Prof Borwornsak Uwanno, architect of Thailand’s constitutions for the past three decades, has been handpicked by Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul to serve as deputy PM overseeing legal affairs.
Borwornsak, 70, is a prominent legal scholar who played key roles in writing the post-coup 2006 and 2017 charters, as well as the so-called People’s Constitution of 1997.
Anutin is said to have personally approached Borwornsak to join his Cabinet, posting a photograph of the two chatting over coffee on Facebook on September 8.
Analysts say Borwornsak’s chief task will be to pave the way for drafting a new Constitution – a key demand set by the opposition People’s Party in return for backing Anutin’s bid for the premiership.
Trio of legal gurus
Borwornsak is the youngest of three legal heavyweights behind Thailand’s recent permanent and interim charters. The other two are Meechai Ruchuphan, 87, and Wissanu Krea-ngam, 73.
Their most significant effort was the interim constitution imposed after the 2006 military coup that toppled Thaksin Shinawatra.
After the May 2014 coup, Wissanu led a team of legal experts – including Borwornsak – tasked with drafting an interim charter to replace the one scrapped by the military.
Borwornsak chaired a post-coup charter-drafting committee between 2014 and 2015, but his efforts failed when the junta-appointed National Reform Council rejected the draft in September 2015, despite his role as council vice chair. When asked why his final draft was rejected, Borwornsak replied only that “they want to stay longer”, apparently in reference to the junta.
In October, Meechai took over as chair of the new drafting committee and rewrote Borwornsak’s draft. Meechai’s version was eventually ratified in a public referendum in August 2016 and came into force as the current charter in April 2017.
From academia to politics
Born on October 19, 1954 in the southern province of Songkhla, Borwornsak earned a bachelor’s in law from Chulalongkorn University and a master’s in administrative law from University of Paris II. He then obtained another master’s and a doctorate in general public law from Paris Nanterre University.
In 1976, Borwornsak began lecturing in law at his alma mater, Chulalongkorn University, before leaving Thailand for France in 1979. His first brush with politics came in 1989 when he was appointed deputy secretary-general to prime minister Chatichai Choonhavan. His tenure lasted barely two years before Chatichai was deposed in the 1991 military coup.
Borwornsak then returned to teaching law at Chulalongkorn University and became faculty dean in 1995.
He also served as first secretary-general of the King Prajadhipok’s Institute, an academic organisation under Parliament, for four years from 1999 to 2003. After a three-year break, he returned to helm the institute, serving two more terms from 2006 to 2014.
In 2003, Borwornsak was appointed Cabinet secretary-general in Thaksin Shinawatra’s government, serving until 2006, when Thaksin was ousted by the military.
Author of the ‘People’s Constitution’
The legal scholar’s involvement with Thailand’s supreme law began more than three decades ago, when he joined two parliamentary committees in 1993 – one tasked with devising constitutional reforms and the other with amending the 1992 charter.
In 1997, Borwornsak became a key member of the Constitution Drafting Assembly that produced what would later be called the “People’s Constitution”. In the charter promulgated in October 1997, he pushed for the creation of a Constitutional Court modelled on the European system.
Borwornsak was appointed professor emeritus of Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Law in 2002. That same year, the UN Economic and Social Council included him in its Committee of Experts on Public Administration – a position he held until 2005.
Since 2014, he has served as a member of the Council of State, the government’s legal advisory agency, and as deputy president of the Royal Institute. He also sits on the boards of several public companies.
Borwornsak frequently posts on Facebook about legal issues, most recently offering advice on the interim government’s authority to seek royal endorsement to dissolve the House of Representatives.
Citing Thailand’s political traditions and constitutional principles, he argued last month that an interim government lacks the power to request House dissolution. He also pointed out that the King would have the “royal prerogative of refusal” even if the interim government went ahead with the request.
Early this month, caretaker prime minister Phumtham Wechayachai’s bid to secure royal endorsement – the Pheu Thai Party’s last-ditch bid to block Bhumjaithai Party leader Anutin from becoming prime minister – failed.
By Thai PBS World’s Political Desk
