Pipe dream becomes nightmare for Thailand

DURING its four-year construction, the 346-kilometre Thai-Burmese Yadana gas pipeline has rode out many controversies. There have been accusations of forced labour and forced displacement of villagers; military intervention and killings in Burma; outcries from environmentalists and human-rights advocates; alleged cover-ups; and law suits against prime ministers and governments.

Now that the pipeline is completed and ready to take natural gas from Burma it has entered a new phase of controversy, this time over an equally emotive issue - money.

Thailand faces a US$87 million payout for gas it cannot receive because two of its government agencies, locked in a 'pay-or-take' contract with the project's consortium, mis-timed the completion date of the pipeline.

A spate of environmental protests and court actions convinced many involved in the project, including the Petroleum Authority of Thailand (PTT) and the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (Egat), that the 17 billion baht (about HK$3.22 billion) pipeline would not be completed by its mid-1998 deadline.

But it was. The last pipes, which connected the natural gas to the Ratchaburi power station, south of Bangkok, from Yadana gas field, about 240 kilometres south of Rangoon in the Gulf of Martaban, were laid in July.

Caught on the hop, the PTT - courtesy of Thailand's taxpayers - is now paying for its complacency to the tune of an estimated 23 million baht a day.