In our childhood, when there was no television or Internet, there used to be the bioscope that would enthrall us with images from distant lands. Let me be that ‘bioscope man’ today and take you through a journey.

Bioscope Slide 1

A photograph of a beautiful happy family. Only, the man in the white shirt is not real. His image has been photoshopped.

Why? Because one fine day, he simply disappeared.

His name is Pholachi Rakchongcharoen, but he was mostly known to all as Billy. He belonged to the Karen ethnic community. The Karen community of around 500 people have been living in the Kaeng Krachan National Park, in Petchaburi province, since many decades. He was one of the leaders of the community.

Kaeng Krachan, covering an area of approximately 3,000 square kilometres, was declared as a national park in 1981. It is described as the largest national park in Thailand and is famous for its diversity in wildlife, the hills and rivers, and the flora and fauna.

On April 17, 2014, Billy Pholachi Rakchongcharoen was travelling from the Bang-Kloy-Bon village in the national park to another location in the Kaeng Krachan district.

But Billy never reached that location.

When family and friends started looking for him, it came to be known that the national park authorities had detained him for possession of a wild honeycomb and bottles of wild honey. The authorities say that they had released him after issuing a warning.

But Billy has not been seen since that day.

His wife and friends fear that he was forcibly ‘disappeared’ because of his work relating to fighting for the rights of the Karen community to continue living in the Kaeng Krachan National Park.

What was this struggle about?

Bioscope Slide 2

He is Ko-ee-Meemi, better known as as Grandpa Ko-ee and he is 105 years old. He is a spiritual leader of the Karen community.

Grandpa Ko-ee says that he remembers living in the land of Kaeng Krachan National Park ever since he was born. It is their ancestral land. The rice that they grow following the traditional farm rotation system, and other forest produce that is available in abundance is enough to provide for their needs.

However, their rights to live in the forests is not recognised under the law. All forest land belongs to the State. Over the years, the State has enacted different laws with the purpose of facilitating reforestation, conserving national parks and protection of wildlife. With each law, forests have become protected, while people who have been living within the forests harmoniously over generations have become more vulnerable.

It is not that the State does not recognise the existence of forest dwellers. It does. And so, Cabinet Resolutions have been adopted by successive governments that provide some recognition of the rights of communities to live inside forests. However, there are problems of clarity and implementation.

Returning back to Grandpa Ko-ee and his community.

In May 2011, authorities descended on the Luk Bang Kloy village in Kaeng Krachan National Park and set fire to around 100 houses and the rice barns. The purpose was to force the villagers to leave the forest. The authorities alleged that the Karen community were intruders from the neighbouring country of Myanmar and were destroying the forests with their agricultural practices.

The villagers watched helplessly as everything they owned went up in flames.

In 2012, with the assistance of legal aid organizations, the villagers filed a law suit before the Central Administrative Court against the Chief of the Kaeng Krachan National Park and other authorities for destruction of their houses and properties. Billy was helping his community with the legal proceedings in this case. He was scheduled to testify before the Court on May 19.

And perhaps for this reason he was ‘disappeared’.

Bioscope Slide 3

In 2016, the Central Administrative Court gave its decision on the case. It dismissed the claim of the community that they had been living on the disputed land for generations, as it was inside a declared national park. It further held that the community had encroached upon prime forest land and thus, the authorities’ decision to burn down the houses was permissible under the National Park Act.

However, since the authorities had not allowed the villagers to remove their belongings from their homes before they were set on fire, the court ordered the authorities to pay a sum of 10,000 Thai Baht (approximately 350 USD) as compensation to each of the six petitioners including Grandpa Ko-ee.

The authorities decided to appeal the decision because they were unhappy with the order requiring them to pay compensation.

14th March 2018, the Supreme Administrative Court upheld the lower courts’ decision regarding compensation of 10,000 baht. The Court also observed that since the villagers had no documents to prove their ownership over the land, their eviction was justified.

Look at the headline of the 2016 article quoted above. Does not the headline strike odd? Can authorities ever have the ‘right’ to commit a ‘wrong’ (burn houses of people)?

Bioscope Slide 4

This is a photograph of the foothills of the Doi Suthep mountains in Chiangmai, near the Doi-Suthep Pui National Park.

In 1997, the Office of the Chief Justice of the region asked for permission to use the above land for construction of court buildings and official residences. Approval was received in 2003. Construction was started in 2013. The cost of the project is approximately 1 Billion Baht.

Citizens’ groups are raising concerns about the impact of the project on the environment and forests.

In response, the Secretary General of the Court of Justice has said, that the construction was ‘legal’. He further said:

“We are giving importance to environmental conservation and we are not just talking. On the  COJ’s (Court of Justice) founding day, April 21, we will plant trees and do related activities. We understand the public’s concerns.”

Meanwhile, the Army Chief General Chalermchai Sittisart has said:

“The construction had gone too far to stop”.

The “sunken cost” argument: In economics, sunken costs refers to costs that have already been incurred and cannot be recovered. So, the argument is that the investment would go waste, if not allowed to continue.

In India, this argument is often used to carry on with projects that may have adverse impacts on the environment.

Bioscope Slide 5

Two sets of people, each staking a claim to live in harmony with forests.

Both of them stand against the authority of the State – its laws, and mechanisms of enforcement.

Imagine the resources that one set of people have – to access the forums of decision making, to frame public discourse and to make its voice be heard. And the resources that the other has.

One set has the power to use the gaps in law to its advantage. While the other invariably falls down through those gaps.

One set can use the argument of ‘sunken costs’ to their advantage as their investment runs into millions of dollars. For the other, the wealth gathered by them over their entire life, is valued to be only a few hundred dollars.

Bioscope Slide 6

The struggles of this Karen community is not unique to Thailand. Similar struggles exist in perhaps all countries. In India, in recent months, peoples’ groups have been mobilising around the latest draft of the National Forest Policy. But that’s, another story, for another day.

They are staking a claim to their rights to forest resources. The path is not easy. But that’s the only path that exists, as the alternative is to loose one’s sense of identity and way of life completely.

Billy Pholachi Rakchongcharoen’s family and community come together every year on 17th April to remember him. It is four years now since Billy disappeared. They continue to take every opportunity to demand answers from the authorities.

Grandpa Ko-ee though displaced from his original village, continues to live with others in makeshift houses within the National Park. He and the small group of people refuse any help to build stronger houses, because he has every intention of returning to live in the place where he was born.

And they, together with others in civil society, have now started questioning the discriminatory access to the forest resources. Perhaps, its from these discussions and questioning, that new standards will emerge.

After all, that is what the struggle for rights is all about.