THAIPBS
Mr Vicha Mahakhun, NACC spokesman and head of the team investigating Ms Yingluck’s role in the fake rice deal with China, said today (Tuesday) that the right to copy the documents was exclusive to the accused, in this case the prime minister, and that she could not assign anybody or a lawyer to do on her behalf although she could assign someone to acknowledge the charge.
He admitted that he had not been notified by Ms Yingluck whether she would show up or not or whether she would ask for a postponement in which case the NACC would consider whether the postponement request was reasonable or not.
But if the prime minister does not want to acknowledge the charge, the NACC will notify her about the charge by mail, said Mr Vicha.
He explained that even if the prime minister was formally charged only the Senate could vote her out of the office.
The NACC spokesman disclosed that he was approached by former Pheu Thai MPs asking whether the commission could be lenient with her. He said he told the ex-MPs that the NACC would not be an independent organization if it did not do its job properly after having been intimidated.
Mr Vicha jokingly said that he could not reply the prime minister’s Facebook message in the social media because they were not Facebook friends yet.
He also dismissed the Pheu Thai party’s accusation that the NACC had deliberately dragged its feet on the probe against former prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva over the rice price guarantee scheme which has been going on for about four years whereas it took the commission only 21 days on complete the probe against the prime minister on the rice pledging scheme.
He defended that the probe on the rice pledging scheme began in December 2012 and took more than a year to complete and not 21 days as suggested by the ruling party.
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