The ultra-royalist group People’s Centre to Protect the Monarchy has filed a royal defamation complaint against French TikToker Yan Marchal over his latest online video.
Yan Marchal (third from left) in the video singing about waiting for a pizza to arrive.
Siamrath reported that group leader Anon Klinkaew, along with other members, filed a complaint against Marchal with the Technology Crime Suppression Division (TCSD), claiming he defamed the monarchy in a short video clip of a song posted on his Facebook page on 12 April.
Anon said that Marchal is a threat to national security, and is collaborating with Thai people living overseas who “do not love their own homeland” to make a song insulting the monarchy, so the group wants to press charges against Marchal and Thai citizens who took part in the video.
Anon also said that the group will make sure participants in the video are prosecuted, even if they are not in the country. He also warned that the group will also file charges against anyone who shares the video.
Marchal, 50, is known for making parody videos about Thai politics and has lived in Thailand for almost 20 years with his wife and children. In 2019, he received a visit from the Thai police after he published a music video mocking NCPO leader Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha’s song “Returning Happiness to the People.”
The police ordered him to remove the video clip and sign a “memorandum,” the English version of which Yan posted on his Facebook page. Part of the document stated that the music video was an “improper act” and that he is “now repenting for the bad action and will not do it again.”
In November 2021, arriving at the Phuket Airport, he was denied entry to the country on the grounds that his behaviour posed ‘a possible danger to the public.’ Immigration officers at the airport told him that he had been blacklisted but did not elaborate. Marchal returned to France afterwards and is now based in Paris.
Marchal told Khaosod English that, although he tried not to risk a royal defamation charge when living in Thailand, he is sure that Thai law is not enforceable in France and decided to take the risk. He also said he should be safe as he believes the Thai royal defamation law can never be enforced in other countries.
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