PBS director chosen amid vote boycotts
Former Thai Health Promotion Foundation (ThaiHealth) director Wilasinee Phiphitkul has been selected as the new director of the Thai Public Broadcasting Service (Thai PBS) with a two-thirds vote.
Ms Wilasinee, 52, was selected over Adisak Limparungpatanakij, the former chief executive of Nation Broadcasting Corporation Pcl.
The selection committee was the nine-member Thai PBS board of governors, chaired by Chumpol Rodkhamdee.
However, two members of the committee boycotted yesterday’s selection.
Narong Petprasert, who boycotted the selection, told Thai
PBS reporters that he disagreed with the selection process, which required each of the committee members to select two candidates from the initial candidate pool, and only the two candidates who received most votes would progress to the final round and present their visions to the selection committee.
This method reduced the chance of success for the other candidates, he said.
There were nine candidates in total
before two withdrew.
Meanwhile, both Ms Wilasinee and Mr Adisak are facing legal challenges — Mr Adisak still has a case to defend in court and Ms Wilasinee is still subject to an investigation into an organisation investment when she was a deputy director of Thai PBS, Mr Narong said.
Pipat Chanasongkram was the second Thai PBS board member who boycotted yesterday’s selection.
Ms Wilasinee, who earlier served as deputy director of Thai PBS, is known to be closely acquainted to Krisda Rueangareerat, a dentist who is a former Thai PBS director and ex-manager of ThaiHealth.
Ms Wilasinee resigned from Thai PBS after Dr Krisada left his post at the station in March amid heavy criticism for investing the station’s money in a fixed income fund of a private company, which could lead to a conflict of interest.
Prior to becoming Thai PBS director Dr Krisda also resigned from ThaiHealth during the Monitoring and Auditing Committee on Fiscal Expenditure’s investigation into the foundation’s budget spending.