Thailand – How to Lose Friends and influence nobody

Even after the blood-letting of April 10, Thailand’s Red Shirts continue to disrupt Bangkok. The Yellow Shirts are preparing themselves for entering into the affray. The threat of more violence remains. If the Reds move up the road into the business and banking district based on Silom, the army will stop them. Or not, as the case may be.

Staggeringly incompetent, the police will sit it out. A respected Thai commentator recently wrote of the Thai police. “No matter who wins this crazy Thai politics of colours, justice is a pipe dream when the police force remains decadently corrupt.” Bangkok Post, March 27, 2010.

He didn’t write that the military establishment is also corrupt. Plus, it can’t keep its nose out of politics. The army is in the process of dividing itself between coloured political camps with vested interests, hence the doubt about who will stop who. This makes the prospect of civil war a distinct possibility.

The world watched in horror as first, the supporters of one of these political groups, ex-Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s 'Reds', splashed tainted fresh blood onto selected Bangkok venues. Then, as one of the worst led armies in the world made a complete hash of trying to remove the Reds from one of their strong points. The death toll is now 25, including 5 soldiers, some of whom were almost certainly killed by paid assassins.

Paid by whom? They were probably paid by Red Shirt leaders, who administer fighting funds provided by Thaksin Shinawatra. Tragically, should this sad bunch of criminally-minded cretins manage to oust the current government and take control of the nation, they will try to reinstall Shinawtra as Prime Minister. He will make a mockery of good governance and Thailand will become a democracy in name only.

The question is, who would want to deal with a man that some brave Thai commentators liken to a common kleptomaniac? Others fear him, hedge their bets and stay silent. When he came to power he tackled the drug problem ‘with extreme prejudice’. People ‘involved’ died in what can only be described as ‘extra-judicial killings’. If he gets back into power his critics will need to watch their backs. Paid assassins come cheap in this country.

So the world is watching as Thailand’s loopy political crisis goes on and on. If Thailand’s Reds or Yellows shut the international airport again in the name of politics, or there is just one more military coup, the international penny will drop and Thailand will be declared ‘basket case’.

Bombs and grenades have been going off all over the country; like today in Chiang Mai, for instance. Before the big ‘kick-off’ on April 10, there were 20-odd explosions in Bangkok. And Thailand got lucky. Only one foreigner – a Japanese journalist - was killed. Had a grenade been launched into the back-packer community on Khao San Road and a few young tourists been found lying in pools of their own blood, the penny would have taken on the attributes of a lead weight.

I don’t know what to make of Thailand these days, but the fearsome Siamese cat is well and truly out of the bag. It is now understood that Thailand’s raging over-development is completely unsustainable; that Bangkok’s pollution is a killer. Early Spring found parts of the North and North East of the country enveloped in smog. Farmers burn off crop residue, an old practice that cannot be easily changed for financial reasons.

In addition, speculators set fire to badly depleted forested areas so that they can appropriate land illegally and plant, or build, something that will make money for them. Because they are protected by people in high places, no one can stop it happening. The smog affects thousands. Hospitals are stretched dealing with people with breathing difficulties. It costs millions to treat them and the same story will be repeated next year. Expats flee their homes and head south, but not too far south.

Three provinces in the deep south of Thailand, once part of old Malaya, are largely populated by neglected and discontented Muslims. There is an undeclared war going on between ‘separatist militants’, tomorrows ‘freedom fighters’, and the Thai military. Atrocities have been committed by both sides. Informed opinion suggests that coup-happy generals are heavy-cack-handedly dealing with the problem. More than 5000 lives have been lost. A rubber-tapper was killed yesterday.

Here in Kata (Phuket) I had a nice view of a thickly wooded hill. Gone. Not the hill, just the aspect. Bulldozers and a JCB are ripping a deep scar that covers at least an acre. ‘Someone’ is sticking up yet another condominium.

Phuket City now has two bus stations, one old, one brand new. The brand new one is not yet open because there is a political/financial row about who will run it. There’s a brand new wet fish market to replace the old one. Supposed to open in July, it probably won’t. There’s a dispute about rents to be charged (gouged) and not one tenant has signed up.

The southern highway leading to Phuket and elsewhere is very dangerous. Tourists are being transported along a road that was built without any attempt to minimise the, often fatal, result of countless accidents. On the main highway the central reservation is often a ditch, with trees in it. In places the ditch is lined with concrete.

Over the Thai (New Year) Songkran festival, seven days in total, there were more than 3500 road accidents. 361 people were killed. The southern province of Nakhon Si Thammarat recorded the most accidents.

In my opinion, responsible guidebooks should advise foreign travellers not to use the trans-Thai bus services. The guides are written with political correctness in mind. Don’t be fooled. Read between the lines. When they say, for instance, ‘the city, town or village is not particularly attractive’, they mean it’s a bloody mess. If they write it’s ‘slightly dodgy’ they mean, ‘watch where you’re going and take extra care’.

Two American tourists I met went to Phuket City for the day (“to see the Sino-Portuguese-inspired architecture”). They were back in less than three hours. ‘Shoddy’ was the kindest word they could come up with.

The ubiquitous concrete shop-houses that line most towns and many village road look bad enough, but when you look up you will see an amazing lash-up. The overhead electricity cables that line every road are as tangled as cooked spaghetti after it has been tumble-dried. When service engineers arrive to work on the supply, don’t look! Wearing flip-flops and without safety helmets, they climb up unsecured bamboo ladders to unhook, fix, then hook ‘em back up. Connections loop across roads. ‘Pirates’ tap into the supply as and when necessity demands.

Pavements are mostly non-existent in non-tourist areas and unnavigable where they exist. The Tourist Authority of Thailand promote the country as ‘family-friendly’. Absolute nonsense. Mothers pushing pushchairs face an obstacle course of electricity posts, potholes, drains, parked cars, restaurant furniture, elephants and curb stones that are half-a-metre high. Wheelchair users take their chances on the roads. If you walk down town or city roads with young children, put reins on them. (They’ll love the elephants. Animal rights activists will freak out.)

Thailand is failing. Anyone looking at this country and applying a modicum of common sense to its problems will tell you that at some stage, something’s got to give, that Thailand is going to have to pay a heavy price for such wanton miss-management.

If Thailand’s domestic political problems are massive, internationally they continue to shoot themselves in both feet. They’ve recently expelled and trucked 4000 refugees back to Communist Laos, expressly against the wishes and advice of the UN, NGOs and the USA. Needless to say, the USA created the problem during the war they were supposed to be waging in Vietnam.

Thailand has recently refused an entry visa to the sister of the Dalai Lama, kow-towing to their powerful and unprincipled Chinese neighbour. And who else, other than China and North Korea, does business with the brutal Burmese military junta? Successive Thai governments do business with the brutal Burmese military junta. And let’s not talk about collusion between businessmen and politicians that facilitates exploitation of refugees from that sad country.

It occurs to me that this sort of insensitive, non-co-operative, international bad-attitude ensures that the Thais are losing friends fast. I was once one of those friends. As a retiree, I intended to divide my time between Thailand and Europe. I leave here in May and I’m quite undecided about coming back.