NACC heads off asset rules flak
Extends its asset declaration deadline
The National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) decided yesterday to apply the same deadline for declaring assets and debts under the anti-graft law to all types of senior officials and committees in state organisations.
The rules require senior officials holding executive positions such as department deputy director-general, university rector and other equivalent positions to declare their assets and liabilities.
The deadline was earlier scheduled to come into force on Dec 2 but the NACC decided to defer it to Jan 31, following strong criticism and resistance by a large number of those holding positions on university councils.
The changes in assets declaration rules have been met with opposition by university councils. They called for the rules to be removed, saying they could trigger a mass exodus of members loathe to see the details of their assets and liabilities go public.
The NACC did not revise the rule, but extended the deadline to pacify critics. The postponement, however, applies only to certain organisations and some positions at universities — the president of a university council, members of a university council, president of the council of King Prajadhipok’s Institute, vice-president of the council and members of the council.
At its meeting on Tuesday, the NACC resolved to grant the same deadline extension to all other positions and organisations, a source told the Bangkok Post.
In a related development, Teerakiat Jareonsettasin, education minister, told media that he was clueless about why the entire board of the Office for National Education Standards and Quality Assessment (NESQA) as well as the director of the NESQA had decided to resign en masse. Their resignations were reported by the media on Tuesday.
Mr Teerakiat said that he was not informed about the resignation, nor knew the reason. He said he only learned from the media that they didn’t want to put up with difficulties in reporting their assets to the NACC.
Asked if he was worried that the latest mass resignation would discourage anyone to take up seats in the NESQA board and the director’s position, Mr Teerakiat said all other organisations are facing the same situation.
Somphong Chittradub, a lecturer at Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Education, warned of more resignations from the university council and executive positions.
“Large universities will be affected because the work process will be put on hold for a least half a year or even whole years before these institutions will be able to find suitable persons to take up the job,” he said.
Prof Somphone said he disagreed with the NACC’s decision to enforce the blanket rule on the university council and its president.
The asset and debt declaration, he said, would discourage those who intend to sacrifice their time to work for a university. He said there were some university councillors with what he termed questionable integrity.