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[Sexpat]

"The Thai cabinet yesterday voted to scrap the controversial One Million Cows distribution project and dissolve the company running the scheme. The Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) company was set up to run the scheme by the deposed Thaksin Shinawatra government.

Government spokesman Yongyuth Maiyalarp yesterday cited ''non-viability'' as the reason for terminating the project.

The populist scheme, initiated by the Thaksin administration in 2005, was unable to attain its goal of lending one million cows to farming families in three years as planned. So far, only 21,684 calves have been distributed to 10,883 farmers across the country."

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/breakingne...newsid=30045081

[Hedda]

I realize that a lot of Thaksin's projects were designed to make him look good and popular among people with little more than the power to vote. They were still perceived by the rural poor, however, as motivated by a concern for their plight.

The sponsors of this coup, however, seem intent on dismantling virtually all of Thaksin's populist programs, even if it means telling the poor, in effect, that they're on their own. That's bad politics, as I see it.

Tell the 10,883 farers who got a cow for nothing that the program's "non-viable." Better yet, tell the estimated 17-20 million Thais out there who saw Thaksin, rightly or wrongly, as caring about the poor that
these free give-away programs are bad for them.

They must be feeling a bit lonely or abandoned right now, no matter what their TV tells them.
.