BUSINESS NEWS:

PPP-led govt to inject THB4.8 bil+ to grassroots Thailand under SML scheme

The government is poised to spend almost 5 billion baht on grassroots Thailand before the end of this month with bigger budget already earmarked for the next fiscal year.

Deputy Prime Minister, Surapong Suebwonglee, said today the state Small Medium and Large community development committee has met and approved the transfer of another 4.8 billion baht to more than 21,000 villages and urban communities across the country before the end of August.

The government has already given out almost 4.5 billion baht to nearly 15,300 villages under the state-initiated SML scheme.

The project was initially introduced during the Thaksin Shinawatra administration in 2005 with more than 78,000 villages nationwide targeted in hopes of teaching grassroots Thais how to beat poverty on the self-sufficiency economic model.

The People Power Party-led government plans to distribute a total of 10 billion baht to around 40,000 villages and urban communities in the fiscal 2008.

A budget of 15 billion baht has also been earmarked for SML villages in fiscal 2009.

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DPM Surapong assigns Pradit Phataraprasit to temporarily take care of Government Lottery Office

With the investigation into the two-and-three-digit lottery scandal continued, Deputy PM Surapong Suebwonglee has decided to delegate his charge of the state lottery office to his deputy.

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, Surapong Suebwonglee, has assigned his deputy, Pradit Phataraprasit, to take care of the Government Lottery Office (GLO).

Pradit will then supervise the works of GLO until the court has instructed otherwise.

The Supreme Administrative Court yesterday refused to issue an injunction to ban three Cabinet members from carrying their duty as requested by the People's Alliance for Democracy.

The PAD asked the Supreme Administrative Court to suspend Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, Surapong Suebwonglee, Labor Minister, Uraiwan Thienthong, and Deputy Transport Minister, Anurak Jureemas, from duty as it claimed that the Supreme Court's Criminal Division for Holders of Political Positions already accepted to proceed with a trial of the two and three-digit lottery case against them.

The Supreme Administrative Court reasoned that the case was outside its jurisdiction and sent the case to the primary Central Administrative Court.

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Revenue Dept confident to surpass THB1.2 tril collection target in 2008

The Revenue Department has expressed its confidence in more than achieving its 2008 collection target by a sizable margin.

Thailand’s Revenue Department expects this year’s tax collection to surpass the 1.2-trillion-baht target by 50 billion baht.

The government’s fiscal year of 2008 will end on September 30.

It is also confident that revenue collection in fiscal 2009 will hit its target of 1.4 trillion baht due to sound economic environment in the country.

The Revenue Department is not worried if former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s asylum in England will affect its work as all related agencies have already confiscated his assets while all investigations still continue.

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Special state committee cut no. of buses to 4,000

The state committee in charge of the controversial NGV bus lease project has reduced the size of the fleet while planning to present the issue for Cabinet consideration in 2 weeks.

The special committee tasked with the state-initiated leasing of 6,000 NGV buses for Bangkok Mass Transit Authority (BMTA) has agreed to cut down the number of buses to 4,000 units.

Deputy Prime Minister, Sanan Kajornprasat, who chairs the committee said the reduction has also led to a decrease in the lease budget by 34 billion baht to 67 billion baht.

The controversial lease plan was initially presented by the Transport Ministry and receives strong support from BMTA.

But it was also strongly opposed by the Democrats and the People’s Alliance for Democracy with the opposition party claimed that there is a kickback of 1 million baht to be paid for each new bus leased under the project.

The project originally involves a total budget of more than 111 billion baht and is hoped to help increase the number of passengers by 1.3 million people or 15% and result in a profit of 1.8 billion baht in the year 2011 for the BMTA compared with the current average loss of 6 billion baht per annum.

The National Economic and Social Development Board will now conduct further studies before the conclusion is drawn and the end result will be presented to the Cabinet on September 2.


SET MONITOR:

Investors cashed in on big-cap shares and drove the local stock market further down on Wednesday.

The SET composite index inched down more than a point to 690 with moderate volume of 10 billion baht or about 294 million dollars.

Foreign investors ended up being the only net seller of almost 1.3 billion baht which is approximately 38 million dollars.

Retail investors were the biggest net buyer of 1.2 billion baht or 35.5 million dollars followed by local institutions of 84 million baht. That’s 2.5 million dollars.

Thailand’s main stock index inched down 0.19% as buying into small-cap shares has been overshadowed by profit-taking in banking and energy sectors.

Analysts said investors also awaited clearer political direction in the country.

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