Lawmakers Slam Interior Ministry for Overpriced Armor Purchases

During a House of Representatives session on September 9, 2025, lawmakers questioned the Interior Ministry's budget allocations under Section 20 of the Public Administration Ministry budget worth 226.929 billion baht. Cholnate Koyakul, a Bangkok MP from the Pheu Thai party, proposed cutting a 100-million-baht mobile phone data extraction and analysis software project, noting that the ministry could not specify what software would be purchased despite setting a price ceiling, and sourced quotes from only two companies—one with zero recorded revenue and another with 480,000 baht in annual revenue. She also raised concerns about data security, potential redundancy with existing police capabilities, and the lack of transparency, questioning why the public must fund duplicative systems when citizens already bear the cost.

Kittipong Piyawannano, a list-based Pheu Thai MP, highlighted concerns about the Interior Ministry's procurement of 14,814 bullet-resistant vests totaling 482.8 million baht at 46,000 baht per unit. He pointed out that the Internal Security Command purchased identical specifications for 31,000 baht per unit—a 15,000-baht difference—and argued that this recurring price discrepancy across government agencies reflects a systemic flaw: each ministry is permitted to conduct its own price surveys and submit separate budget bids, despite the government already holding vast procurement data that could establish standardized pricing.

Kittipong emphasized that this is not an isolated issue but a pattern that repeats annually, where identical products with identical specifications command different prices across different agencies simply because each operates independently in procurement, ultimately shifting the burden to taxpayers.