future.

At present, the Board of Investment is developing investment-promotion measures that focus on the 10 target industries.

A PETITION will be filed with the Ombudsman’s Office tomorrow, calling for a review of two clauses of the referendum bill arguing that that they deprive people of their rights and freedoms.

The move by the Internet Law Reform Dialogue (iLaw) comes amid increasing political tension, with several legal actions taken against dissidents and other critics of the referendum bill ahead of the August plebiscite.

This followed last month’s enactment of the vaguely written bill, which many people believe could be used as a tool by the powers that be to target all movements deemed critical of the charter draft.

Jon Ungpakorn, iLaw’s director, said the petition concerns clauses two and four of Article 61.

Clause 2 stipulates that anyone distributing false, aggressive, harsh, rude, seditious or threatening messages, pictures or comments through the media in an attempt to influence how people vote or not vote at all will be considered a person who creates conflict.

Clause 4 states that any party of five or more people committing acts as stipulated in Article 61 will face one to 10 years in jails, a fine of between Bt20,000 and Bt200,000, and a ban from voting for 10 years.

Jon said that further details on the move against the bill would be revealed tomorrow.

The petition will call on Sriracha Wongsarayangkul, president of the Ombudsman’s Office, to propose the matter to the Constitutional Court to determine if the clauses violate the interim charter.

Jon said the petition was signed by him, the former chairman of the National Human Rights Commis-sion Niran Pitakwatchara, former senator Kraisak Choonhavan, a number of former Election Commission members and Law Reform Commissioners, as well as a number of representatives from non-governmental organisations and some university lecturers.

Meanwhile, Interior Ministry permanent secretary Kritsada Bunrat said he would instruct provincial governors, kamnan and village heads to give their cooperation to the EC for the referendum.

He said the Cabinet’s April 5 resolution approved the EC’s guidelines for the referendum and sought the cooperation of all ministries, departments and state enterprises to ensure the referendum was carried out with fairness.

He said he had instructed all government officials under the jurisdiction of his ministry – at local, regional and central levels – to cooperate with the EC. They were ordered to help disseminate the content of the charter draft and provide trainers to explain the draft in districts, tambons, and villages.

The officials were also told to support the EC in providing personnel, places to vote and polling booths and check the household registration of eligible voters across the country.

Eligible voters must be notified about the referendum date no less than 15 days before it is held. Those who want to vote outside their constituency must be registered at least 30 days before the referendum date.

Kritsada said officials were instructed not to guide voters to vote for or against the charter but to act in a neutral manner.

He called on the media to disseminate news about the referendum to increase voter awareness about exercising their voting rights.

Government Spokesman Maj-General Sansern Kaewkamnerd said provincial charter trainers would be selected from high-ranking provincial civil servants and trained on May 18-19, before being assigned to educate 8,780 district trainers between May 30 and June 10. He said the district trainers would train 80,491 people between April 11-30, before all 321,964 trainers disseminate the charter to the public from July 1-20.

“Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha insists that the trainers must not create bias in the public about the draft,” he said. “They must also understand the draft thoroughly.”

Constitution Drafting Committee member Chatchai na Chiangmai revealed that the CDC would observe the draft education campaign in 107 villages in 27 provinces, as randomly picked by the National Institute of Development Administration.

The CDC will monitor trainers’ trustworthiness, to ensure they are free from bias, while also monitoring their ability to communicate their assignment clearly in an appropriate time, Chatchai said.

“The government’s prosecution of the draft’s critics could affect the people’s vote decision,” the CDC member said. “The government must be patient and act as a committee, not a rival party, to ensure the referendum is not in vain.”

Its first review in 2011 contained 183 recommendations for Thailand.

Thailand this time could break the record thanks to a “dramatic decline” in the human rights situation, said Sunai Phasuk, senior researcher on Thailand at Human Rights Watch’s Asia division.

“All the international spotlight, whether they are countries or organisations, have been on us since the junta came to power two years ago,” Sunai said. “This consensus never happens [to Thailand] and no lobbyist could arrange such a scene,” he added.

The warning came as the military-led government has been criticised over tough legal actions against political activists, many of them with links to the junta’s critics and enemies.

A Thai delegation, headed by Justice Ministry permanent |secretary Charnchao Chaiyanukij, will have to do their best explaining to the UPR Working Group, but “they need to be aware that there’s also the reality on the ground that may not match their clarifications”, Sunai said.

He suggested that Thailand, which once chaired the UNHRC, should take international concerns seriously if it wanted to maintain a good status among the world’s largest intergovernmental organisation.

According to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Thailand’s situation will be reviewed by the UPR Working Group in Geneva on Wednesday. The Kingdom is going through the review session together with 13 other countries – a process that started last Monday and is slated to conclude on Friday. The review is periodic, Sunai said, “but it happens to be taken at our worst time”.

The UPR Working Group plans to publish recommendations for Thailand on Friday.

The review will be based on three reports, one each from the Thai government, independent human rights experts and other stakeholders such as non-governmental organisations. The reports can be accessed on the OHCHR’s website.

In September, Sunai revealed the HRW submitted its report to the UPR for the review, addressing concerns such as the junta’s oversized power, the suppression of fundamental rights, the arbitrary use of detention, human trafficking, refugee conflicts and slavery in the fisheries industry.

Last month the NGO updated the report, including adding recent charges against eight Facebookusers for violating the Computer Crime Act, and distributed it to the international representatives who will conduct the review.

Although the report cannot be accessed publicly, Sunai said the updated version was basically a summary of the HRW’s statements regarding Thailand since last September.

“Last time in 2011, we were slammed on massive extra-judicial killings, forced disappearances and lese majeste cases,” Sunai said. “And we seem to fail all principles of civil and political rights for this time.”

The Election Commission is expediting the printing of the charter draft summaries and summaries for the document’s additional question to be ready for distribution on May 25.

Suphachai Somcharoen, the EC chairman, said the EC would receive the first batch of the summaries from the contracted printing houses by May 23 before distributing some of them during the official kick-off event to mark the charter distribution to concerned agencies and voters.

He said the EC was supervising public participation countrywide and would instruct its promotion centres at all tambons to help distribute the summaries and disseminate information concerning the charter draft as much as possible.

Supachai assured that the upcoming referendum would run smoothly and encounter no problems as feared.

He urged the public to adhere to the law while the EC would do its best to keep order.

Supachai insists that the EC had been working in line with the new referendum law, especially in regard to Article 7 of the law, which ensured people’s freedom of expressions, and Article 61, which set penalties for violations of the law.

“The EC has not done anything other than what the law has addressed,” Supachai said, in implied reference to the EC’s recent issuance of new announcements that strictly prohibit eight activities during the referendum process deemed violation of the law, especially any provocation or incitement.

“People can surely pursue activities with a good intention and no violation of the law,” he said.

Supachai said he was not worried about anything ahead of the referendum, as the EC had been following and adhering to the law. As an agency, which has to maintain neutrality, the EC is careful when it takes steps, especially in times when people agree and disagree with the charter draft, he added.

The National Reform Steering Assembly, meanwhile, is set to have the first meeting of its representatives and representatives from the National Legislative Assembly who will help the Constitution Drafting Commission and the NLA explain the charter draft and the additional question to people.

Alongkorn Ponlaboot, NRSA vice chairman, said the meeting would be held on Friday to discuss primarily the explanation about the additional question proposed by the NLA.

Last week, the three assemblies met and decided to have at least 167 members from the NRSA and the NLA explain the charter.

CDC chairman Meechai Ruchupan had said the 167 members would act as volunteers to help the CDC explain the charter’s difficult legal terms “in layman’s language”.

Meechai believed they would help the CDC’s work considerably as they were familiar with the areas of their responsibilities and had good knowledge about the constitution. Voters will get sufficient information before making their decision, he said.

The NRSA has submitted an initial list of 42 NRSA members who will serve as volunteers, and will recruit more before they receive a major training course on May 18-19. They will then be dispatched around the country.

“We will stick to the EC’s regulation not to speak about anything beyond what’s needed. That there will be no leading explanations from us as we respect people’s opinions and decisions,” said Alongkorn.

Seri Suwanpanon, NRSA political reform committee chairman, suggested the government take a soft approach when dealing with people during the upcoming referendum, citing a group of academics who petitioned the UN over wanting an assurance of freedom of expressions ahead of the referendum vote.

He said at this point it could not be predicted whether the referendum would be affected by political activities, but it was better not to fuel confrontations with harsh measures.

His committee, he said, was working on the details of the EC’s regulations as some of them were still interpreted differently, and he feared that different regional dialogues could further confuse the situation and cause problems unnecessary.

He called on the EC to take that point into consideration when its regulations were applied in different regions.

The details of what the woman, Patnaree Chankij, is alleged to have done have not been disclosed but her lawyer Arnon Nampha said she was told by police yesterday after responding to an arrest warrant issued against her by the military court that she faced a charge related to that section.

As of 6pm, the lawyer was working on a bail of Bt500,000 for her temporary release, but was not confirmed by the police.

“We had no idea what they would say about the bail,” said the lawyer, during the time reported.

Lt-Colonel Sanpetch Nuthong, an investigator specialist from the Technology Crime Suppression Division, went to ask the military court yesterday for an arrest warrant against Patnaree, accusing her of jointly committing a wrongdoing against the section.

The court reportedly considered the evidence submitted to it by the police and then issued the warrant against her.

Sirawith posted on his Facebook after learning about his mother’s arrest that he was worried about her the most while she was meeting with the police at the TCSD. His mother, he said, was not used to politics and hardly talked or discussed politics with anyone. She would not have been interested in politics at all if he had not engaged in political moves.

“My mom often says we are only the grass roots people, so that’s what we are and what we would do with lives, that’s,” said Sirawith on his Facebook, while being away on a cultural trip in Cambodia.

“It’s shocking, and I feel pity for her,” he said.

Sirawith is among one of the most active student activists at present, as he regularly challenges the military after the coup took place. Sirawith has faced some charges from the police including violation of the National Council for Peace and Order’s prohibition on participation in politics after detention.

Sirawith in 2014 had joined the politically symbolic expressions including the so-called “sandwich party” and then the “[Dearing] Stolen Election” in 2015.

He then was charged again after a trip to Rajabhakti Park in Prachuab Khiri Khan province this year to investigate the claimed corruption scandal.

People are simply expressing their opinions towards the draft, he said.

The powers that be should instead be concerned about a low voter turnout for the referendum, as people tended not to cast ballots when suppressed, the veteran politician said in a Facebookmessage yesterday.

Chaturon, formerly an education minister, also questioned why opposition groups were banned as people would be able to voice their opinions for or against the draft as guaranteed by Article 7 of the referendum bill.

People were tending to pay more attention to the draft and it was unlikely they were focused on the next general election, he said, as they were sick of the junta’s promise that it would take five years to resolve the country’s turmoil.

Chaturon called on the Election Commission to clarify whether some orders issued by the National Council for Peace and Order would still be enforceable if the charter draft were voted in as they violated the charter.

The EC should also suggest what people could do rather than warning them, he said.

Chaturon’s remarks came after EC member Somchai Srisuthiyakorn warned the person(s) behind a fan page on Facebook, which sold T-shirts, on Wednesday that doing so could convince people to vote a certain way in the referendum in violation of section 61 of the referendum – a crime that carries a maximum 10-year jail term.

Somchai said although the T-shirts were sold prior to the referendum bill being enacted, those behind it could be charged if a complaint against the page was lodged.

Meanwhile National Legislative Assembly vice president Surachai Liengboonlertchai is confident that no opposition groups will disturb its field trips to clarify the additional question in the referendum.

He said the NLA and the Constitutional Drafting Commission had prepared the field trips.

He said the CDC had allocated its nine groups to hold events to educate the public nationwide about the draft and the NLA would follow with its nine groups to clarify the extra question.

It would also allocate one member per province to clarify the question at district level. He said the NLA would require less time than the CDC at the talks, as the charter draft had more key points. Question and answer sessions would conclude each event, he said.

Surachai is confident people will understand that the NLA and the CDC will only try to inform people of the facts and not try to convince them how to vote. “At the end of the day, it depends on the people’s decision. We want them to independently decide,” he said.