We do not know what we are doingPublished: 16/10/2011 at 12:00 AM
Newspaper section: News
Thailand is a tropical country with monsoon seasons. Annual flooding is even more a part of life than skin-whitening cream, but less so than corruption. Given climate change, deforestation, decades of poor planning and mismanagement, the flood disaster will get progressively worse and worse. The present disaster will pale compared to the next one.
Decades of mismanagement and short-sightedness cannot be blamed on any one government. It requires a collective effort to achieve this level of incompetence. But I can guarantee that in news meetings of every media organisation in the Kingdom over the past weeks, editors have been pulling their hair out over how to report the flooding situation accurately. The problem is the confusion and mixed messages given by the authorities.
This minister says one thing. That minister says something else.
Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, Science and Technology Minister Plodprasop Suraswadi, spokesperson Wim Rungwattanajinda, Justice Minister Pracha Promnok and Bangkok Governor MR Sukhumbhand Paribatra are all ''official authorities'' on the flood situation. But their stories are rarely ever the same.
Editors scratch their heads and ask, ''Can't these people have one centre of command and control, one voice and one direction?'' and ''Who's in charge here?''
All the confusion culminated on Thursday night when Minister Plodprasop suddenly rushed out of a cabinet meeting to tell the public that a sluice gate had burst and the north of Bangkok was about to be hit by a metre of floodwater. It was a false alarm.
This prompted mass panic and resulted in the Facebook wall of the Don Mueang flood relief operations centre receiving more hate messages than your average Bangkok socialite has had botox injections. The entire government was embarrassed. We just don't know what we are doing.
We complain when foreign governments issue warnings for their citizens to stay away from Thailand because we value tourism baht like school administrators value tea money.
At the same time, the Japanese embassy urged the flood relief operations centre to help foreign governments keep updated on what's going on by also reporting on situations in English. They can't know what's going on if we don't tell them.
In the comical irony that is life, a tear-drop may be worth a thousand words in English, or Japanese.
Deputy Prime Minister and Commerce Minister Kittiratt Na-Ranong burst into tears and gave a consoling hug to a Japanese investor whose factory in the Bang Pa-In Industrial Estate was inundated by floodwater as efforts to strengthen the dykes failed.
The tears of failure should be sufficient to let foreign governments know exactly how things have fared.
In fact, if you watched the news, you saw the deputy prime minister bawling like a baby. Some may interpret these as genuine tears, while others may say it was just playing up for the cameras. After all, tears garnered worldwide good publicity for China's Prime Minister Wen Jiabao after the 2008 earthquake.
All the confusion led to Bangkok Governor Sukhumbhand telling the public: ''Please listen to me and me alone. I will say when we should evacuate. Please believe me and only me.'' We just don't know what we are doing.
Take any old Hollywood disaster movie _ meteors about to hit the Earth, alien landings, the Earth's core out of whack, the coming of the apocalypse, or any old disaster.
The first thing they do is send out helicopters with stern-looking FBI men to pick up all the experts, whether they are academics or working in the relevant field.
They are the experts. They spend their entire lives becoming the experts. They know what they are doing.
They are put in charge and 90 minutes later the crisis is solved, with a couple of romantic hook-ups and an Oscar-winning original soundtrack to boot.
But instead of taking valuable life lessons from cheap pirated DVDs on Silom, we do the complete opposite. We make reality even more ridiculous than Hollywood makes fiction.
I am sure Minister Plodprasop is tech-savvy and a mean hand with a Bunsen burner. He probably knows quantum physics as well as any red-blooded Thai male knows a good massage. After all, he's the minister of science and technology.
I am certain Minister Pracha is a very just man and knows every letter of the law. In fact, while most people sing in the shower, he probably recites the constitution while having a bubble bath.
I'm willing to bet Prime Minister Yingluck is err, is umm, is err, is a wonderful business genius. After all, she's was a high-ranking executive in companies owned by her brother.
But how are any of these people experts in flood management?
Having all the ministers in the entire cabinet actively involved may be a sound publicity stunt at first. But is it sensible to ask a hairy, fat plumber to don ballerina spandex and dance Swan Lake?
We just don't know what we are doing. A fine example is Capt Somsak Khaosuwan, director of the National Disaster Warning Centre, who I interviewed some weeks ago. He knows the problems inside and out _ nature-made, man-made and politics-made.
He's the expert. He knows what he's doing. Is he in charge of things? No. He has to take orders from people who don't know what they are doing, even if they mean well.
It's the same old soap-opera tale of how Thailand can't get it together because good men are bogged down by politics.
Sure PM Yingluck has trouble articulating words and ideas, and at times simply does not know what's going on, but I do believe that she cares.
Certainly, Minister Plodprasop may be more excitable than a 17-year-old boy anxious to collect his girlfriend's promise on prom night, but I do believe he cares.
Of course, Democrat party chief Abhisit Vejjajiva is doing early campaigning and repairing his image, but I do believe he also truly cares.
Donation centres have to ask people to curtail their charitable impulses because they have run out of places to store the donations. Hundreds of volunteers, ordinary citizens, flock to disaster areas to help the victims.
We Thais care about each other, even if our leaders don't know what they are doing. So take that care and turn it into something positive.
First, admit that we simply do not know what we are doing. Second, learn from people who might. Perhaps seek help from countries that have mastered flood management.
Sure, every country is unique in its problems. Certainly, there's no one-size-fits-all solution. But of course, there are things that can always be learned and adapted. I do not know the model that works, but I do know the model that doesn't _ the one we are using.
Yes, the risk of losing face is great. To admit that we do not know what we are doing and worse, seek help from foreigners? The toll of the existential horror to the Thai identity may have us all foam at the mouth with blood.
But it's a burden that we must bear because the lives and livelihoods of our brothers and sisters surely hold more value than any vain delusion that stems from inner insecurities.
However, before we look anywhere else, why not simply put our own people _ who actually are the experts and know what they are doing _ in charge. Thailand is not short on good, capable people. We have plenty of them. We just prefer to bog them down in a web of politics and pettiness.
Or perhaps true experts can't be put in charge because flood management, like everything else, is a money game, as such it's heavily politicised. And that is another can of worms.
This entire story is typical, and decades in the making. The theme of incompetence; the plot of mediocrity; the characters that are self-righteous, vain and greedy; and the climax of disastrous loss of lives and livelihoods. Yes, there's something we know best how to do, to get things done in our favour. But unfortunately, Mother Nature doesn't take bribe money.
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