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Public forum: a failure, a victory
CHANG NOI
The Nation August 22, 2000
How to protect the environment and protect the little people in an era
which
worships the "creative destruction" of the free market? This is
a global
problem. Despite the explosion of scientific knowledge, we are smashing up
the planet. Despite unprecedented prosperity, the ranks of the world's
poor
continue to increase.
The Pak Mool dam has become an international issue because it captures
this
big global problem in a tiny local nutshell. The project was a bad idea,
carelessly managed. It has damaged one of the country's major river
systems
for very little benefit. It hurt a lot of little people who have refused
to
be ignored. As a result, Pak Mool has become a rallying point for people
who
want to stop this sort of destruction. Last week, this put five ministers,
200 aggrieved villagers, 20 television crews, and 1,000 observers into a
Thammasat University auditorium for a "public forum" on the
issues of dams,
land and forests.
The event had great billing. Government spokesmen announced that it would
"solve everything". Deputy Interior Minister Vatana Asavahame
called it a
"historic day". The moderator said this was "a new way to
solve problems in
Thai society". It seemed many people attended just to be there and to
be
seen there - the prime minister's secretary, a TV chat-show host, the
university rector.
But in one sense, the forum achieved nothing. There was no attempt to
negotiate a solution on any one of the specific issues up for debate. Both
the government representatives and the Assembly of the Poor advisers
reeled
off their speeches like actors in a well-rehearsed play. After all, who
really believed that problems accumulated over decades would be solved in
four hours under the spotlight of live TV?
It was a drama, with heavy influences from the theatre of the absurd. As
the
participants arrived, they were treated to a video of Mr Bean. The
villagers
were identified by pink paper tags. They were ushered into the auditorium
in
a crocodile, like schoolkids on an outing. The speeches were heard over a
soundtrack provided by the constant tinkle-and-beep of personal electronic
equipment. The moderator was armed with a sports clock borrowed from the
Asian Games, which timed out speakers with a peremptory buzz. When PM's
Office Minister Sawit Bhotiwihok failed to make his point within the
three-minute limit, he giggled like a game-show participant who had just
lost the money.
More importantly, the play on view seemed to be a tragedy in which the two
sides end up more alienated than ever. Most of the government side read
their lines from a script. Several phrases came up time and time again.
The
national interest. The benefit of everybody. All 60 million people. The
country's future. The scriptwriter wanted to emphasise that the Assembly
of
the Poor and the protesting villagers are a small group of selfish people
who are standing in the way of the government's noble efforts to bring
prosperity to everybody.
More tragic was the growing realisation that many on the government side
have learnt nothing from the Pak Mool affair. Sawit argued that government
has spent the money on the dam, so now we just have to use it. In short,
it
doesn't matter that the benefit is small, the ecological cost is high, and
the dam is internationally condemned. Who cares about the Mool river?
Deputy
Agriculture Minister Anurak Jureemas was panting to build Phong Khun Phet
and other irrigation dams whose plans are based on the same bad thinking,
bad cost-benefit analysis, and devious evasion of environmental controls
as
Pak Mool was. This is not the last time we will see this tragedy staged.
To understand why, you had to look at the details of the cast list,
costuming, and staging. While the villagers were identified by their pink
paper tags, the government people were all identified by those telling
little lapel pins. Not all of them were so little. Forestry chief
Plodprasop
Suraswadi had the biggest and shiniest lapel pin that Chang Noi has ever
seen. Vatana came with two impressive models of the senior bureaucrat.
Their
only role was to sit on either side while he spoke, because every
temple-goer knows that a god looks much more powerful with a pair of
flanking thevada. This was the Assembly of the Gods. Scan down the cast
list
and read the attending ministers' surnames: Asavahame, Bhotiwihok,
Tejaphaibul, Chidchob. This was the Assembly of the Rich too. When the
framework of an old dictatorial bureaucratic state is taken over by
business
politicians, then development is very destructive.
But this play is part of a larger drama, which has some brighter scenes.
Two
important things have come out of the Pak Mool mess, and the government's
recent confrontations with the Assembly of the Poor. The Electricity
Generating Authority has committed that Pak Mool is the last hydro dam. It
has junked plans to trash other Isaan rivers just like the Mool. The
Forestry Department has said it will no longer move people out of the
forests by force.
Of course there are still problems with these commitments. The government
is
still trying to evade local participation and environmental concerns
mandated by the Constitution.
A third victory was the Thammasat forum itself. The only way to oppose
destructive development is public pressure. The little people are not
admitted to the Assembly of the Gods. Over the last decade, they have
created a parliament of the street. With the forum broadcast on live TV,
this was for a elevated into a parliament of the airwaves.
In the larger scope of things, these are three big victories. The tragic
side is that the agitation to achieve these victories has taken about 10
years. Almost every day Chuan says to the villagers sleeping on the roads
around Government House: go home and we will solve your problems. But the
lesson of history is that if you go home, nothing happens. The Assembly of
the Gods has its own concerns.
As AOP advisor "Mot" Wanida Tantiwittayapitak, said to huge
applause, they
can rescue a financial system at any cost, but they resist spending
peanuts
on the problems of the poor. The only way to prevent the government
trampling on the little people and trashing the environment is by constant
pressure. Many of the protesters have still not got what they want. Their
particular problems are too small, too old, or too tricky for the Gods to
tackle. But these protesters have contributed to some big victories which
will have future value. This is heroism of a kind. Maybe we should think
of
those pink paper tags as medals.
CHANG NOI is a pseudonym
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