AS MANY holidaymakers started their journeys to hometowns along congested highways across the country yesterday, Interior Minister Anupong Paochinda presided over the launch of a road-safety centre in Bangkok that aims to solve traffic problems and prevent road fatalities during the New Year holiday period.

Anupong instructed the centre, operating under the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department, to intensify operations in collaboration with related agencies, the general public and the private sector under the government’s Pracharat, or “state of the people”, model that aims to reduce factors contributing to road accidents from yesterday to Wednesday.

He urged local administrative organisations to repair roadways that are known to be accident-prone. Officials were also told to ensure public transport buses and vans were safe.

Provinces and local agencies were told to strictly enforce traffic laws, set up road checkpoints to arrest drunk drivers and speeding motorists, and arrange pit stops for drivers on long trips, he said.

Provinces with water attractions or with rivers or canals were to ensure safety at piers and in public transport boats, he added.

The New Year 2016 holiday period saw 3,379 road accidents that killed 380 people and injured 3,505, compared to the previous period’s 2,997 accidents with 341 deaths and 3,117 injuries. The main causes of accidents were drunk driving (26 per cent) and speeding (17 per cent).

During the New Year 2016 holiday period, Chiang Mai province had the most accidents and the highest number of injuries while Nakhon Ratchasima saw the most deaths.

A 20-kilometre-long stretch of highway in Khao Chong Tako in Sa Kaew’s Ta Phraya district was congested from about 1am to 4am yesterday, as people travelled to the lower Northeast region. Police, the Army and local administrators set up checkpoints and pit stops along the route.

A similar traffic jam was expected throughout the day, with officers dispatched to aid the flow of traffic and to warn motorists to follow traffic laws.

Similar conditions were reported on Mitraparp Highway in Nakhon Ratchasima province, known as a gateway to Northeast. A special lane was added to a 20km-long section of the highway from Sara Buri’s Khaeng Khoi district to Nakhon Ratchasima’s Pak Chong district and another at a 7km-long section in Muang Nakhon Ratchasima. Highway No 304 in Prachin Buri’s Kabin Buri district was also congested.

For those travelling by car or bus to hometowns in the North, the Asia Highway in Phichit province has had a high volume of vehicles.

Meanwhile, city police chief Lt-General Sanit Mahathaworn asked for cooperation from truck associations not to operate on Bangkok roads today and Tuesday to allow smoother traffic flows for holidaymakers, said acting deputy chief Maj-General Jirapat Bhumijit.

He asked people who spotted trucks on Bangkok roads on those two days to alert police by the hotline number 1197 so police could notify truck associations. The Highway Police may ask for a similar cooperation nationwide, he added.

In Pathum Thani’s Sam Khok district, vocational students are providing a free car and motorbike repair and maintenance service to holidaymakers until Wednesday at the Cosmo Oil gas station on Kanchanapisek 9 western ring road heading towards Ayutthaya’s Bang Pa-in district.

Pathum Thani Technical College director Kwanchai Panichakan said students wearing orange vests would also provide free services at pit stops on the highway in the province.

In a related development, Immigration Police chief Lt-General Natthorn Phrosunthorn and Don Mueang Airport director Phet Chan-charoen presided over a ceremony at the airport yesterday to dispatch officers to accommodate and to provide security to tourists during the holiday period.

The NLA took just one hour to pass the bill in three consecutive readings with a final vote of 182, and 6 abstentions.

In essence, the amendment revises the current Act by giving the monarch discretion to select the candidate for the country’s top ecclesiastical post.

Pol General Pichit Khuande-chakupt, chair of the NLA committee on religions, arts, culture and tourism, proposed the change to the 1992 Sangha Act on the grounds that the country should return to its traditions.

The meeting chaired by NLA president Pornpetch Wichitcholchai started at 10.40am. PM’s Office Minister Ormsin Chivapruck, who oversees the National Buddhism Office, also attended the meeting.

The move could provoke protests by the monkhood as Phra Methee Dhamma-chan warned that Buddhist organisations across Thailand would stage protests if the NLA went ahead with the change to the law.

Facebook has not admitted a mistake or that the alert was made in error, but it turned off its Safety Check feature after it became clear that the bomb alert was inaccurate.

The check-in feature allows users to signal to friends that they are safe after a life-threatening event in their area, such as a terror attack or natural disaster.

On Tuesday night, many hours after the incident at Government House, the crisis notification tool created an alert called “The Explosion in Bangkok”, which stated that a blast in the capital had been confirmed by “multiple sources”.

In the genuine incident in the morning, a protester climbed on to the rooftop of a post office inside the Government House compound and threw five non-lethal, “ping-pong” firecracker bombs to draw the attention of authorities.

In its statement issued yesterday, Facebook said the alert was activated on the basis of confirmation by third-party sources, citing several English-language news outlets based in Thailand.

“As with all Safety Check activations, Facebook relies on a trusted third party to first confirm the incident and then on the community to use the tool and share with friends and family,” the statement said.

The social-media network’s alarm caused many people to confirm their safety before Facebook realised the error and deactivated the feature.

“The Safety Check for this crisis has been turned off,” Facebook wrote on its Safety Check page regarding the false bomb alert in Bangkok.

The incident caused speculation in the Thai-language online community that there had been a false alarm but Facebook did not specifically refer to a “false” alert in its statement.

Facebook first launched its crisis notification tool in October 2014. The first time the tool was activated for an event other than a natural disaster was during the Paris terrorist attacks in November 2015.

Last month, the social-media company announced that Safety Check would be activated by the community instead of by Facebook so that more people could use the tool when they felt they needed it. This allows Safety Check to be used by more people regardless of the nature or severity of the incident.

“With every activation, we are continuing to learn how to make Safety Check better for communities in need and continue listening to feedback to make the tool more useful and relevant in future,” Facebook said.Meanwhile, police are attempting to determine whether the false bomb alert was caused by an innocent error in Facebook’s notification system or an intentional act by an individual, Royal Thai Police deputy spokesman Pol Colonel Krissana Pattanacharoen said yesterday.

He said causing public panic was a violation under the Computer Crime Act and offenders risked a maximum jail term of five years or a fine of up to Bt500,000.

According to police, Chatchawal Sriruang, 37, and Sakda Jitdamri, 38, along with another male accomplice still at large, raided the victim’s room on Saturday night, claiming to be police officers.

They allegedly accused her of a drugs offence before demanding Bt100,000 to let her go free.

The woman said she gave them Bt7,500 in cash and promised to pay the rest later. When they allegedly kept harassing her by phone, she filed a police complaint.

Officers from the Metropolitan Police Bureau 5 Investigation Division then staged a sting operation in which the woman lured the suspects with a promise to pay them Bt10,000. The pair were arrested in front of an apartment building in Soi Sukhumvit 22 late on Tuesday night.

A search at the suspects’ apartment in Soi Sukhumvit 16 found 45 Valium pills and 10 alprazolam pills, which the pair claimed to belong to a friend, police said. Chatchawal tested positive for drugs.

The arrested men reportedly have served as police informants in the South.

Srisuwan Janya, secretary-general of the Association for the Protection of the Thai Constitution, handed the petition to the NACC following a report that Preecha owned a large, unnumbered house in Phitsanulok that remains undeclared. Preecha reasoned that construction of the house had not yet been completed.

Srisuwan said that the house should have been included in Preecha’s declaration to the NACC by October 30, a month after his retirement from the Defence Ministry, as designated in the 1999 Counter Corruption Act.

He also doubted whether the younger brother of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha should have unusual wealth, noting that the Phitsanulok house looked rather elegant despite Preecha being a retired military officer who would have received a salary of around Bt10 million throughout his service.

If Preecha was found to have failed to declare his assets, the NACC should file the case to the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Political Office Holders for further prosecution, he said. The NACC could also temporarily confiscate the retired general’s assets while waiting for the court’s ruling, he added.

The petition was received by the NACC’s deputy secretary general Yongyuth Malithong, who said that the commission would need to investigate first before ordering any seizure.

Preecha had responded to the previous report on Tuesday, explaining that he planned to declare the house to the NACC a year after his retirement, the third phase of asset declaration as designated by law, and had no intention of concealing it from the NACC.

The house, meant to be Preecha’s family abode, has just been given its number this month and was located on one-and-a-half-rai plot, not five rai as earlier reported, he said.

The land was purchased in 2011 and the house construction started three years later. It was now 90 per complete, he added.

Preecha further explained that the house was bought from his savings and inheritance money, and was not at all extravagant. “There are just empty rooms like those in normal houses,” the National Legislative Assembly member said. “I also live like an ordinary person, like going to the market and doing household chores by myself.

Referring to a series of controversies on alleged nepotism his family has faced, Preecha added: “This kind of scandal makes me sick. I don’t understand why they have to dig things out from my sons, my wife, and now my house.”

Both he and Prayut refused to comment on each other’s issues.

Boonsong and Bhumi are facing civil lawsuits and a Commerce Ministry order to pay Bt1.77 billion and Bt2.3 billion in compensation for damage to the state.

The two men were accused of being behind fake government-to-government rice sales while the Yingluck government was implementing its rice-pledging scheme, which resulted in over Bt500 billion in losses to the state.

Boonsong and Bhumi petitioned the court to temporarily stay the asset confiscation on the grounds that they would be injured suffer if the authorities hastily proceeded with the order and the auctioning off of the assets to gain the funds for compensation.

The Commerce Ministry’s representative also attended the court’s hearing yesterday to clarify the ministry’s legal position on this case.

The seven-judge panel will hear both sides before deciding whether to issue the injunction to protect the interests of the defendants while the court considers the defendants’ petition against the asset confiscation order.

According to the civil code, the Legal Execution Department will be responsible for enforcing the Commerce Ministry’s order.

Besides Boonsong and Bhumi, other former Commerce Ministry officials are facing massive lawsuits seeking Bt40 billion to cover damages caused by the phoney rice contracts.

Bogus G2G rice deals with Chinese state enterprises were announced while the Yingluck government was implementing the rice-mortgaging scheme to give the public the impression that China would buy a large quantity of Thai rice while the previous government purchased an unlimited volume of rice from farmers under the controversial scheme.

Former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra also faces a similar civil lawsuit.

The Commerce Ministry yesterday lodged an objection with the court to Boonsong’s and Bhumi’s requests for the injunction.

Boonsong, who attended the hearing, said that if the court issued the injunction, the government would have to suspend its asset confiscation action until the court makes its final ruling on the validity of the legal move against him.

Phetchabun national park road proposal put on hold

The board, chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan, considered the proposal in which the department aimed to expand the road cutting through 40 kilometres of the national park.

The No 12 road is part of a regional route linking Tak’s Mae Sot on the Myanmar border in the West to the edge of the Northeast province Mukdahan, which borders Laos.

The environmental impact assessment (EIA) for the proposal was passed by an expert committee and tabled for the board’s consideration yesterday.

Environmentalists have cried foul, however, saying the section cutting through the park was densely populated by wildlife, including wild elephants, and that there were salt licks used by the animals in a 2km radius.

The activists, including members of the Seub Nakhasathien Foundation, issued a statement opposing the proposal and calling on the board to put it on hold.

They also said that the route was not economical as claimed because of the steep mountainous landscape of the section.

Also, they said the EIA did not disclose details to the public and thus precluded environmental governance. The proposal also went against the previous Cabinet’s resolution to not expand the section, but instead reduce vehicle speed to mitigate impacts at the site, critics said.

A source close to the issue said the board heeded the warnings and had instructed the concerned agency to review the proposal and find other feasible options.

The next meeting is yet to be scheduled.

Road expansion and construction in pristine forests has long been one of the country’s environmental management challenges. Several projects in the past have posted environmental threats to the forest, prompting debate about the costs and benefits of the projects.

THE NATIONAL Legislative Assembly (NLA) is expected to pass an amendment to the Sangha Act at its meeting today, returning power to appoint the Supreme Patriarch to the King, sources said yesterday, in a move that could provoke protests by the monkhood.

The bill is expected to be approved in three consecutive readings by the assembly. In essence, the amendments revert to the original 1962 version of the Sangha Act, which gave the monarch discretion to select the candidate for the country’s top ecclesiastical post. The original version was amended by the 1992 Sangha Act, which is currently in force.

The proposal involves just one article but has sweeping implications. Phra Methee Dhammachan, a senior ecclesiastical figure and key supporter of the current acting Supreme Patriarch Somdet Chuang, has threatened to stage protests.

If the proposed amendment is passed, the chances of Somdet Chuang, who is also known as Somdet Phra Maha Ratcha Mangkhlachan, becoming the country’s permanent Supreme Patriarch would become more unlikely.

According to the proposal, the King will appoint the new Supreme Patriarch and the prime minister will countersign the appointment. The proposal will remove the legal clauses that have given the Sangha Supreme Council the right to nominate a candidate when the post becomes vacant.

Early this year, the Council nominated Somdet Chuang as the new Supreme Patriarch, but Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha has not submitted the 91-year-old’s nomination for royal endorsement, citing many issues.

Somdet’s Mercedes-Benz

One issue that has been cited is the accusation that Somdet Chuang owned a Mercedes-Benz, which was illegally imported into the country. The acting Supreme Patriarch is also seen as being close to Phra Dhammachayo, the controversial former abbot of Dhammakaya Temple who is now a fugitive.

Pol General Pichit Khuande-chakupt, chair of the NLA committee on religions, arts, culture and tourism, proposed the change to the 1992 Sangha Act on the grounds that the country should return to its traditions.

Eighty-four NLA members have already signed in support of the proposed change.

Initially, today’s NLA meeting was not slated to include deliberations regarding the Sangha Act amendment. However, NLA President Pornpetch Wichitcholchai announced in additional documents yesterday afternoon that the proposed change would be considered today. “Given that the proposed change involves just one article, it will likely sail through the NLA within one day,” a source said.

However, Phra Methee Dhamma-chan issued a warning on Facebook yesterday that Buddhist organisations across Thailand would stage protests if the NLA went ahead with the change to the law.

“What you [NLA members] plan to do will wreak havoc in society,” he said.

Phra Methee Dhammachan has been pushing for Somdet Chuang’s appointment as the permanent new Supreme Patriarch since he was first nominated.

Meanwhile, Thai People Sovereignty Party secretary-general Kamphi Khamphirayannont, who describes himself as the representative of 48 Buddhist organisations, demanded that the NLA cease its effort to amend the 1992 Sangha Act and for authorities to suspend the ongoing legal proceedings against Phra Dhammachayo.

“We have already submitted a petition to the King, asking that the NLA suspend deliberations on any law about Buddhist monks and that government agencies suspend any legal proceedings related to monks and Buddhism,” Kamphi said.

PM’s Office Minister Ormsin Chivapruck, who oversees the National Buddhism Office, urged opponents to the proposed amendment to remain calm and let the NLA do its work.