By Veera Prateepchaikul
Bangkok Post
It was not until last week after a chain of events since Big Jiew made his much-hyped one-day working trip to Phnom Penh last month and brought with him a message from Hun Sen that I began to grasp the meaning of Pa Prem's warning to Big Jiew. The Cambodian leader said he felt exiled former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra whom he called his "eternal friend" was not fairly treated in Thailand and that he would set aside one of his luxury houses to accommodate the fugitive should he want to take refuge on Cambodian soil.
As a messenger, Big Jiew has done a good job in passing on Hun Sen's sentiments to the Thai government and the Thai people. Had Thaksin been with the retired general, who is now Puea Thai chairman, he might have given the latter a pat on the shoulder and whispered in his ear "Good job Phi (brother) Jiew".
But as a one-time prime minister of Thailand, Big Jiew should have foreseen the impact of such a message on the Thai side after he made it public. One might have been set to wondering whether Hun Sen would repeat the message and make a more provocative remark while attending the Asean summit in Hua Hin had Big Jiew not paved the way for him by disclosing the message to the media in the first place.
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