PM’s Office Minister Napintorn Srisunpang, one of the lesser-known members of Anutin Charnvirakul’s Cabinet, has been thrust into the spotlight after allegations surfaced that he helped rig the 2024 Senate election.
During a heated online exchange, Napintorn was accused by opposition MP Parit Wacharasindhu of holding meetings with three Senate candidates while serving as deputy commerce minister in June 2024, shortly before the final vote.
Citing information from the collusion investigation, Parit claimed one candidate was asked to sign a resignation letter in advance so it could be used to control him if elected.
Napintorn denied the allegations, saying the candidate in question was among a delegation representing Ratchaburi turkey farmers at the Commerce Ministry.
Request for help
The minister said he rebuffed the candidate’s requests for help in the election twice, explaining that his Bhumjaithai Party prohibited such intervention.
“I asked him to leave the room, since the meeting was about turkey oversupply. He looked unhappy as he left.”
Napintorn said he gave similar testimony to the Election Commission (EC) investigation of the Senate vote, citing senior ministry officials present during the meeting as his witnesses.
The vote has faced accusations of a Bhumjaithai-led conspiracy to control the Upper House.
“If I wanted to break the law, would it have been wise for me to do so in front of these people?” the minister asked, adding that the high-ranking civil servants present would not have risked their careers to defend him with false testimony.
He also noted that the candidate in question had failed to get elected.
The EC is expected to rule later this month on whether 229 suspects, including 138 sitting senators, should be prosecuted in the collusion case.
The August 28 online faceoff made headlines, drawing comment even from Prime Minister Anutin.
“Iron doesn’t melt. Ice cream does,” he wrote in an August 29 Facebook post, alongside a photo of Napintorn and Parit facing each other. Parit is nicknamed “Itim”, the colloquial Thai word for ice cream.
A former senator
Born in Ratchaburi on May 30, 1959, Napintorn earned a bachelor’s degree in law and a master’s in political science from Ramkhamhaeng University. After graduating, he became a senior executive in the family business, which operates one of the largest fruit and vegetable markets in his home province.
He entered local politics in 1984, elected to the Ratchaburi Municipality Council at the age of 25. After completing his four-year term, he won a seat on the Ratchaburi Provincial Council.
Napintorn was elected as a senator for Ratchaburi in 2000, serving until 2006. Five years later, he contested the 2011 general election as a Pheu Thai Party list candidate. Although he initially failed to win a seat, he entered Parliament after a vacancy opened.
In 2018, he left Pheu Thai for Bhumjaithai and was subsequently appointed as a vice minister by his new party’s tourism and sports minister, Phiphat Ratchakitprakarn.
In 2023, Napintorn was named deputy commerce minister in the Pheu Thai-led government of Srettha Thavisin. He remained in the post after Srettha was removed by court order and succeeded by Paetongtarn Shinawatra, finally stepping down in June 2025 when Bhumjaithai withdrew from the Pheu Thai-led coalition.
In December 2024, while serving under Prime Minister Paetongtarn, Napintorn was one of three low-profile Cabinet members dubbed “forgotten ministers” by Government House reporters.
The other two were Deputy Commerce Minister Suchart Chomklin and Education Minister Permpoon Chidchob.
After Paetongtarn was dismissed and Parliament elected Bhumjaithai leader Anutin as prime minister in September last year, Napintorn was appointed minister attached to the Prime Minister’s Office.
He was reappointed to the same post after Bhumjaithai won February’s general election and Anutin returned to the premiership.
By Thai PBS World’s Political Desk
