BANGKOK, May 30 (Xinhua) -- Facing a lese majeste accusation, Thailand's Prime Minister's Office Minister Jakrapob Penkair announced resignation on Friday, becoming another victim that fell from the big ship of the coalition government led by Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej amid increasingly stormy opposition waves.
In the meantime, rallies organized by government-critic group People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) continued in the capital to mount pressure for the step-down of the Samak administration.
Jakrapob made the announcement at a press conference one day after a police spokesman said initial investigation found ground to pursue a charge of lese majeste against him over a controversial English speech titled "Democracy and Patronage System in Thailand" that he made at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand in Bangkok last August.
Jakrapob insisted on his innocence and vowed to prove it in court.
He said he resigned to prevent political rivals -- the opposition Democrat Party and PAD from further instigating political tensions and damaging stability of the current government by using his case as an excuse.
Jakrapob was the second cabinet member and the third member of parliament of the ruling People Power Party (PPP) who had succumbed to pressure from the opposition, since the PPP-led coalition government took office in February.
Early this Month, the Social Development and Human Security Minister Sutha Chansaeng, also a PPP member, resigned, citing health concern. Local media linked his step-down to a controversy over his education background raised by the opposition camps.
On April 30, House Speaker Yongyuth Tiyapairat, a PPP party executive, resigned over charge of electoral fraud in the Dec. 23 poll.
Jakrapob was known as a anti-coup group leader after a bloodless military coup toppled the elected government led by former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra in September 2006 and installed an interim government. It was then when he made the controversial speech in which the Democrat Party and the PAD accused him of attempting to challenge the Kingdom's monarchy institution.
Jakrapob, a PPP MP who was appointed as the PM's Office Minister in charge of media affairs, had faced pressure from military leaders, opposition camps as well as coalition parties who called for his step-down to ease political tensions, after the Democrat Party publicized a translated version of his speech in Thai language and filed a lese majeste complaint with the police against him last week, which caught wide attention and criticism due to the highly sensitive nature of the issue.
Lese majeste is a crime subject to a penalty of 3-15 years jail term in Thailand, where loyalty to the royal institution is stipulated in any version of constitution ever born in the kingdom since it was transformed from an absolute monarchy to a constitutional monarchy system in 1932.
Though Jakrapob had strongly denied the accusation and finally opted to resign in a bid to "save the government," the pressure on the Samak administration was not expected to die out quickly.
The PAD, which organized a series of mass protests against the Thaksin government to climax into the military's step-in with a coup, on Friday continued their rallies in Bangkok, which they launched on Sunday initially to protest the Samak government's move to amend the 2007 Constitution.
Friday's PAD rally, joined by some 8,000 people in central Bangkok, continued after Jakrapob resigned and another bunch of lawmakers withdrew their endorsement to back the PPP-pushed motion to amend the 2007 Constitution, which brought the motion to abortion.
Seven senators withdrew their names in the charter rewrite motion, which was originally lodged last week by 164 lawmakers at the two Houses. Earlier 20 senators and two MPs withdrew their names.
The motion has now only 124 lawmakers' support, falling short of the 126 endorsements required to put the motion onto the agenda of a special parliamentary session scheduled next month.
The PPP on Friday decided to gather signatures from lawmakers to file a second motion to amend the 2007 Constitution, which they labeled as a junta charter as it was drafted by junta-appointed panel after the coup-makers abrogated the 1997 charter.
