Moken sea gypsies seek help from Gen Prawit Wongsuwan



BANGKOK: -- A group of about 30 Moken sea gypsies from Phuket showed up at the Government House today (Tuesday) to seek help from Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan to settle their land dispute with a real estate developer.

In a petition addressed to General Prawit, also defence minister, the sea gypsies led by Mr Maitree Chongkraichak, coordinator of Ban Rawai sea gypsies network, the Moken ethnic people referred to an incident last month when about 100 people allegedly hired by the real state developer, Baron World Trade Company, blocked access to their community on the Raiwai beach with boulders culminating to a scuffle between the two sides.

The sea gypsies called on the Land Department to revoke the land right document issued to the real estate developer which, they claimed, overlaps on 19 rai of their ancestral land on the Rawai beach.

They also asked a committee tasked with solving land conflicts to investigate whether the land right document issued to the real estate developer was done legally because the 33 rai of land purportedly owned by the developer have overlapped on their ancestral land which covers a passage way to their community and the burial ground of their ancestors.

After having submitted their petition, the group was huddled in a meeting with Pol Lt-Gen Thammasak Wicharaya, the assistant national police chief.

Pol Lt-Gen Thammasak said he would get more information about the land dispute in addition to the information provided by the sea gypsies. He said that the authorities were concerned with the plight of all concerned.

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/content/150220


-- Thai PBS 2016-02-10

"concerned about all concerned"

In order:

1. The brown envelope recipients

2. The developers

3. The gypsies.