Arkady

14 hours ago, david143 said:

i also heard from one friend who has business in Silom claimed he got a call from MOI for interview on 25 April 2024, if anyone else received a call please provide further information, this guy is a friend of my friend and also claimed he applied 1.5 years ago based on Thai family, i am flabbergasted that is he so lucky while previous batch of 2019 still waiting for MOI interviews.
Please inform if anyone has received call.

It's good that interviews are getting under way now under the current government.  I have a couple of friends waiting for interviews who are getting very  pessimistic about the outlook.  One of them is even considering leaving Thailand due to despondency over his application, the remittance tax and some other issues he doesn't like this government for.

On 4/21/2024 at 5:46 PM, DrJoy said:

6 yrs from start to finish..

 

I can recall many here who applied in Dec 2018 and got their ID card within 3 yrs. Dont understand why it took so long for you.

Things speeded up after the 2014 coup and 3 years became the new normal for a brief few years.  Things had already started slowing down a bit at the end of the coup government period and slowed down more under the Prayut government, despite no change in the minister. With Anutin as minister we are probably looking at 5+ years now to be realistic.  Before the 2014 coup 5 years years was considered good with many running at the 7-8 year mark and some 10-11. Before the first Thaksin regime it was 1-3 years.  Now Thaksin is back again.

On 4/21/2024 at 9:24 AM, DrJoy said:

Congratulations.

 

Usually its 10-12 working days, but may vary

Congrats to all in the latest batch.  I had to wait two months for the certificate but your mileage may indeed vary.  Bear in mind that many district offices now ask you to make an appointment to get your first ID card which can be a bummer, if you dash over there expecting to come out with an ID card like I did.

I note that Anutin signed the authorisation to publish in the RG on 5 April and it was published two weeks later which included Songkran.  That is very fast as there can often be a gap of six months or more between the publication date and the signature on the bottom. Somewhat less encouraging though is that this batch must have been approved by Anuphong, whereas Anutin merely approved publication in the RG of applicants already approved by the previous minister and probably by HMK before he actually started as interior minister.  Of course he has no choice but to publish applicants already approved by HMK in the RG.  So unfortunately it doesn't prove that Anutin is actually getting anything to do with citizenship done off his own bat and this batch might have been sitting in his in tray since his first day in the ministry.

Many are Thai names who are probably hill tribes or other minorities or displaced Thais.  I have never seen them mixed in with naturalisations of non-stateless applicants before.  They have always had their own batches.  They apply to district offices for initial processing but still have to go through the same section at the ministry for the final processing. I am not sure, if there is any significance to this new type of mixed batching. Probably not.

On 3/7/2024 at 6:36 PM, david143 said:

https://ratchakitcha.soc.go.th/documents/16436.pdf

Loss of thai Nationality
Signed By Anutin .
his First RG which was signed by him on ๒๒ ธันวาคม พ.ศ. ๒๕๖๖ 22 December 2023 and Published Today

Glad to see these were all voluntary renunciations.

On 1/16/2024 at 6:38 PM, Ebumbu said:

 

Your post seems sensible. Two questions: 

 

1) How do you see this playing out in terms of access to people who use cannabis medically (and recreationally) like myself. 

 

2) I'm concerned about what I read here about banning flowers. I can't take edibles or extracts due to gastritis. Do you think flowers will still be available for medical use? 

 

Thanks. 

They have told the media they will prevent shops selling fried flower but there is nothing about that in the draft bill.  I searched the word flower in Thai and nothing. No questions about that from shop owners and growers in the public hearing at the ministry either.  Perhaps it is something that will come later in ministerial regulations they don't need to get through parliament.

1 hour ago, jayboy said:

I understand that a Thai national's Tax Identity Number is the same at his/her 13 figure national identity number as issued by the Ministry Of Interior.

 

For foreigners with PR I wonder whether the same applies - ie the 13 figure number on the tabien baan/driving license/pink card etc - or is there a different method used?

Yes.  A PR's 13 digit ID number, which remains the same, if he upgrades to citizenship, should be used as his TIN. However, in cases where they or their company continue to use their old foreigner TIN, it doesn't seem to cause a problem. As a PR I filed for tax under my 13 digit number for years.  Then I moved to a company that ignored me when I told them to use my TIN.  They applied for a new foreigner TIN for me and insisted on using that the 3 years I worked there.  I filed my tax return under my 13 digit number as usual submitting the documentation from the company with the foreigner number.  The RD had no problem with this.

This has been posted before but probably not everyone has seen it. There was a detailed proposal under the first Thaksin government to merge the MOI departments that handle citizenship and PR together with the two SB citizenship departments (one for naturalisation and one for wives of Thai citizens) and the PR desk at CW that handles applications. As you would expect, it was resisted by the police tooth and nail and one of the arguments apparently fielded was that police couldn't bear to give up their police ranks (and parachute wings and medal ribbons too I guess) and become ordinary civil servants. So it got shot down or whoever was pushing it ran our of time in office.

As you know, the the 1967 ministerial regulations pursuant to the 1965 Nationality Act were revised last year, following a cabinet resolution in January 2022, and included a plan to kick SB out of the process completely and take it all in house at the MOI. For reasons that have not been disclosed the new ministerial regulations were not issued before the Prayut government that commissioned them left office - possibly due to the impracticality of setting MOI facilities for application in each province, as called for in the draft regulations.

It is a rough guess that, if the current minister and team ever get around to looking at this issue, they will probably want to go ahead and put the entire citizenship process under the MOI to have total control over it. The problem of provincial applications can be easily solved by having an office in Bangkok or Lamlukka handle applications nationwide in the same way as CW handles nationwide applications for PR.  There is huge inefficiency in the current system, e.g. why does SB need two citizenship departments when both of them are under worked?  Also there is the problem of lack of communication between SB and the MOI which looks down on the police and often leaves them guessing.

Personally I hope for future applicants that the current government doesn't get around to looking at the citizenship issue and doesn't make any changes to the process. Intuition tells me that any changes would be for worse.  Nearly in 2008 that allowed males with Thai wives to apply without PR. However, that was forced on an extremely reluctant MOI establishment by lawmakers intent on eliminating gender discrimination in the law (they succeeded only partially.)  My advice to anyone already qualified is not to procrastinate, as whatever happens to the regulations and SB's involvement, it is only likely to get harder.

24 minutes ago, cocoonclub said:

I recently travelled abroad with my PR. I went to Chaengwatthana before to get the endorsement and a multi entry reentry permit. 
 

question: is the above enough to travel abroad again? Or do I need to go to Chaengwatthana again to get another endorsement (because only the reentry permit has multiple entries)? 

Sounds like a mistake. Unless something has changed since I last did it before becoming a citizen, you should have the multi in your passport. I just double checked my old passport.  You better go back to CW and get it corrected.

18 hours ago, JayLeno said:

Hi all,

 

I have a question and I was wondering if you could help me. 

I have been employed and working in Thailand since 2015. I lost my job to COVID-19 and was in Thailand on a COVID-19 extension until I found a new job in April 2021. Am I eligible to apply for residency or nationality?

 

Best

You need 3 full tax years (1 Jan to 31 Dec) to qualify for both citizenship (with a Thai spouse) and PR, assuming you make the other qualifications.  PR has a specific application time which is announced annually and usually runs till the year end but I think you can apply at the end of your third year and submit tax return in the New Year. Citizenship is open for application any time. So you can apply after submitting your tax return for the 3rd year.  So, if you keep working continuously you will make the the 3 year qualification end 2024. For more info on PR see the AN Camerata PR thread.

One day the red book and the blue/white books will be replaced by smart card.  This will upset people whose job it is to issue these pointless documents. When will this happen? Could be next year or 20 years hence.  Is Anutin the man to shake things up? Probably not, or if he does it might not be to the advantage of PR holders, given his remarks about foreigners during COVID.

Looking at Anutin's monologues in media about drawing up a hit list of mafiosi appointed for reasons unknown as kamnans and pooyai baan at the Interior Ministry, gun control and other hot button issues,  I found my mind a wandering to what he might do to the citizenship application process, if anything.  The stage is set for him to make major changes, if he has a mind to do so, as a result of the failure of the Prayut government to issue the new ministerial regulations they ordered the ministry to draw up. We will have to see but something tells me that applicants will be better off, if he never turns his attention to this issue during his tenure.

1 hour ago, onthemoon said:

I recently turned 60 and asked the staff at the BTS to issue a Senior pass for me. They checked and said this is only for Thai citizens. I understand that they don't want to discount the fares for tourists, but I have PR and I pay taxes, like every Thai citizen. Does anybody know anything more about this?

That is BTS's racist policy I am  afraid.  Even as a Thai citizen they tried to refuse me, on the grounds of being not Thai in the eyes of the idiotic girl on the desk.  I had to cause a fuss and let an angry queue build up behind me.  I refused to budge from the queue and she refused to back down, so I suggested that, in the interests of the other passengers waiting, she might like to call her supervisor.  He arrived in seconds and ticked her office roundly, saying, "He is Thai. Give him the senior ticket NOW".  She went bright red at the loss of face. I still can't imagine what she thought she was trying to prove.

2 hours ago, Kayahammer said:

For what it's worth, I applied for PR early 2017, using the visa/HR lady at my work. She gathered all related documents from work and told me what I had to do (including photos outside my house, outside my village, inside all rooms in my house, outside my place of work, inside my pace of work). We submitted all the paperwork, and each subsequent time we went back they asked for something else. Each visit the immigration officers at CW tried to sell us things like a Thai course (wife informed them I didn't need it as I spoke Thai well enough), a fast track (no thanks, we can wait) etc. until we were called in to an unofficial interview where they asked about savings, assets etc. I'm not stupid, so I said we had none. They explained I would not pass unless we made a contribution (not their policy, but their superiors we were told). It wasn't a great amount, and we were cornered, so we paid. After that it was plain sailing. Short, easy interview. The visit from local immigration beforehand was tension filled as the main guy was not happy about having to perform this task, and didn't hide it.

 

The whole process was about a year.

 

As an aside, the visa lady from work tried to trick me out of 100K as a payment to immigration officials, which we refused to pay (immigration asked for a lot less than that).

 

I will add that having PR is nice, however I have since bought a couple of condos, and both land and house offices refused to accept I now have the right to buy a condo without sending money from overseas, even when I showed them the official rules and regs regarding foreigners purchasing property).

 

Lastly, I am about to get my PR renewed for the first time - does anyone know what documents I have to produce for this?

 

Thanks in advance

I think what happened with your HR lady was similar to what happens with lawyers and agents.  They quote huge fees, claiming that a large element is bribes for Immigration and maybe the MoI too but it is unlikely that they pay more than about 30k of it to CW Immigration, if anything.  They have very little decision making power and can't speed things up. It is unlikely that they pass anything higher up the chain than the front office CW staff, as it is much harder for them to get access and the applications go through a committee which makes it obvious to the others, if someone is getting favorable treatment.

20 hours ago, Thaindrew said:

I can see them potential saying that you haven't declared enough money to live so how are you living as a way of taxing you above what you have declared as bringing in. That's fraught with danger given the way other government office like immigration deal with things.

 

I suppose as a minimum you'd have to bring in and declare at least 65000 baht x 12 a year as living expenses to match what they insist people on retirement visas bring in (ignoring agents in the whole process for now). But what would the tax be on 780,000 Baht, not small for sure !

I think it is fair to assume that they will do this in the not too distant future. They already demand evidence of tax payment of employee and company for renewal of NON-B visas from what I recall.  Also they may well raise the monthly amounts and lump sum.  Under the first Thaksin regime they were raised  substantially when he first came to power in 2001 (I think the lump sum was raised from 200k, so 4x).   If you have already been in the country long enough for file a tax return and pay tax, there would be a logic to this for sure.  Some double tax treaties allow the country of residence to collect tax and make the taxpayer try to claim a refund of tax already deducted in the other jurisdiction. Others will allow the taxpayer to claim a tax credit for tax already deducted in the country of origin. 

If you are earning the minimum required for renewal, currently 65k a month, you are way above the threshold that requires you to do a Thai tax return. So Immigration could easily ask for a certified copy of your prior year tax return.  The current forms have a space to declare foreign income but I don't think there is anywhere you can claim a tax credit under a foreign DTA.

1 hour ago, StayinThailand2much said:

Knowing Thai bureaucracy, one may have to prove it. Say, you made x£/€/$ 20 years ago, then had it in a savings account till now, maybe they will ask you to prove that it was taxed 20 years ago in your home country. - I'm not suggesting that it will be like that, but who knows...

This new interpretation of the Revenue Code to mean ANY previous tax year, rather the apparent intent which was the THE previous tax year, gives rise to exactly that concern, since it appears to set no limit on how long ago that money was earned. Not only that the interest earned on the savings account going back indefinitely could also be deemed as taxable when remitted to Thailand.  The Revenue Code doesn't specify income from property or real estate, as many of the translations suggest, but actually says income earned from assets overseas which could be any form of income generating asset.  Furthermore there is no separate treatment of capital gains in the Revenue Code. So any capital gains, say from selling a house at any time in the past, could be taxed at progressive rates as income, if remitted to Thailand.

5 hours ago, h3ith said:

The Google translation refers to (A) "income due to work duties or business conducted abroad" or (B) "because of property". 

 

A) Section 40 of the revenue code:

A1) Any of us is a tax resident of TH if we stay more than 180 days. Tax residency has nothing to do with the immigration status or the type of extension. 

 

A2) "Income derived from employment, whether in the form of salary, wage, per diem, bonus, bounty, gratuity, pension, house rent allowance, monetary value of rent-free residence provided by an employer, ..." 

"Pension" among all these types of income seems to refer to private pensions paid by an employer, (perhaps) not government pensions.

The double-tax treaty between your country and TH regulates where government pensions and private pensions are taxable. In previous years, many retirees could not even get a Thai Tax ID even when they asked for one. 

 

B) Section 41 paragraph 2: capital gains, interest, dividends. "A resident of Thailand who in the previous tax year derived assessable income under Section 40 from an employment or from business carried on abroad or from a property situated abroad shall, upon bringing such assessable income into Thailand, pay tax." 

This decree does not change the current tax law, which only imposes tax on financial income if you transfer it into TH in the same calendar year when it was earned.

Employment income is different - it's always taxable in TH if you earn it while you are in TH, even if you receive it from a foreign employer and park it in a foreign bank account. 

 

(C) Income tax on capital, i.e. on the savings you transfer from your foreign savings account to TH: No, cannot happen. If you transfer 5mil THB of savings to buy a condo and TH were to impose 25% income tax on the incoming 5mil, then the real estate market would implode. This decree does not change the tax law, which only taxes income but not the substance or capital.

In the worst case, the revenue office may demand proof of how much financial income was included in the 5mil, e.g. 200,000 interest income in the months before it was transferred. Then they could impose a 5% tax on the 50,000 of interest that exceeds 150,000. That's not a new tax law. It was just not enforced. 

 

(D) TH has signed up for the Automatic Exchange of Information with most other countries. So if an account owner is registered with a TH residence address with his bank in the EU, ANZ or UK, then the TH revenue department will receive data about incoming payments the next year. In 2025, a foreigner who received a 2024 stream of payments from some Western business in his Western bank account may be asked to explain the source: "We've got these data from your foreign bank. Did you earn foreign business or employment income while you lived (and apparently worked) in TH?"  

A well thought out and explained commentary but there are some potential issues.

A2 There is a ruling for the RD's tax lawyers from the early 2000s that I can't lay my hands on for the moment to the effect that foreign pension income remitted to Thailand by Thai tax residents in the year it was earned was indeed deemed taxable income.  The RD has done nothing to try to enforce this probably because it would be too much trouble and very little would be collected, since a great deal of the pensions would be covered by DTAs. That is still true but this idea doesn't seem very well thought through, so nothing can be said to be impossible.

B Section 41 of the Revenue Code indeed appears to say that income earned abroad in the previous tax year is taxable when remitted to Thailand and that has always been the RD's interpretation until now.  However, when you look at the Thai original and take into account that Thai has no definite or indefinite articles, you can see that see that it could be interpreted as income earned abroad in a previous tax year is taxable when remitted to Thailand.  And that unfortunately appears to be the interpretation that Srettha as finance minister has instructed the RD to make.  If you consider the intent, it seems that the previous interpretation was intended.  That is a wordy language and makes up for vagaries like having no definite or indefinite articles by adding more phrasing for the avoidance of doubt, e.g. "in any previous tax year whatsoever".  But the drafters didn't say that which implies they meant only the previous tax year for which you have to file a tax return.  Some may say this interpretation is non-intuitive and is merely a sleight of hand tactic by the government to try to raise more revenue without the need to subject amendments to the Revenue Code to parliamentary scrutiny and test the unity of the marriage of convenience coalition. It could be that the new interpretation will be challenged in the tax court.

D The exchange of information agreement is a concern in this context.  I received a letter from the UK taxman accusing me of concealing income that had obviously come from a bank somewhere reporting a remittance. I had to pay my tax accountant to send them a letter explaining that I was a non-UK tax resident but regularly filed tax returns on UK sourced income. The same could easily happen in reverse in Thailand.

I was just browsing the British Embassy's website to advise a friend who needs a notarized passport copy (one of the few notary services they still offer) and came across this.

Letter of no objection for a Thai citizenship application

This service is available by post. It costs £75 plus a postage fee of £2.

This letter is for British nationals making an application for Thai citizenship. To apply, follow the instructions in the Application Pack – Thai citizenship letter of no objection (ODT, 22.6 KB).

A letter of no objection seems a far cry from what the MOI seems to want from embassies but, if the Brits have really persuaded them to accept that or left them with little choice, good for them. I wonder what the current version says, as there isn't a copy of the text in the information pack. The original letter, after they stopped doing the affidavits, was a sort of acknowledgement that the person in question was applying for Thai citizenship but pointed out that British citizens can have as many citizenships as they like and the government cannot force them to renounce citizenship.  I guess this is the same in essence as a no objection letter. So the current text may be the same.

2 hours ago, samran said:

Interesting slide on the screen. Its a little blurry but it looks like some stats on citizenship applications. Can't quite read it, but maybe if someone has some sort of picture enhancer it would clear up and we can read it. 

I sharpened it up as much as possible in Lightroom and translated it with the Google translate camera which did a better job of deciphering the characters than my own eyes but a not so good job of translating it. The second part must people who applied for naturalization, if the first part is foreign women who applied to adopt Thai husband's nationality. Foreign wives rejected looks like 300 and something but the number approved is obscured on the slide, although it looks to be a 4 digit number. Likewise applicants for naturalization is a undeterminable 4 digit number, while rejections looks like 459, not 555.

No time period for these stats but it must be 10 years or more.  What is surprising is the number of rejections, as we never hear of outright rejections and tend to assume that one the one hand, everyone who meets the qualifications passes, and that on the other hand SB is smart enough not to put up applicants who are unqualified.  I still believe that the former is true but I would guess the tendency for the rejections are cases where SB let some slip through the net and/or applicants who become unqualified in between applying at SB and being interviewed, e.g. got divorced, became unemployed and WP was requested. This thread also probably has some survivorship bias, i.e. most of the posters are fully qualified and persistent enough to deal with the inevitable banana skins lobbed in their path.

1 hour ago, Somjot said:

 

Phantastic thread by the way.

 

I've been thinking about Thai citizenship for quite some time now.

 

I have permanent residency since 2006, as it was mandatory to get a blue tabien baan, which again was one of many requirements to be allowed to certain exams. To pass them, which I finally managed 2010, would allow me to work in my profession in Thailand.

 

I do see the advantages of Thai citizenship, but I am not much interested in buying land or a house as I live in a beautiful one already, perfectly located for my needs, with a 30-year lease.

 

The residency is very comfortable and as all I must do, is getting my multiple re-entry permit, in case I want to travel abroad, which is not a big deal.

 

The advantage is, that I am 100% legal.

 

Thai citizenship requires to surrender the original one, mine being German, which I definitely don't want to.

 

I have read in here, that it only requires “the intention to surrender the original citizenship”, but despite not having any experience with that, I doubt, the officials would accept any excuse like: “of course I intended to give back my citizenship but later I changed my intentions which is only human.”

 

I'm pretty much sure the reason why they did not write “MUST give back the original citizenship” is, that many countries simply do not allow it and you just can`t give it back.

 

But the German one can be given back, even worse, if you successfully apply for a new citizenship without asking for permission in advance, your German one is automatically revoked, once they find out.

 

Any suggestions?

 

And apologies, I did not read the entire thread, but I will do as soon as I have the time.

 

I know a couple of Germans who are naturalised Thais. The procedure was to obtain permission to retain German nationality from foreign ministry in Berlin before you apply for Thai citizenship. You need to present what is considered a good reason. Historically they have accepted that an applicant needs Thai nationality to own his own business and/or land without the disadvantage of having to use a Thai nominee and, of course wishes to retain strong links with Germany and ultimately move back there, which is of course contradictory to the intent to remain permanently in Thailand when you apply for Thai nationality but that doesn't seem to matter.  In the past AFAIK the German embassy has been willing to provide the affidavit about renouncing German nationality, even though the applicant has been given permission to actually retain German citizenship.  You ought to check with the embassy that this is the case.

Re your questions about the MOI doesn't ask for a renunciation certificate, as indeed Germany does from new German citizens who have not been given permission to hold dual nationality.  I am sure they would love to ask for this but they cannot because it is not authorized in the Nationality Act which makes provision for revocation of Thai nationality of dual citizens in certain circumstances but makes no provision for forced renunciation of their other nationalities.  So the MOI goes as far as it thinks it can without overstepping its authority under the Act which it fears could lead to law suits in the Administrative Court. A recent case where the MOI was sued for revoking Thai citizenship dragged on for 16 years and ended up with the ministry losing the case and having to reinstate a couple's Thai nationality. There are some powerful people who either have dual nationality or their children have which has historically prevented the MOI from having more specific and general prohibitions against dual amended into the Nationality Act. in 1992 the Act was in fact amended to allow the MOI to strip Thai nationality from luk krung, unless they renounced their other nationality between the ages of 20 and 21 and this happened under a military installed government without any public outcry in the media.  But it was obviously very upsetting to a person or persons of consequence because the law was amended again only three weeks later to dilute the offending clause, so as to mean that luk krung had the right but the not the obligation to renounce Thai nationality at that age, if they wised to retain their other nationality, which some might choose to do, if they lived outside Thailand and were forced to do so to retain their other nationality.  Very few countries actually check up on this and I can't recall seeing a single case in the RG.  Asking for the affidavit was only introduced in 2009 and is not in the Act or ministerial regulations and therefore is potentially open to legal challenge. It is effective with nationalities that prohibit dual nationality because they inform the embassies once Thai citizenship is granted.  Since a lot of the applicants are from China and India, this may have the effect of forcing those nationalities to renounce their birth citizenships, although I am not sure how strict China is over this.

12 hours ago, onthemoon said:

Thanks. Let me c&p this sentence: "The competent official must complete the process within 90 days or 120 days in the case of filing abroad. which can be extended for no more than 30 days at a time". I don't know whether this means the DOPA needs to send the file to the committee within that time frame, or who the "competent official" is. I haven't read the original Thai text yet, though. FWIW I am attaching a file I saved on my computer in 2020. Hm.

 

BTW I did not see anything about a language test by Chula in the files you attached, I did read this: "Tuition from an educational institution in Thailand at least at the primary level". It's a course offered by some established language schools, and you study at your own pace. Three months, two years, up to you. The primary school final exam for foreigners is at the Ministry of Education (I think once or twice a year). I got my Thai Primary School degree (ป. 6) this way in the early 2000s.

 

 

 

I think the idea was send the file to the next stage at the MOI within 90 days after the applicant has signed the application.  That covers the period the file is going around the narcotics agency and the NIA interview.  That was what was in the flow chart on SB's website some years ago.  So I assume they just rehashed it, except that SB would no longer be involved.

Chula was not mentioned in the cabinet resolution but I saw the suggestion that Chula would be asked to help design the tests in an article somewhere but can no longer find it. It seems logical that an educational institute like Chula that has a course of Thai for foreigners would be involved but who knows what they will do when they get around to it. 

I think the dea of Por 6 was exempt applicants from language testing if they had graduated from Thai medium school at Por 6 or higher.  It would be tempting to think that would include a pass in the Por 6 for foreigners exam, assuming it still exists, but I somehow doubt that would count because they have probably never heard of it.  I presented my own Por 6 for foreigners certificate to SB, thinking they would very impressed and might even let me off the language testing.  But they simply had no idea what it was, were unimpressed when I explained and I even had to push them to include a copy of it in my file.

It is interesting to note that there is hardly anything of consequence in the 1967 ministerial regulations that it took them the better part of two years to publish after the 1965 Nationality Act which probably meant no one could apply in that time. I think it also quite likely that most of the regulations were cut and paste from the previous ones pursuant to the previous nationality act, as indeed was the nationality act itself, but the new act specified that they had to be redrafted.  What is significant in the 1967 regulations is the impractical system of requiring applications in the province of residence which the new draft regulations failed to address after 55 years of the chaos caused by that. They only took away the initial application processing away from SB and gave it to DOPA, which they perhaps believed might solve the problem in the provinces.  The 1967 regulations also specified that the definition of knowledge of the Thai language is the ability to speak and understand it.  The new draft regulations seemed to expand on that by requiring more rigorous testing but I think but am not certain that they stopped short of testing for reading and writing ability.

It is odd that the regulations have not been regularly updated but we know that ministerial guidelines in 2009 added the requirement for the affidavit which has also been made somewhat impractical by the refusal of certain embassies to cooperate (understandable on their part). Ministerial guidelines, unlike ministerial regulations, are not published in the Royal Gazette and do not technically have the force of law.  There was apparently no reference to the affidavit in the cabinet resolution or the draft ministerial regulations.

Since the last government failed to get the draft ministerial regulations into the RG, we will have to wait and see what happens to them under the next government. Since the new interior minister was in the cabinet that resolved what should be in the regulations in January 2022, it could be that he will publish the draft that has already been written.