Impeached female Thai PM vows to fight till the end

BANGKOK, January 23 (TNA) - Impeached Thai prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra insists that the rice-pledging scheme of her toppled government was a good programme, as it was aimed to improve local farmers’ quality of life, vowing that she will “fight till the end” to prove her innocence and to bring prosperity to Thailand and bring back the democratic system to the country. Posting on her Facebook page on Friday, after the National Legislative Assembly (NLA) decided to impeach her with the majority vote earlier in the day, forcing her to be banned from politics for five years, Yingluck stressed on her innocence. Reiterating that she still wanted to see national reconciliation and Thailand's strengthened democratic system, Yingluck said she was sorry for local farmers and all other Thais for a loss of their opportunity, as they would “return to poverty, live in debt and lose basic democracy", while laws have been twisted. Yingluck was impeached, as filed by the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC), for her alleged dereliction of duty and failure to stop corruption and a loss to the state from the rice-pledging scheme. Besides, the Office of the Attorney-General (OAG) decided in the same day to file criminal charges against Yingluck for the alleged corruption scheme. Meanwhile, NLA President Pornpetch Wichitcholchai told journalists that NLA members cast their votes independently and transparently on impeachment cases against Yingluck, as well as former House speaker Somsak Kiatsuranont and former Thai Senate speaker Nikom Wairatpanij. The former House and Senate speakers survived the impeachment votes, but Yingluck did not and has been banned from politics for five years consequently with immediate effect, after NLA members voted 190 in favour of the impeachment against her, while only 18 others were against it, eight abstained and three invalidated their ballots. The motion requires a minimum of 132 votes of all 220 NLA members to impeach her. (TNA)