Twelve engineering and architecture organizations have joined forces to ask Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha to exercise his executive power to scrap the Airports of Thailand’s plan to build the second passenger terminal at Suvarnabhumi international airport.

The decision to ask for the prime minister’s is intervention to suspend the construction of the controversial project was adopted after an extensive debate of the passenger terminal project held at the Association of Siamese Architects on Tuesday.  About 200 representatives from 12 engineering and architecture organizations attended the event.

All the speakers, among them Associate Professor Dr Somjate Tinnapong, chairman of the National Innovations Committee, and Dr Samart Ratpolasit, raised questions about the worthiness of the project and its benefits for the country.

They pointed out that since the three existing airports namely the Suvarnabhumi, Don Mueang and U-tapao with combined capacity to handle 100-120 million passengers a year would be linked together with a train system, there would be no need for a new terminal at Suvarnabhumi international airport.

Among the 12 organizations are the Council of Engineers, Association of Siamese Architects, the Architecture Faculty of Thammasat University, the Thailand Interior Designers Association, the Anti-Corruption Organization of Thailand and the Association of Thai Construction Industry.