Thailand’s corruption watchdog has voted to indict former ICT Minster Juti Krairiksh for helping TrueMove with its controversial 850-MHz 3G deal with CAT Telecom, and also for receiving benefits from the winner of TOT 3G expansion partner, SL Consortium.
The TrueMove 850 deal was widely criticised as a back-door concession that gifted True valuable 850-MHz spectrum without due process. State-owned CAT Telecom ostensibly is the MNO and True is the MVNO, but on the other end CAT sub-contracted the network back to True taking a cut in de-facto concession that was never approved by the Cabinet.
For the True-CAT case, the National Counter Corruption Commission indicted Juti on three counts for gross misconduct as a government official, for abusing power to break the law or constitution and for a severe breach of ethics.
Juti was also indicted on a further count of taking bribes in TOT Corporation’s 3G expansion project with SL Consortium consisting of Thai firms Samart and Loxley and Nokia-Siemens Networks and Huawei. The winning bid for the January 2011 project was $487 million (16.29 billion baht)