Five Illegal Myanmar Tour Guides Arrested on Pha Ngan Island

[webfact]

Surat Thani – Five Illegal Myanmar tour guides were arrested on Pha Ngan Island on Thursday (May 23rd).

Surat Thani Immigration told the Phuket Express that they received complaints that there were many illegal Myanmar tour guides on Samui Island. Surat Thani officers pretended to be customers buying tour packages on two tour boats. The boats departed from Samui Island to Tao Island (Turtle Island).

 

Myanmar nationals on the tour boats explained tour programs to customers and tour boats stopped at small islands to let customers enjoy snorkeling while they were being serviced by illegal Myanmar tour guides.

 

By Goongnang Suksawat

PHOTO: mgronline

 

Full story: THE PHUKET EXPRESS 2024-05-24

 

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[George Bowman]

11 minutes ago, webfact said:

Myanmar nationals on the tour boats explained tour programs to customers

I'm assuming that the conversations were in English. The Ministry of Education should have a think about this.

[Tropicalevo]

8 minutes ago, George Bowman said:

I'm assuming that the conversations were in English. The Ministry of Education should have a think about this.

That is just one problem.

Thais who can speak good English can get better paid jobs in 5 star hotels or in the cities where street food is abundant.

Many Thais do not like working on the islands. Not easy to walk to food areas and shops, costs are higher, less Thais to integrate with, little or no public transport etc

I have heard many reasons over the years.

Then we have post Covid.

During Covid, most hotels and tourism service businesses just sacked all staff. The Thais went back to the mainland.

We still have major staff shortages on the islands. Thais are not rushing back.

One hotel recently advertised a starting salary of 24,000 baht per month for cleaners. (I lost two staff to the hotel.)

[brianthainess]

4 hours ago, George Bowman said:

I'm assuming that the conversations were in English. The Ministry of Education should have a think about this.

Was thinking the same, same with Cambodians, even Thais Spleeking Eglish

are hard to understand, now Peas sit down and have a Dink.

[crazykopite]

I’m confused the headlines read Phangan but then it states the arrests were in Koh Samui. 

[Tropicalevo]

53 minutes ago, crazykopite said:

I’m confused the headlines read Phangan but then it states the arrests were in Koh Samui. 

Confusing for sure.

The tours go from Koh Samui to Koh Tao.

They seem to have been arrested and taken to Koh Tao police station.

Koh Tao is a sub district of Koh Phangan.

From the original story -

"The suspects were taken to the Koh Tao Police Station in the Koh Pha Ngan district to face charges of being illegal tour guides."

[khunPer]

Myanmar workers have for long time been in high value for the tourism industry due to their better English skills. Samui and her sister-islands – i.e. Phangan and Tao – have many Western or relative good English speaking vistiters, Chinese were only 15% in the pre covid stats while both Brits and Germans each were 10%; the Chinese are not yet back, however both Ukrainians and Russians have instead increased the last few years.