Former TAT governor denies bribery scam
BANGKOK – Thailand’s National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) is expected to rule soon on whether there are grounds to charge former Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) governor Juthamas Siriwan over bribery allegations involving the Bangkok International Film Festival.
The move comes after a Los Angeles filmmaking couple, Gerald and Patricia Green, were convicted last Friday by a US court of bribing Thai officials so they could run the film festival and land other projects.
A federal jury convicted the Greens of conspiracy and money laundering. They are scheduled to be sentenced on December 17 and potentially face life sentences.
The NACC said the information from the US Justice Department and the defendants, as well as the US jury’s verdict, would be taken into account in assessing if a Thai official was involved in bribery.
Juthamas has denied all allegations.
Defence lawyers for the Greens denied the payments were bribes and said they would appeal the verdict.
Juthamas was the TAT governor from 2002 to 2006 when the Greens were awarded the rights to host the Bangkok International Film Festival (BIFF) from 2002 to 2007.
According to the US indictment, the Greens allegedly paid US$1.8 million in bribes to the former tourism chief via overseas bank accounts i set up in the names of the former TAT governor’s daughter and a friend.
US prosecutors said the Greens had received more than US$13.5 million in revenue from the contracts.
The Nation newspaper reported that Medhi Krongkaew, a commissioner and chairman of the NACC subcommittee investigating the corruption allegations, said besides Juthamas, “a few more” TAT officials were involved and that they would be summoned for interrogation.
A TAT source said all documentation at the agency regarding the BIFF disappeared from a storage room soon after the Department of Special Investigation first launched its investigation early last year.
“This case is causing the TAT to have a bad reputation,” said the source.
Ian Jarrett
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