Poom Sarapol: The Shinawatra loyalist crushed by rice scandal fallout

Poom Sarapol is out of prison after serving seven years for malfeasance, but fallout from the Yingluck government’s rice-pledging scheme now threatens financial ruin for the former deputy minister, 14 years later.

The National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) is seeking a Supreme Court order to seize assets worth 19.94 million baht held by Poom, his wife and their two children. Assets covered in the April 25 petition include three cars, bank deposits of over 4 million baht and plots of land.

The NACC accuses the 69-year-old political veteran of amassing “unusual wealth” – a euphemism for ill-gotten gains – during his time as deputy commerce minister from August 2011 to October 2012.

Poom, a seven-time Pheu Thai MP, was the Yingluck Shinawatra Cabinet member tasked with approving government-to-government sales of rice from state stockpiles.

The rice had been bought from farmers at subsidised prices under the rice-pledging scheme.

Graft accusations

It was this involvement in the scheme that led to his indictment in 2015, after the NACC accused Poom, then-commerce minister Boonsong Teriyapirom, and three senior ministry bureaucrats of malfeasance.

In August 2017, the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Political Officeholders sentenced Boonsong to 42 years in jail for falsifying rice deals between the Thai and Chinese governments. Poom was given 36 years while the senior bureaucrats got 24 to 40 years for the same offence.

The court found that the Chinese firms named in the fraudulent purchase were not representatives of the Beijing government as claimed. The rice that was supposedly sold to China never left Thailand and was instead passed on to Thai merchants.

Yingluck was notably absent from court when the verdict was read on August 25, 2017, and it was discovered later that she had fled the country. A month later, she was sentenced in absentia to five years in prison for failing to prevent corruption within her government. Yingluck has lived overseas in self-exile ever since.

Out on parole

The media-shy Poom maintained a low profile while in office – labelled a “forgotten” Cabinet member by a 2012 opinion poll.

Even his release on parole in September 2024 went unreported, with the public only learning about it when Boonsong was paroled in early December last year.

Both Poom and Boonsong benefited from royal pardons and were granted parole after serving the minimum two-thirds of their reduced terms, in line with Corrections Department regulations. Poom spent seven years and one month behind bars, while Boonsong, 64, was in jail for seven years and three months.

Both were required to wear electronic monitoring bracelets and report regularly to their probation officer for a year after being released.

From law to politics

Born on November 6, 1955, in the Northeast province of Khon Kaen, Poom earned a bachelor's degree in law from Ramkhamhaeng University and a master’s in public administration from the National Institute of Development Administration (NIDA).

Poom kicked off his career as a lawyer and quickly earned a reputation as a rising star among his peers.

He switched to politics in 1992, when he was elected as MP for his home province under the Palang Dharma Party, founded and led by popular former Bangkok governor Chamlong Srimuang.

Khon Kaen voters returned Poom to Parliament another six times under the banner of various parties, namely New Aspiration, Thai Rak Thai, People Power, and Pheu Thai.

Over more than three decades in Parliament, Poom rose steadily up the political ranks, serving as secretary to several ministers, deputy government spokesman, and a member of multiple House committees.

Poom joined Thaksin Shinawatra’s Thai Rak Thai Party in 2000, a year before Thaksin became prime minister. Poom remained a Shinawatra loyalist even after Thaksin was ousted in the 2006 military coup while he was away in New York.

He was among the 233 MPs elected under Thaksin’s proxy People’s Power Party (PPP) when it triumphed at the 2007 election.

Four years later, after the election victory of Pheu Thai, PPP’s successor, Poom became the deputy commerce minister in the government led by Thaksin’s sister, Yingluck, Thailand’s first female prime minister.

He served in the post for 14 months before being replaced by Natthawut Saikuar, another Pheu Thai MP.