Once a key loyalist of the Shinawatra dynasty, former commerce minister Boonsong Teriyapirom was barely recognisable when he showed up at Chiang Mai’s probation office recently after his release from prison on December 2.
The 64-year-old, frail-looking and wearing a facemask and sunglasses, arrived clutching a cane in his right hand and supported by an assistant.
Reporting to authorities for the first time since his release from prison, Boonsong stayed silent amid a hubbub of questions from reporters.
Paying the penalty for rice deal
In August 2017, the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Political Officeholders sentenced Boonsong to 42 years in prison for malfeasance in connection with falsifying government-to-government rice deals between Thailand and China.
The court found that the Chinese companies involved in the fraudulent purchase contracts did not represent the Chinese government as they claimed. The rice supposedly sold to China was never exported, instead passed on to merchants in Thailand.
The rice came from government stockpiles collected from farmers under the rice-pledging scheme of Yingluck Shinawatra’s administration, in which Boonsong served as commerce minister.
The fraudulent rice deal also led to convictions for Boonsong’s deputy, Poom Sarapol, and three senior Commerce Ministry officials, who were sentenced to prison terms ranging from 24 to 40 years. Executives and staff of companies involved in the fraud were also jailed.
Yingluck reportedly called Boonsong on the day of the verdict in August 2017 to tell him she was on her way to court, but in reality, she was heading to the Cambodian border.
A month later, she was sentenced in absentia to five years in prison for negligence in failing to prevent corruption within her government. The former prime minister has lived overseas in self-imposed exile ever since.
In September 2019, Boonsong’s jail term was increased to 48 years after his appeal was rejected. However, his term was later reduced four times by royal pardon – finally to 10 years and eight months in 2021.
That left Boonsong due for release on April 21, 2028. However, the Department of Corrections decided he met the conditions for parole on December 2, after serving seven years and three months behind bars.
Just hours after leaving the Department of Corrections Hospital in Bangkok, Boonsong flew to his home province of Chiang Mai. Two days later, he reported at his local Department of Probation office.
The Department of Corrections said Boonsong was eligible for parole because he had served at least two-thirds of his term. However, he is required to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet and report regularly to probation officials.
‘I can't talk about it’
Shortly after Boonsong was found guilty, his close friend and former colleague in the Yingluck government, Suranand Vejjajiva, posted a Facebook message of sympathy.
“In politics, some stories must die with us. We can't talk about them. I understand that well and sympathise with my friend [Boonsong] for being bound to that condition. I may be luckier as I can still be myself, while he is not that lucky,” wrote Suranand, who served as the PM’s Office secretary-general under Yingluck.
He recalled visiting Boonsong’s office at the Commerce Ministry, skimming through documents on the desk and realising that most of the issues being handled by Boonsong “looked scary”.
Boonsong also showed “signs of worry in his eyes” in their subsequent meetings, he wrote, adding that something was obviously troubling his friend.
After the 2014 coup that ousted their government, he recalled asking Boonsong: “Can you tell me how this story goes?” His friend simply replied: “I can’t talk about it.”
Always with the Shinawatras
Born in Chiang Mai on July 8, 1960, Boonsong earned a bachelor's degree in business administration from Kentucky State University in 1982. He later graduated from Thailand’s National Defence College.
Before entering politics, Boonsong was an industrialist who led the Chiang Mai chapter of the Federation of Thai Industries between 1997 to 2000.
He entered Parliament in 2001, voted in as MP for his home province at the general election under the Thai Rak Thai Party, which was founded and led by the soon-to-be PM, Thaksin Shinawatra. Boonsong was part of a faction led by Thaksin’s sister Yaowapa Wongsawat.
After the Thai Rak Thai Party was ousted by the coup and dissolved by court order in 2007, he joined other party colleagues in joining its reincarnation, the People’s Power Party (PPP). After the PPP was disbanded in 2008, Boonsong shifted to Pheu Thai along with others. All three parties were under the wings of the Shinawatra political dynasty.
Chiang Mai voters elected Boonsong to Parliament for a fourth time in 2011, under the Pheu Thai-led government of Yingluck Shinawatra. He was initially appointed deputy finance minister and later served as commerce minister until June 2013, when he was replaced by Niwatthamrong Boonsongpaisan.
