Thai protests: heckling of royalty in ‘motorcade moment’ reveals escalating showdown

Name: Thai police arrest 21 at pro-democracy rally, drawing chants against royal motorcade
Uploaded: 2020-10-19T14:30:21.000Z
Duration: 3 min 5 s
Description: Thai police arrest 21 at pro-democracy rally, drawing chants against royal motorcade

Unprecedented heckling of a motorcade carrying Thai Queen Suthida and heir apparent reveals how youth-driven protest movement is breaking taboos

The monarchy as an institution is still of inestimable importance to many Thais, who balk at the idea of it being brought into the reform conversation

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Thai police arrest 21 at pro-democracy rally, drawing chants against royal motorcade

SCMP Reporters

Published: 10:30pm, 19 Oct 2020Updated: 9:29pm, 25 Nov 2020

For decades, the monarchy has occupied a position of inestimable importance in Thai society, protected by a lèse-majesté law that can see transgressors jailed for years.

Last week’s unprecedented heckling of a motorcade carrying Queen Suthida and the King’s youngest son, however, reveals how the confrontation between Thailand’s youth-driven protest movement and the authorities has escalated.

Despite emergency rules banning gatherings of more than four people in the capital and Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha declaring he will not step down, protesters have still gathered en masse to rail against Thailand’s entire power structure, from the monarchy at its apogee to the army, government and billionaire tycoons who hold the system in place.

On Wednesday in downtown Bangkok, dozens of demonstrators lined the motorcade’s route and raised a three-finger salute taken from The Hunger Games film series that has become the symbol of the ongoing protest movement. Some could be heard chanting “my tax, my tax” about the country’s highest institution in rough Thai slang, which is considered abrasive language for an elder and unthinkable for use on royalty.

King Maha Vajiralongkorn, unlike his popular father who reigned for 70 years, is a distant figure to most Thais – spending most of his time overseas in Germany. Since ascending to the throne in 2016, his moves to cherry-pick palace and army positions, put key military units under his direct command and take control of the assets of the immensely wealthy Crown Property Bureau have raised fears Thailand is abandoning its model of constitutional monarchy.

The bureau is estimated to hold more than US$40 billion in real estate, shares and other assets, although the exact value of its holdings and investments is not made public.

As a kid they told us to love [the king] so I did, then I went onto the internet and learned about things that changed my mind

Mee, 19-year-old Thai protester

For protesters like 19-year-old student Mee, who only gave one name, the king is an unknowable figure, and the monarchy? “I’m just not into it.”