Report on the Seminar and Personal Reminiscences, Thammasat University

Coordinator

Freedom Against Censorship Thailand (FACT)

http://facthai.wordpress.com

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I was fresh to Thailand in 1989 and attended the democracy demonstrations at Sanam Luang against a Thai Army general self-appointed to Prime Minister, Suchinda Krapayoon, in May 1992. Although many people saw Chamlong Srimuang as their leader, I only ever saw him as a political opportunist. I saw Chamlong arrested to safety with his followers at Phanfa Bridge. This was when I sent my Thai family home.

An interesting point raised at today's seminar was that Chamlong was identified disguised in sunglasses among the Village Scouts who were party to the lynchings and atrocities at Thammasat in 1976; politicians, particularly those coming from the police or military, are rarely completely clean. Did he take part in the bloodshed?

We shared water and fruit with the soldiers through the razor wire. Firing from automatic weapons began in the air. Then the guns in Ratchadamnoen were were levelled at us. The soldiers were all so young and all from upcountry. They were told the demonstrators were c/Communists--sound famiilar?

In various situations, I was in groups of people who were fired upon five times. I managed to crawl and run to safety, my clothing stained with the blood of the fallen. I was alone in a Banglampoo side-street with soldiers closing from both ends. Several foreign onlookers from Khao San were killed and I might have joined them had not a shophouse grate been slid back and a local resident hauled me literally by the neck to safety until they had passed; there would have been no witnesses.

I saw the fallen heaved onto canvas covered army trucks (dead, wounded? dead now) just past Phanfa Bridge. Three lorries and one waiting, dozens of bodies certainly, perhaps more than 100. I saw the Ratchadamnoen Nok police station and the Lottery Bldg set ablaze. From the safety of the Rattanakosin Hotel, we saw loaded hijacked buses attempt to breach the lines--all aboard were shot dead. Even a petrol truck, which didn't go off.

Having medical training, I helped Sirira Hospitalj and Mahidol medical volunteers tend the wounded. A Thai photog friend on the next balcony was killed by a shot to the head, probably occasioned by his flash. Perhaps the most horrifying for me were the courageous and stupid young people marching up Ratchadamnoen carrying the Thai flag and pictures of the king and queen; they were shot and killed by soldiers through these symbols of the Thai nation. Their blood was on the Thai flag and the Thai monarchs.

We tried to hide about 20 people in our bathroom but the searches were too thorough and we saw them kicked and rifle-butted down the stairs to be arrested. I need to honour compatriots and longtime journos Bertil Lintner and Philip Blenkinsop for their determination on this.

I don't believe the official dead and missing figures; they just don't tally with what I saw with my own eyes. Black May was the catalyst when I decided I was committed to this country because Thai people could be counted upon to defend their freedom. Pretty simplistic, eh, but I still seem to hold a lot of hope for this country, though to no apparent reason.

The conclusions of today's Thammasat seminar is that Oct 14 and Oct 6 live on (thanks to Uncle Samak!) because these were mass movements formed from the educated classes. The perception is that Black May was a movement of the common people; that was not my experience: I think that most May 1992 demonstrators were middle-class Bangkok. In fact, Black May was propagated by mobile phones; this was not an assembly of poor people. Most people think the lessons and sacrifices of Black May have been forgotten; unfortunately, I think this is a true statement, with the possible exception of those of us who lived it.

Today's seminar was attended by several hundred veterans of 1973, 1976 and 1992 and, after all the intervening years, many of us were still moved to tears. Many of my friends and colleagues over the years had been gaoled, exiled overseas or fled to the Isaan and Southern jungles. I, certainly, lost several good friends in 1992 and some of myself, too.

It took more than 30 years for the October Memorial on Ratchadamnoen to become a reality because government does not want to acknowledge its shame. This signifies a basic lack of recognition for historical truth. Writing history is a political struggle to which the power elite will never yield. Thai people, and people everywhere, need access to their history without distortion or censorship.

Rather, politicians seek to reinvent history by deluding a gullible public. Most politicians try to spin their roles in important historical events as greater than they may have been. In Thailand, our Prime Minister is trying to convince us that history never happened. Such statements trivialise the struggle for social justice in Thailand by relying on propaganda.

If the PM saw the death of "one unlucky guy", it puts him at the scene of the massacre. He has eyes to see and ears to hear so he could hardly be unaware of the firing of heavy weapons into the Tha Prachan campus. He saw, he heard and he did made absolutely no attempt to stop the violence.

Here are the numbers. In the October 14, 1973 period, 77 people were killed and 857 wounded. On October 6, 1976, around 500 were killed and 11,000 arrested. These figures come from Phuket resident Nicholas Bennett, a member of the Coordinating Group for Religious Studies in Society. CGRS had become the first indigenous human rights organisation in Thailand and completed its report.

Not only do these lies eliminate the Prime Minister's chances for effective leadership of Thailand, but they poison any aspirations he may have for appointment to His Majesty's Privy Council. It takes a big man to retreat from a lie, to say he was wrong, to apologise to the Thai people, the Royal Family and Buddhism. It would befit his position for the Prime Minister to do so.

When I lectured at Peking University in the summer following Black May, my students took me to quiet places to talk about Ratchadamnoen. The world, of course, remembers only Tiananmen and the young man who stopped a tank. Our Ratchadamnoen was at least 100 times worse and no one remembers but us who were there.

Why does this foreigner care what happens in Thailand? Because my heart is Thai and this is where I take a stand. Because I care about the future of my country.

There are October heroes and there are May heroes. I shall never forget the young man gunned down before Democracy Monument, his blood soaking through our country's flag.

We need to thank Uncle Samak for reminding us how important our freedom is, and that Thai means free. When history is censored, our future is predicated on a lie.

Addenda. This is a link to the original CNN interview:

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/02/18/talkasia.samak/index.html

This is a link to the Prime Minister's further comments to Al-Jazeera on the massacre at Tak Bai in Patani:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuoqLiLSgnI&feature=related

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/FCFBA8C6-4B98-4913-84F6-9C8DA2E7B273.htm