<p>It is now obvious that the military junta have no intention of conducting a clean and democratic referendum on their new constitution. While the government is shamelessly spending millions of the public&#39;s baht on propaganda urging the population to vote &quot;yes&quot; and accept the constitution, those who are opposed to it are prevented from campaigning properly by arrests, threats and a total lack of access in the media.</p>

<p>Mention the sufficiency economy to your average foreign businessperson in Bangkok and you will likely be met with a snigger, perhaps with the added comment that such concepts go very well with the &lsquo;sufficiency democracy&#39; promised by the draft constitution and Internal Security Act.</p>

<p>&quot;<span>The village </span><span>was founded especially to serve our main occupation, fishing, since before the dam came. Only a few people here collected things from the forest to earn extra income. Due to the hilly geography here, we could farm only along the banks of the Moon River and along the creeks.</span></p>

<p><span>The reshaping of Thailand&#39;s polity by the conservatives after the Sept 19 coup is based on </span><span>a fear of the election system and of an elected leadership which for the first time can &quot;challenge&quot; the key institutions in Thai society. Therefore, the priority is to get rid of the threat that potentially undermines &quot;Democracy with the King as Head of State&quot;, and prevent it from happening again.</span></p>

<p>PRACHATAI had received this letter from Thongchai Winichakul which was addressed to his human rights friends, before the human rights groups, both Thai and international, took actions to protect the UDD political rights from the incident that occurred on the night of 22 July 2007. However we at Prachatai decided to publish his letter now as we believe the contents of his letter is important in raising people&#39;s awareness and concern in protecting the rights of civil society.</p>

<p>The protest rally against Gen Prem Tinsulanonda at his residence is legitimate because a) a lot of evidence points to Prem's key role in the attempts to undermine the elected government and the Constitution which led to the Sept 19 coup, b) there is also circumstantial evidence that Prem had a key role in the coup d'&eacute;tat.</p>

<p>The 19th September 2006 coup, which overthrew the government of Thaksin Shinawat and destroyed Thai democracy along with the 1997 Constitution, has not only prolonged and intensified the Thai political crisis, it has also exposed the true nature of Thai Liberalism. </p>

<p>The draconian Internal Security Act (ISA) has long been used by governments to stifle peaceful political dissent. One of the more unfortunate legacies from British times, it is still in use in countries such as Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei. </p>

<p>Now the junta, the charter writers, and all state mechanisms, as well as all their allies, are campaigning to raise an understanding about the draft Constitution 2007--well known as an elitist charter--in a bid to propagandize the people to vote for it in the upcoming referendum.</p>

<p align="justify">The investigation has been carried out when the Deputy Minister being accused of receiving RM5 million corruption for releasing 3 triad leaders. However, there is no instruction from Abdullah to investigate the corruption case of Musa Hasan, the IGP when it was revealed in the internet.</p>

<p>At a seminar at Thammasat University on last Sunday, I commented that if we just call on the people to vote 'no' against the CNS draft Constitution, there will be several problems consequentially.</p>

<p>According to UNHCR, &quot;Asia has not only been the main host of UNHCR&#39;s total population of concern but also by far the main source... some 8.4 million persons originating from Asia were considered by UNHCR as being in need of international protection.&quot;^{<a name="sdendnote2anc" href="#sdendnote2sym" title="sdendnote2anc">ⁱⁱ</a>} </p>