Two parties sign up for Patong elections
PHUKET: Two local political parties signed up today (August 6) on the first day of registration for elections to the post of Mayor of Patong Municipality and for seats in the town council.
Paritta Wangkiat
Monday 6 August 2012, 06:16PM
One of the mayoral candidates was incumbent Mayor Pian Keesin, leader of the Rak Patong (Love Patong) Party, who led 18 members to sign up for election in all three wards.
Mr Pian’s rival, Kittisan Kuru, the leader of Patong Kao Na (Advance Patong) Party received candidate number 2.
Mr Pian, who receive candidate number 1, said that, if reelected, he would continue with projects and policies that he had set up including education enhancement, a skills training program to support Patong when the Asean Economic Community comes into being in 2015, and care programmes for underage pregnant girls and the elderly.
“We will give priority to a good security system in Patong,” Mr Pian added. “As part of the Patong Safety Zone project, I will set aside a budget of B25 million to install more CCTV cameras in the area, as well as to buy bomb detectors.”
Mr Pian vowed his administration would be transparent. He said that the municipality has funds totalling about B180 million, with 68.2 per cent of that coming from taxes collected in Patong.
“Our administration has never been penetrated [by influential people],” he added, “and we have managed to keep the municipality debt-free.”
Mr Kittisan Kuru, a member of the council from 2003, also led a full crew of 18 party members to sign up to contest all seats.
Mr Kittisan said that if elected he would focus on fixing flooding and water pollution, while also devising strategies to fix traffic problems and stop the spread of drug use in Patong.
“I think the flooding problem is an urgent issue for Patong,” Mr Kittisan said. “We would like to set up good policies to expand waterways, while controlling the expansion of construction that could obstruct water run-off.”
He expressed his intention to improve the water treatment in Patong, especially the Patong water treatment plants that are not efficient enough.
“Sixty per cent of polluted water treated at the plants has been discharged into the sea, plus almost 100 per cent of waste water from residences drains into waterways. We should think about this problem seriously if we still want to use natural assets to be an attraction of Patong,” he said.
Patong is divided into three wards, with six council seats for each ward.
The election date is set for September 2, with about 12,000 Patong residents qualified to vote.
Registration will continue until Friday (August 10).
