President of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club, Hong Kong,

Distinguished Members of the Press,

Ladies and Gentlemen, 

           First of all, let me say what a pleasure it is for me to be in Hong Kong once again.  This time in a different capacity.  It is my first visit since I assumed office and also a pleasure for me to have the opportunity to talk to you this afternoon at the prestigious Club.

           Many of you may know that my trip is actually very short one.  I counted that I shall be spending altogether only 11 hours in Hong Kong.  After riding on the inaugural sky train trip across the river with the new station being opened up this morning, I boarded the plane so that I could be here in time for a luncheon organised by the Hong Kong Trade Development Council where I met a number of business entrepreneurs and investors.  And just before I arrived at the Club, I had a meeting with the Chief Executive of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region to discuss various bilateral issues.  And after more interviews I shall be meeting with yet more investors and businessmen before leaving Hong Kong late in the evening. 

           You might of course wonder why I do make this short trip.  Most significantly, it is the first trip abroad since the unrest in April took place in Bangkok, having of course followed the disruption of the ASEAN Summit in Pattaya a day before that.  And the simple reason that I am here is to reaffirm Thailand’s commitments as partner and friend of Hong Kong where there have been growing and close relationship, particularly on trade, investment and of course tourism.   And at the same time, I am here to share with you my perspective of what is happening in Thailand.

           I know that most of you would have followed the events in Thailand closely and have seen not only in the last three or four months, but over the last two or three years where there have been a lot of tension, conflict and division within the country.  

           What I would like to do is to give you a perspective of what I have been trying to do over the last four and a half months and what, I hope, that we will achieve in the coming months as we face the twin challenges of leading the Thai economy through what is seen as one of the worst financial and economic crises that the global economy has seen in recent times, and also of course overcoming the problem of political division and conflict in the country.

           Let me just briefly start off on politics.  I know that the image that you have seen in Thailand over the last two to three years would be one of protests, and, during the worst time,  chaotic scenes whether at Government House, airports or on the streets of Bangkok.  I am here to reassure you that the priority of my government is to achieve true reconciliation.  And from the first day in the office, I said that I would pursue that objective by making sure that the rule of law and justice will prevail, and that our political system, the democratic system, will continue to be developed and reformed so that all voices can be heard and that Thailand will truly have a political system where there is participation from all sides, and all differences can be resolved through democratic and peaceful means.  

           The first three months in office, the way we approach this problem was to make sure that the government would do whatever we can to avoid any kind of conflict or confrontation, and try to get the grips with the concerns, complains or grievances various groups in the society have, so that we can begin the process of reconciliation through reform and through enforcement of the law in the way that is seen to be fair and non-discriminatory. 

          It seems to have worked for three months.  The unfortunate thing in April was that the protestors decided to resort to violence; and of course what followed was what we saw on the news.   May be some of you may have covered the events yourself.  The disruption at the Summits in Pattaya and some chaotic scenes on the streets of Bangkok, which was why we had to declare a state of emergency, using the powers entrusted in the law - special law - where we issued a special emergency decree, and we quickly moved to restore order.  I should say that the operations to restore order lasted about two or three days, with no losses of life as a direct result of those operations.  What I have been anxious to do since then was to point out that our operation was not about scoring political victory, or in anyway trying to clamp down on our opponents.   We insist that they can continue exercising their democratic and constitutional rights so long as they do not violate the law, by either inciting violence or blocking streets or, worse, trying to cause harm to people, particularly people in the government have been targeted.  And immediately after the events, I called for a special session of parliament to have a general debate, where the opposition, government MPs and senators could voice and share their views on how we should proceed or even raise questions about the events that took place in April, especially concerning government operations. After two days, we agreed to set up two parliamentary committees - one to review the situation and events that had taken place particularly during the unrest; and another to look for a political solution, whereby political division could be resolved once and for all.

           I am glad to say that over the last couple of weeks, these two committees have now been set to work and they intend to report back to the President of the Parliament very soon, so that we can begin our very inclusive process of political reform and addressing the concerns about injustice or problems within our political system, so that we can achieve a long lasting peace and stability as far as politics is concerned.  

          What is perhaps more significant for me is, despite the turmoil over the last three months and all these political challenges, the government has also been able to implement our recovery and  stimulus packages as far as the economy is concerned on track and on time.  Very swiftly, the first thing we did was to move to pass the mid-year supplementary budget so that we could protect the least fortunate and the poorest in our society from the impact of the financial crisis.  So, comprehensive programme ranging from price support for farmers to income support for low income earners as well as protecting the vulnerable people by providing the income support for the elderly and beginning the programme of free basis education for our children, all that was passed with the approval of the parliament and I am glad to say that 70-80 percent of the 3 billion USD programme has now been dispersed.  So, we are very well on the way to completing the first phase of the recovery programme.   

        The second, perhaps more ambitious, stimulus package which is now currently being asked for approval of the parliament will involve 45 billion USD of public investment over the next three years.  There are clear framework as to how that money will be invested, putting particular emphasis on investment on water distribution, transport, communications and logistics, upgrading our health sector and also ours schools, as well as providing support for future directions of economic development, where we will focus more on service sector and creative economy.  To finance that we need to seek additional borrowing because we are running up against the legal limits as far as fiscal allowance is concerned, but most of the borrowing will be domestic because there is ample liquidity in the Thai system, given that Thailand’s financial continues to remain in good health.  

         So, as I said, despite the headlines and political troubles that you see in the news, the economic programme is proceeding very well, and the government will focus on that because we know that that is actually number one concern of the majority of Thai people.  And by the end of the year, we will begin to see the implementation of such investment, some of which will, as I said, will be financed through budget, some of it financed though loans, and some through public-private partnership, reaffirming our continued stance to lead the economy through the private sector and through market forces.         

         At the same time, we are also carrying out our commitments as ASEAN Chair.  In February, we successfully hosted the 14th ASEAN Summit so that we put into effect the ASEAN Charter and continue our path to realizing the vision of the ASEAN Community.  And in October, we will be hosting the 15th ASEAN Summit and Summits with our dialogue partners, as well as the East Asia Summit, particularly to follow up on a lot of the regional and global missions to deal with the financial crisis.  This includes, of course, a number of the agreements and initiatives that we saw at the London Summit of G20.  There will be additional roles of facilities that are now being offered by global financial institutions like the International Monetary Fund and also the World Bank.  And also our own regional initiative in ASEAN, such as the multilateralisation and expansion of what is called the Chiang Mai Initiative, which is an arrangement for reserve pooling, where Hong Kong, I am glad to say, has also participated.  

         Apart from all these challenges, ASEAN continues to be proactive.  Last week we also hosted the ASEAN+3 health ministers’ meeting to meet the challenges of the new influenza H1N1.  

           So, all in all, I am here to say that behind the pictures that you see from the news, on the television, and beyond the headlines, Thailand continues to get back in business.  And that the government is still very much focus on the economic challenges while, at the same time, we have set off a national reconciliation process through the parliamentary mechanism in the hope of achieving peace and stability in the country.   So that is very much overall picture that I would like to give, what we have achieved over the last five months and given you a rough idea of we expect in Thailand for the months ahead.  At this point in time I will be very happy to answer the questions that are of interest to the members of the press.

         Thank you. 

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Government Spokesman Bureau

Foreign Relations Division