Many Thais still disapprove of the government’s plan to allow investments in casinos and the legalization of online gambling as Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra sought to assure citizens the initiative would bring economic benefits.
About 59 percent of respondents said they disagreed with investments in both casinos and so-called entertainment complexes in Thailand, according to the Jan. 20-21 survey by the National Institute of Development Administration (NIDA).
About 29 percent said they agreed with both casinos and the large venues they would be housed in, while the rest preferred only having one of the two, the survey published on yesterday showed. The nationwide poll of 1,310 Thais aged 18 and above has a margin of error of 3 percent, NIDA said.
Photo: EPA-EFE/Royal Thai Government Handout
About 69 percent of respondents also disagreed with the government’s plan to legalize online gambling to support casinos, while the rest were in agreement, the poll showed.
Opposition has been growing among Thais as the government pushes ahead with the initiative. Last week, a group of Thais attending a provincial election campaign rally in northeastern Si Sa Ket paraded banners saying casinos and online gambling would harm future generations.
In response, Paetongtarn said on Saturday that entertainment complexes will be the nation’s new “man-made tourist destination,” and they would help create jobs and generate new income to help boost economic growth.
She also said negative sentiments among Thais were understandable and the government would seek to address public concerns.
Earlier this month, Thailand’s Cabinet approved in principle a bill to legalize casinos, which the government pitched as a major step to spur tourism and tackle rampant illegal gambling in the Southeast Asian nation.
The bill proposes that casinos be housed within large entertainment venues, which could also include hotels, convention centers and amusement parks. Thailand can emerge as a major player in the global gaming industry if casinos become fully operational in about six years, Citigroup Inc said last year.
RUN IT BACK: A succesful first project working with hyperscalers to design chips encouraged MediaTek to start a second project, aiming to hit stride in 2028 MediaTek Inc (聯發科), the world’s biggest smartphone chip supplier, yesterday said it is engaging a second hyperscaler to help design artificial intelligence (AI) accelerators used in data centers following a similar project expected to generate revenue streams soon. The first AI accelerator project is to bring in US$1 billion revenue next year and several billion US dollars more in 2027, MediaTek chief executive officer Rick Tsai (蔡力行) told a virtual investor conference yesterday. The second AI accelerator project is expected to contribute to revenue beginning in 2028, Tsai said. MediaTek yesterday raised its revenue forecast for the global AI accelerator used
TEMPORARY TRUCE: China has made concessions to ease rare earth trade controls, among others, while Washington holds fire on a 100% tariff on all Chinese goods China is effectively suspending implementation of additional export controls on rare earth metals and terminating investigations targeting US companies in the semiconductor supply chain, the White House announced. The White House on Saturday issued a fact sheet outlining some details of the trade pact agreed to earlier in the week by US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) that aimed to ease tensions between the world’s two largest economies. Under the deal, China is to issue general licenses valid for exports of rare earths, gallium, germanium, antimony and graphite “for the benefit of US end users and their suppliers
Dutch chipmaker Nexperia BV’s China unit yesterday said that it had established sufficient inventories of finished goods and works-in-progress, and that its supply chain remained secure and stable after its parent halted wafer supplies. The Dutch company suspended supplies of wafers to its Chinese assembly plant a week ago, calling it “a direct consequence of the local management’s recent failure to comply with the agreed contractual payment terms,” Reuters reported on Friday last week. Its China unit called Nexperia’s suspension “unilateral” and “extremely irresponsible,” adding that the Dutch parent’s claim about contractual payment was “misleading and highly deceptive,” according to a statement
Artificial intelligence (AI) giant Nvidia Corp’s most advanced chips would be reserved for US companies and kept out of China and other countries, US President Donald Trump said. During an interview that aired on Sunday on CBS’ 60 Minutes program and in comments to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump said only US customers should have access to the top-end Blackwell chips offered by Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company by market capitalization. “The most advanced, we will not let anybody have them other than the United States,” he told CBS, echoing remarks made earlier to reporters as he returned to Washington
RSS