Thailand’s tarnished image abroad: Thai tourism in decline

Thailand's tourist industry is struggling. Last year we watched with astonishment as three months of protests and the unopposed occupation of Bangkok's Government House culminated in a week-long siege of the country's main airport, Suvarnabhumi, as the police stood by and did absolutely nothing. Tens of thousands of visitors were stranded by the yellow-shirt (then) anti-government PAD movement’s actions. This single event did immense harm to Thailand’s international image. This year it has been the turn of the red-shirted pro-Thaksin DAAD supporters, with clashes in the street that led to the humiliating cancellation of SE Asia’s ASEAN summit, planned for Pattaya. Regular political upheavals have reinforced a natural reluctance to visit a country which seems prone to a succession of natural disasters and man-made clangers. Thailand has had a bird flu scare, a plane crash in Phuket, the tsunami. There are regular accounts in the international press of the arrest and imprisonment of Westerners; extremely harsh penalties are sometimes imposed for what can appear to foreign observers, unfamiliar with Thailand's culture and laws, to be minor misdemeanours. Examples? Taking a beer mat from a bar, eating a doughnut on the way to a 7-11 supermarket check-out, contravening the severe lese majeste laws (for example by not standing up in a cinema during the pre-film national anthem). As a Brit, should you be rude about your own royal family during a flight to Bangkok, in the earshot of someone who takes these issues seriously, you could find yourself under arrest on arrival. The maximum lese majeste penalty for disrespectful comments about foreign royalty is two years’ imprisonment. Wherever you make them in the world.

Few customers, plenty of pollution in Chiang Mai...

On top of all this, even if limited progress has been made, Thailand still has a reputation for rampant corruption. Foreigners can feel they are tiptoeing on eggshells through some mystifying rules and regulations, and to cap it all, they appear to be somewhat 'flexible' according to occasionally rather questionable decisions and interpretations by individual officials. And it's hardly rare for an official to need an 'unofficial' payment to smooth the way...

It's dead at the Chiang Mai Saloon, on Loi Kroh Road in Chaing Mai. (The guy in red is the owner)

All serve to instil doubts into would-be travellers about the risks involved in visiting Thailand. Many seasoned travellers and long-term expats are able to come to terms with certain idiosyncrasies, which effectively boil down to respecting the Thai way of life. But expecting first-time visitors to be able to do the same? More than a little optimistic.

Things could well get worse before they get better. More political demonstrations are planned from late June. There have been rumours of one new Chiang Mai hotel being down to 10% occupancy. Bars and tourism-related businesses are closing left, right and centre. Ok this is the start of the low season, but even so. Sterling, the euro and USD are still weak compared to a few years ago, and there is little sign of Thailand's central bank relaxing its strong baht policy. Before the financial crisis began to bite, certain middle- and high-end hotel rates were rising well above inflation rate. Dwindling numbers of tourists that are still coming to Thailand are being more careful with their money. Other countries seem to be doing a better job of marketing their tourist industries, especially those S.E. Asian countries that are now selling themselves as family destinations, eating into what not so long ago seemed to be Thailand's monopoly of the tourist market in this part of the world. Bali, the Philippines, Cambodia, Malaysia and Vietnam are all making significant inroads into Thailand’s former share.

Thailand’s image has also been tarnished by accounts of high pollution in the Chiang Mai region as well as Bangkok, and endless traffic jams in its capital city. The pristine beaches and undeveloped islands of twenty years ago are a fading memory.

The town hall in Malaucene, Provence, France. The mill workers are fighting the closure of a five centuries old business, but it seems to be a lost cause...

The worrying economic situation on a global level is just exacerbating the problem. As an example just today in my little village of 2,750 people in the Provencal backwaters of France, workers from the sole industrial business in the area of any size were desperately trying to persuade the Schweitzer-Mauduit Group, American owners of Malaucene's five centuries old paper mill since 1920, not to make the final 211 employees redundant and close the mill altogether. The machines already stopped turning on April 1st of this year; some April Fool’s joke. A little piece of history, this mill has been producing paper using water from the Grozeau spring since 1545 - the oldest mill in France. A sign of how bad things are, that a business that has operated non-stop for almost five centuries is closing. And surprise, surprise – Schweitzer-Mauduit opened a 100 million dollar mill in China in 2005, making exactly the same product. The writing was on the wall. Industrial production was being moved from the West to Asia and a ready supply of cheap labour, long before the economic crisis began to bite.



Thailand has long been a popular destination for the French. A stagnating European economy will see a sizeable proportion of holidaymakers saving money and choosing to vacation much nearer to home. Some of those thinking of retirement to the Land of Smiles are now looking at different alternatives. A couple of years ago the owner of the Ad’Hoc pizzeria in Vaison la Romaine was convinced that Thailand was the place for him. Tucking into a ‘pizza royale’ there on Wednesday, he was much less enthusiastic. The euro… pollution… violence on the street… unstable politics... all came up in the course of a brief conversation, all issues raised by le patron, first.

Still on a French theme, there are some similarities between Thailand and France - the latter is also rather complacent about its value as a tourist destination. A case in point, winter sports vacations. France once held a virtual monopoly on the mass ski tourism business on their side of the Atlantic, with unrivalled infrastructure combining with natural resources and competitive prices to leave challengers far behind. But little by little less obvious ski tourism countries (eg Bulgaria, Russia), have been building up their appeal, and are starting to offer more competitive packages. To the point that some French resorts are now seriously feeling the pinch. A bit late now to think about investment in marketing, renewing infrastructure, making prices more competitive, with an increasing number of former clients having already voted with their ski boots, sliding off to considerably less expensive white slopes elsewhere. France is beginning to learn that size and even reputation isn’t everything. You have to be able to keep it up, and there are some younger and hungrier suitors out there.

Although regular travellers to the more exotic destinations are a resilient bunch, a major part of the global tourism market targets first-time visitors rather than returnees. These are considerably more fickle – it takes one worrying event, and a country can be quickly crossed off the list of possibilities.

It's the extra-low, low season in Pattaya - photo by MyThailand.com

Any positive signs from Thailand in response to the crisis? We have seen a few commercial gestures sponsored and marketed by TAT, the official Thai tourist board. Plenty of hand-waving from government officials and politicians. But the suspicion remains that Thailand will as ever muddle through, mai pen rai style. Tomorrow’s another day…

Edit 13.06.2009: Personal Thailand has some interesting facts on corruption taken from the recent NACC study

Edit 13.06.2009: Bangkok Blogger has a great post on the nitty gritty survival problems of ordinary Thais because of the current lack of tourists, and some quite astonishing personal anecdotes from his last week around the Big Mango... click her for "Bar Girls, Restaurant Girls, and Laundry Girls"

thai tourism thai politics thailand recession global tourism france tourism winter sports

Shown the door, Chiang Mai style

The privileged elite acting as it pleases… we had a glimpse of the darker side to life in Thailand a few days ago, just over the wall dividing us from the six storey condo building site next door. A crew from Isaan (earlier blog) had turned up several weeks back riding a tipper truck laden with everything from tools to a damp cuddly toy for the six month old baby in the arms of its mother, perched atop the load with her husband and a dozen other workers.

A lovely lady. We’ve a big courtyard and garden, and when we heard mother and baby choking in the fumes from the mechanical diggers and cement-mixers working overtime in a relatively confined space next door, we told them to use our back yard whenever they needed to get some (relatively) unpolluted air. One day I came back from a trip to the gym to find the whole place tidied, trees pruned, weeds uprooted. A good few hours of hard work had been put in.

No effective social legislation to protect the workers here, in the event of the boss suddenly deciding to get rid of a few employees. And that’s just what seems to have happened – an arbitrary decision to let husband, wife and baby go simply because they were surplus to requirements. Shown the door - not that the shack they'd been living in on site had a door, mind you...

It was a bit of a shock when I caught sight of them, dejectedly wheeling the bicycle and trailer down the soi, loaded with pans and crumpled clothes, baby in arms. It’s a long way back to Surin. Couldn’t make myself understood, but I got the message – they had to go home. I had a couple of thousand baht on me, seemed the least I could do. The mum was so grateful she almost cried.

Now just days later work has picked up again, so more Surin workers rolled in atop a truck in the early hours of this morning. How’s this for a kitchen to work in…



No wonder the EU is struggling to remain competitive in the face of competition from Far Eastern companies that can virtually do as they please with respect to a workforce. When a business/middle class elite considers itself to be inherently superior to its dark-skinned northern and north-eastern labour, it is hardly likely to feel guilty when it needs to act in its own interests. The law pretty much allows it to hire and fire at will. It is pretty clear too that those same selfish interests are best served by maintaining a poor, uneducated pool of labour that is naively grateful for everything that it is graciously given by its masters.

I'll miss our former neighbours...

It all harks back to feudal times, in some ways.

Which somehow leads me on to the politics … (leave now, if you’ve had enough these past weeks!)

With all the machinations of those pulling the strings of power in the current Thai crisis, it’s all too easy to get confused by the propaganda, the arguments and counter-arguments. A few basic points keep coming to mind in all this.

No matter how ‘illegitimate’ the former government was prior to the Constitutional Court’s (selective) dissolution of three governing parties and the (selective) banning of scores of members from politics, it was elected for a fixed term. The opposition Democrats and those shadowy interests behind the PAD movement were perfectly aware that they only had to wait for the next elections, in order to face and convince the electorate with their arguments, thereby returning to power. Surely if they have right on their side, they should have the courage of their convictions, and put their arguments to the people in the belief that the most worthy would prevail. That is a key principle of the democratic process, after all.

However PAD , the People’s Alliance for ‘Democracy’, along with its business, military, middle-class etc supporters, seem to have preferred to put lives, jobs, indeed the political and social stability of the nation on the line, rather than wait for the opportunity to prove themselves at the ballot box.

It clearly wasn’t simply a case of impatience. They as good as admitted as much when they explained their demands for a revision of the Thai constitution, whereby elected representatives would retain only 30% of decision-making powers in the new version of government they envisaged. 70% would be controlled by appointees. And we can be pretty certain from which sectors of Thai society these appointees will hail, if they have their way.

The simple fact is that they knew perfectly well, as and when fresh elections took place, that there was a very good chance they would yet again find themselves and their political representatives in the minority. Possibly with their grip on power diminished even further as a result of the chaos they have been responsible for in recent months.

The corruption and vote-buying allegations, while certainly true to a considerable extent, are only smokescreens for their real agenda. The emerging Thai democracy has proved to be too bitter a pill for some powerful interest groups to swallow. The Thai elite is alarmed at the prospect of seeing its control over the country diminished even further. They have determined to stop this from happening. It really could be that simple.

However, aside from the fact that there is obviously a lot of self-interest on the part of certain powerful movers and shakers involved in all this, might PAD not have a point? Are elements of the electorate too stupid, too uneducated, to ill-informed, to vote? Is the average Isaan peasant worker less entitled to have a say in the direction taken by his country than the typical middle-class urbanite?

Thinking about my home country, the UK... How qualified, or otherwise, is the average Brit to play his part in deciding the future of his country through a one man one vote system? After all it’s hardly too unfair a stereotype to say that there’s a large number of people, some might even dare to suggest a majority, whose reading extends no further than skimming the occasional tabloid, whose knowledge of real problems affecting contemporary society is limited to those raised by the housemates in the latest Big Brother reality TV series, or in this week’s EastEnders. Foreign affairs? Only of interest when they want to know how many euros they’ll get for their £’s for their next holiday in Tenerife. A fair percentage of the British public would probably readily admit themselves that they are not exactly best qualified to know how their country should be run.

How about the US then – is the electorate any more intelligent there? Not really for me to judge as an 'alien' who has never set foot in the place, but I was pretty astonished when it took a rather dopey if lovable ‘B’ movie actor to its heart and propelled him to the presidency of the world’s most powerful nation. And, then of course, not much later, there was Bush junior… less said about that, the better...

So do we need a ‘BAD’ - a British Alliance for Democracy? A council of appointed ‘wise men’ from the military, big business, academia, perhaps some of the more blue-blooded members of British society, invested with the bulk of decision-making powers? Democracy clearly has its limits, but I for one would rather make do with what we’ve got, despite its short-comings!

Given the choice, where would the average Thai prefer to live – in a ‘Ronnie Reagan’-led Western-style democracy, or under the thumb of a Burmese junta? Only the Thai people, with or without education, can give that answer. The question is whether they will get the chance to put their views across at the ballot box again, to vote for a government of elected representatives retaining 100% of decision-making powers in the Land of Smiles. That prospect is not as certain as it was a few months ago.
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Getting away from the serious stuff ...

With all the building going on next door, seven days a week, sometimes twelve hours a day, I've been thinking about paying this doctor a visit. He's clearly a specialist...

The stand-off continues, tension mounts

Feelings running high at the red-shirt pro-government headquarters in Chiang Mai. As early as 6 pm there was both expectation and a lingering smell of Sang Som thai whisky in the air.... fortunately the over-exuberant youths present were few in number tonight.

A film was showing, with graphic clips of some of the worst of PAD excesses in recent weeks. Speaker after speaker condemned the total failure of the forces of order to act early enough to prevent the current ludicrous situation from arising in the first place. The feeling is clear - that powerful shadowy figures and interest groups are manipulating the situation to their own ends, and that the majority of the population - having made their presence felt through the electoral process - are now on the verge of being indefinitely sidelined, should the government give in to PAD demands and resign.

It was quiet in town, as most people were at the big rally taking place at Mae Rim, twenty minutes drive away, in front of Government House. I went out to take a look.

No suggestion here of the demonstrators taking over government buildings as Eve, tonight's adopted interpreter, went to some pains to point out. It would have been so easy for the several thousand-strong crowd to do so - there wasn't a policeman in sight. But she was adamant that this was not their way, that they would do all they could to continue to make their voices heard in a law-abiding manner. All the same, I can see that changing very rapidly, should the tanks move in...

(Sadly since the rally there have been bombings in Bangkok at Don Muang airport and Government House, with many wounded.)

The crowds rally in front of Chiang Mai's Government House, Mae Rim, November 29th. The numbers were impressive, but more would have turned up had there not been some entirely credible bomb threats. No police, no security on the way in, the park in front of the building in virtual darkness, it would have been a simple matter to plant a bomb and vanish in the confusion...

The speakers appealed for lawful protests so as to continue to contrast themselves with the antics of PAD

Eve owns a small business, the Kavil Guest House close to Thapae Gate in Chiang Mai. Hardly one of the PAD-stereotyped 'unintelligentsia' whose right to vote PAD believes should be limited in a 'New and Better' Thailand. Quite fluent in English, at ease expressing her insights and ideas, she was keen to explain her fears for the future.

A twelve room guesthouse charging between 180 and 250 baht (4 - 5 euros) a night is not going to make anyone rich, even in Thailand. Eve manages to get by on mostly full occupancy for a big part of the year. However the current turmoil is threatening her survival, despite having a few farangs booked in... they are only there because they can't get flights out of Thailand! When they've gone, she fears for the worst. Yet in discussing the occupation of Suvarnabhumi and Don Muang airports in Bangkok she quickly revealed the Thai achilles heel. She almost defended the reluctance of the police to storm the sites, trying to explain how because of an ingrained Buddhism-inspired compassion and respect for life, that this was not the 'Thai way'.

Eve readily accepts that former leaders of the political party she supports are far from perfect. She deplores the PAD propaganda that all 'redshirts' are Thaksin lovers, anxious to see him return to power in Thailand. She emphasised that most pro-government supporters have moved on from Thaksin and are more concerned about the right to vote, the continuation of policies supporting the less privileged in more remote and impoverished parts of the Kingdom. Democracy has become the new rallying cry - there is no longer the cult of the personality that PAD supporters would have foreign observers believe - even if the PPP supporters retain a soft spot for the man that gave them reason to believe in themselves and a new form of Thai politics.

Over the course of the evening, a number of people approached her to translate their views for me, to find out the foreigner's take on all this. They especially wanted to point out that their movement is acting within the law, unlike PAD. That they are ordinary people simply asking for the right to express themselves, and to have their votes and views both heard and respected. For a people who tend to take each day as it comes, they were clearly very worried about the future.

Ning, a young Thai student training to be a doctor, married to an US citizen and living in New York, is back in Chiang Mai to visit her family. She explained that only a couple of years ago she was so proud of her country and its newly discovered democracy, happy to tell people in her adopted home how much she loved Thailand and thought it the best place in the world to live. Now she felt ashamed to be Thai.

Tourist guide Darunee, who spoke both English and fluent French, has seen her income dwindle to nothing in recent weeks. She sees PAD as a minority group representing the rich middle classes, holding the entire country to ransom.

It was a chill breeze that kept Thailand's flag fluttering above Government House tonight...

Red-shirts Rally In Chiang Mai

The red-shirts (pro-government supporters) of Chiang Mai seemed in good spirits Friday night. To a Western eye the organisation appeared rather haphazard, the 'pro-democracy' crowd lacking a real sense of purpose. Talk to the demonstrators, and it's hard to penetrate the hyperbole, to get at the grass-root supporter's real understanding of the issues involved. In fact there was considerable suspicion - not so much of the single foreigner present at the rally, but of my interpreter for the evening - Fon, a student. As the night wore on I was gradually getting a sense that on a simple level this conflict was developing into an 'us and them', class war thing. There was immediate suspicion of the intelligentsia, as represented by the two or three students who turned up. I was just a curiosity farang with a camera, and tolerated as such with the usual friendly, if confused smiles. Had the same camera been in Fon's hand she wouldn't have been allowed to take a single shot.

Fon speaks great English, studies sociology at Chiang Mai University. Not present to support one side or the other, but just to get a better grip on the strength of feelings and motivations of those involved. Something of a rarity amongst students here, as unlike the highly politically motivated students in the likes of, say, France, students in Chiang Mai are tending to dissociate themselves from the current conflict -in public anyway - preferring not to take sides. Their main incentive is to do well in their studies and get a good job in business once they graduate. They fear involvement, even academically in this conflict, could damage their prospects. Their professors seem to be encouraging them in this attitude.

Get your red t-shirt here - 150 baht. Or 200 baht for a polo-neck. All for a good cause... Good spirits all round early on in the evening.

As the night wore on, the redshirts were increasingly on edge at the pro-government headquarters in CM. Clear though, after I'd heard every possible rumour under the sun, that no one had a clue what was really going on. 'Troops' being shipped off to Government House in Mae Rim in this photo where Somchai is holed up, a reaction to the apparent threat of hordes of PAD supporters about to arrive ...

Note the crutches in this first vehicle of the convoy ... not for beating yellow-shirts over the head with - they belong to one of the red-shirt leaders who lost the use of his legs fighting for democracy in Thailand, as he told us from the stage earlier on in the evening...

One of the pro-democracy leaders took some time out to speak to me in passable English. It was very clear that they had little notion of what people outside Thailand thought about what was going on. I found this strange - after all, as far as the pro-democracy camp is concerned - it would obviously help their cause to add the West's astonishment at PAD's antics to the message to their red-shirt supporters. Hard for me to steer a middle way when asked directly for my views, but I made it clear that in the West or indeed anywhere else other than Thailand that I could think of on the spur of the moment, nowhere - NOWHERE - would the occupation of the country's main airports be tolerated. It simply wouldn't be allowed to happen.

Having said as much this then immediately became part of his next address to the four or five hundred red-shirts present. Oops.

The entrance to the 'soi' (street) was closed off at either end, with armed guards posted against possible drive-by attacks from PAD supporters

A new convert to the cause, 'Tee' (above) had never attended a rally before. However he has watched his Thai/Japanese tourism business suffer, with the current airport standoff leaving him with no income whatsoever, and the latest PAD antics he considered the last straw - motivating him to don a red bandanna for the first time Friday night.

Graphic images of PAD violence on display on boards around the demo site...

The speakers had little difficulty stirring up the crowds, but it still seemed to lack the fervour of the much more professionally-organised PAD rallies

The evening passed off peacefully - until midnight when I left, at any rate. No sign of any PAD supporters, much to the regret of some of the increasingly drunk baton-wielding youngsters hanging about the perimeter ostensibly as 'guards', I sensed. How much of a role does alcohol have in all the violence, whatever the shirt colour, I wonder...

Thailand - caught in a humiliating political farce

Thursday 27th November - all flights to Bangkok from Chiang Mai cancelled

Those worried about making a trip to Thailand would be justified in thinking that the country is caught somewhere between a state of dangerous anarchy and a Broadway farce, going by reports from the international news media. People sporting colourful T-shirts seem to be in control of different parts of the country. A succession of politicians spend a few months in power issuing edicts which no one listens to, least of all the forces of order, until they themselves get kicked out for crimes against the state such as being paid a few quid to cook badly on TV, or whatever dirty linen their opponents can dredge up. Current PM Somchai has been accused of bribery. Worst of all he's allegedly been filmed taking an unidentified young lady out for 'dinner'. Scandalous.

Few tourists in need of advice at Chiang Mai airport. Even the Tourist Police are dozing off...

Just to confuse foreign onlookers a bit more the party in power has to change its name every so often. After Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai (Thais Love Thais) party got the heave-ho from the military in 2006, it reincarnated as the People's Power Party - which itself will probably have to disband soon as it is accused of electoral fraud from the last time the people were allowed a vote. It will no doubt soon be reborn under a new name, and the same supporters will back it for the same reasons that made it popular in the first place, ie Thaksin-initiated policies giving certain hitherto unknown rights to the urban poor and the underprivileged country-dwellers in the likes of Isaan (NE Thailand province). A complete waste of time and energy then.

A bunch of old ladies and kids wearing yellow T-shirts and brandishing umbrellas are allowed to take over international airports and government buildings at will, while the police smile happily and politely open the doors for them.

The elected government is forced out of its official offices to take up residence in a Don Muang airport VIP lounge - but that doesn't last long either. The yellow T-shirt brigade moves in yet again, so the PM is looking for yet another home. If anyone's got a lock-up garage they don't need, please contact Somchai, c/o his gran somewhere near Chiang Mai, where he's currently holed up.

No sign of him here at the PM's Public Relations Office in Chiang Mai first thing Friday morning. The place was deserted (except for a single muppet standing guard, bottom right)...

The PPP supporters have gone for a nice vivid shade of red for their T-shirts just to make doubly sure we don't confuse them with PAD - the People's Alliance for Democracy. PAD has a novel concept of democracy, which mostly boils down to the belief that only its own supporters are clever and educated enough to understand politics. This is of course entirely consistent with the democratic principle, as there will be universal suffrage for all those privileged to have the brains in the first place to know to vote for PAD-supported policies. Stands to reason, dunnit.

The PPP supporters are most upset over the suggestion that they're a bunch of country bumpkins, and are demonstrating their superior intelligence by setting thugs on 60 year old PAD supporters, such as near Chiang Mai airport last night. The man was beaten to a pulp, and died.

The PPP politicians demonstrate their own intelligence by replacing the TV cook PM with exiled leader Thaksin's brother-in-law Somchai, to ensure that the dispute with PAD could do nothing but worsen.

In the meantime accusations and counter-accusations are bandied back and forth about who paid what to vote for whom, as if such scandalous behaviour has always been unthinkable in whiter-than-white, corruption-free Thailand, and as if either side has a significantly better record than the other in that respect. Riiiight.

The Army itself seems clueless. All a frustrated military could do was show its muscle by engaging in a senseless spat with Cambodia over a few square metres of useless jungle near a pretty temple that was built by the Khmers in the first place.

On Thursday night PM Somchai declared a state of emergency in the areas surrounding the two international Bangkok airports. He seemed to suggest that it would be enforced by the police and backed by military Naval and Air Force units. No mention of the Army whose chief Anupong Paojinda has been making rumblings in recent days. The latter gravely announced on Wednesday that PAD should immediately vacate the airports and the government should resign. Both ignored his 'advice' and said they would do no such thing. Another in a long line of losses of face during this lengthy drawn-out charade.

To borrow a theme from Spike's excellent summing-up over on Pattaya Days, the red and yellow muppets involved should perhaps all put their sweaty T-shirts together in a boiling wash, and produce an orange muppet government of national unity, before the Thai military does its usual trick of sending in the tanks.

Other than some isolated incidents, if you didn't watch the news in Chiang Mai you wouldn't even know that there was a national crisis. Life goes on...