Thai court docket voids order for former PM to pay $1B for losses

A court docket in Thailand on Friday annulled a 2016 order by the nation’s Finance Ministry for former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra to pay 35.7 billion baht ($1.1 billion) in compensation for losses incurred by a money-losing rice farming subsidy program that her 2011-2014 administration launched.
The nation’s Central Adminstrative Court stated the 2016 fee order lacked a authorized foundation since Yingluck was not answerable for the alleged corruption as a result of it was carried out operationally by different officers. The court docket stated the Finance Ministry didn’t show Yingluck was straight answerable for the monetary losses.
Yingluck, whose authorities was ousted in a 2014 coup, was sentenced in absentia to 5 years’ in jail in 2017 for negligence in instituting the subsidy program. She fled Thailand earlier than the decision and referred to as the case politically motivated.
The rice subsidy program was a flagship coverage that helped Yingluck’s Pheu Thai Party win the nation’s 2011 common election. Under this system, the federal government paid farmers about 50 p.c greater than they’d have acquired on the worldwide market, with the intention of driving up costs by warehousing the grain.
But different rice-producing nations captured the worldwide rice market by promoting at aggressive costs. Thailand because of this misplaced its place because the world’s main rice exporter and enormous quantities of rice sat unsold in authorities warehouses.
Yingluck’s critics described the overriding motive of the rice subsidy program as political — an effort to purchase the loyalty of rural voters with state funds.
Yingluck and her defenders stated she was persecuted in an effort by political enemies to dismantle the political machine of her brother, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was toppled from energy by a 2006 navy coup after being accused of abuse of energy, corruption and disrespect for the nation’s monarchy.
His supporters, who delivered him unprecedented electoral victories, imagine his solely offense was difficult the ability of the nation’s conventional elite, which is led by monarchists and the navy and supported by the city center class.
Yingluck and Thaksin stay in self-imposed exile.