The Expressway Authority of Thailand (EXAT) warned netizens to remove meme posts of its misspelt “Welcom” to APEC 2022 highway sign, threatening to sue those who failed to do so within 24 hours.

The EXAT statement that was uploaded to Facebook and removed a few hours later.

The letter was issued by the EXAT legal division on 17 November morning, 5 days after its admission that the final ‘e’ had been left off the word ‘welcome’ on one of its variable message signs (VMS) at Chalong Rat Expressway.  The mistake has already been corrected.

In the statement, EXAT expressed concern that circulating doctored pictures of the sign, which includes the organisation’s logo, will damage its reputation. It urged people to delete such offensive content within 24 hours and threatened legal action against those who failed to do so.

Pictures of the misspelling have been doctored to include the line,  “Hello wellcome. Have room. Have condom.  Have KY.  Good take care.  Do everthing.” It was taken from a video that went viral in the past, a narrative delivered by a person posing as a Thai sex worker.

EXAT posted the warning on its Facebook page.  It became inaccessible a couple of hours later. A subsequent post stated that EXAT will only deal with those who circulate the doctored version of VMS, which damages the organisation’s reputation and society’s morals.

EXAT’s struggle to protect its reputation is the latest in a growing list of “protective actions” taken by the hosts of Apec 2022. As the event approaches, security officers have been rounded up Cambodian refugees, taking steps to keep protests far away from the event venue, deploying officers to pressure activists, and forcing activists to stop wearing Winnie the Pooh costumes.

Prachatai English replaced an original text with an edited version at 16.00 of 17 November 2022.