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Mayor says local ‘red shirts’ under control
Doesn’t expect violence
Chatchanan Boonnak
Mayor Itthiphol Kunplome doesn’t see conflict between
red-shirted anti-government demonstrators and “no color” opposition forces
to escalate in Pattaya, but says he is watching both sides vigilantly.
Speaking to the Pattaya Business & Tourism Association
April 28, Itthiphol proposed inviting foreign ambassadors to the city to
witness for themselves that Pattaya is safe, calm and devoid of the violence
that has wracked red-shirt protests in Bangkok.
Both the mayor and business leaders are concerned about
foreign-government travel warnings such as those issued by the United
Kingdom, which specifically mentioned Pattaya in advising tourists to avoid
all but essential travel to the entirety of Thailand. The British Foreign
Office cited “unpredictable” rallies and gatherings in Pattaya, as well as
Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai.
Itthiphol, however, maintains that while red-shirt
protestors have gotten into shouting matches with allegedly un-aligned, but
ultimately pro-government “no color” demonstrators, there has been no
violence and none is expected.
The mayor said he is in constant communication with both
sides and the city has received good cooperation, such as when the red
shirts left their stage at Pattaya City Hall during the final days of
Songkran. While they ultimately returned, their assembly has been peaceful
and been closely monitored by police.
“Police have been able to control the situation,” he
said. “No one should worry right now as the city is getting good cooperation
from the police in controlling the situation.”
Mayor Kunplome, part of a large political family that has
always been independent of the ruling Democrat Party and the opposition
forces aligned with fugitive former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, said
he has not taken sides in the dispute and is happy to act as moderator if
asked.
He also added the city does not intend to disperse the
red-shirt demonstrators, as government forces have done in Bangkok, setting
off several deadly clashes. He said his concern is that the protestors don’t
abuse city services and maintain peace so tourists will continue to visit
Pattaya.
Man shoots pistol near red shirt rally site
Police and red-shirted demonstrators try to assess the
situation after what was then an unknown gunman had fired a shot near their
rally site at Pattaya City Hall.
Boonlua Chatree
With the long drawn out anti-government rallies that the
whole country has been enduring for many months, a resident of Bangkok in
town for the weekend caused a slight panic amongst the red shirts
demonstrating in front of city hall when he fired off his pistol.
The incident occurred on the night of April 27, when a 39
year old man ‘saw red’ as he drove past city hall where the red shirts have
been gathering for the past few months demonstrating against the government
calling for a dissolution of parliament.
Not able to control his pent-up frustration any longer,
he pulled out his 9mm pistol and fired a shot into the air before speeding
off.
Witnesses who saw the incident told police that the shot
was fired from a white minivan and were also able to identify the license
plate number.
Police did not have to search far, because the next day,
his angry emotions having subsided, the gunman felt a sense of remorse and
decided to turn himself in. He also surrendered his weapon and bullets.
He told police that it was not his intention to harm
anyone or to break the law, but the ongoing tension and strife between the
people of Thailand was becoming too unbearable and was getting on his
nerves.
He said that he willingly turned himself in because he
wanted to show the public that no one was above the law and that when one
breaks the law, one must accept the consequences. Police remanded the person
into custody awaiting due process of the law.
Pattaya looks to bring order to Wong Amat beachfront
Popular Wong Amat Beach will soon have
designated
swimming areas for public safety.
Montree Kotchawong
Hoping to prevent accidents like those that occurred off
busy Koh Larn beaches, Pattaya officials plan to quickly bring some order to
marine-related activities at increasingly popular Wong Amat Beach.
With the opening of new, large resorts, Wong Amat has
seen a rapid increase in the number of beach vendors, including those
hawking jet skis, parasailing and banana-boat rides. Combined with a growing
number of swimmers, the area is ripe for an accident unless something is
done, officials say.
In a first step at bringing an order to the chaos, Deputy
Mayor Ronakit Ekasingh met with Pattaya Marine Office 6 Director Wittaya
Chayanukulkitti April 22. Together they detailed a plan to cordon off
swimming areas and organize where marine sports vendors can operate.
Wong Amat will soon have five designated swimming and
boating areas. Zones will be set up on beaches in front of the Centara Grand
Hotel & Resort, Garden Beach Resort, Long Beach Hotel and Park Beach Condo
Hotel. Another zone will run from the Saranchon Condominium to Saiyoi House.
Details on the actual size and placement of each zone
will be decided in future meetings.
Yellow-tinged ‘no color’ group to launch daily rallies in Sattahip
The “no colors” group in Sattahip say they plan
to meet
each night at 5 p.m. for an hour of rallies.
Patcharapol Panrak
Members of the growing “no color” movement opposed to
anti-government protestors have vowed to assemble for an hour every night in
Sattahip until the so-called “red shirts” give up their demonstrations in
Bangkok.
About 1,000 Sattahip-area residents - dressed in a
multitude of colors but led by Rang Rockestra, a former leader of the
yellow-shirted People’s Alliance for Democracy - launched their
counter-rally at Prince Chumporn Park in Sattahip April 28. The noisy
assembly saw the crowd sing the national anthem, listen to pro-monarchy and
anti-red shirt speeches and wave Thai flags and pictures of HM the King
around for a distance of one kilometer.
From loudspeakers mounted on trucks to a central stage,
the supposedly non-aligned group urged Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva not
to dissolve parliament as the red shirts demand. Echoing the yellow-shirted
PAD’s central theme, the group also urged the government to protect the
monarchy, which they see as threatened by the red shirts and their
self-exiled leader, fugitive former prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra.
TAT targets Thai tourists to
offset loss of foreign visitors
Phasakorn Channgam
With foreign tourists increasingly scared to visit
Thailand due to bloody protests by red-shirted anti-government
demonstrators in Bangkok, the Tourism Authority of Thailand is looking
to the domestic market to prop up Pattaya’s tourism industry.
TAT Pattaya Director Niti Kongkrut asked the Pattaya
Business & Tourism Association at its April 28 meeting to participate in
TAT “road shows” it has planned for southern and eastern parts of the
country this month and next.
“While Pattaya has not been directly affected by the
riots, the real problem is that the entire world is thinking Thailand is
dangerous,” association Vice-President Sinchai Wattanasartsathorn said.
“Many tour groups from China and Hong Kong have already canceled and the
end of high season also brings an end to European holidays. This clearly
has resulted in fewer tourists in Pattaya.”
Kongkrut said TAT will market Pattaya to southern
Thais this month and those in the east in June. The agency is hopeful it
will generate new business for the city.
Yaya wins Chonburi Council seat serving Nongprue
Boonlua Chatree
Yaya Sensuri of the “We Protect Chonburi” party was
elected the new Chonburi Council member for the Nongprue area of Banglamung
District.
Yaya Sensuri has been elected new Chonburi Council member
representing Nongprue.
Yaya beat out Sayan Chanthong and Pongpichet
Kanchanasombat, taking 3,196 of the 23,338 votes cast. Sayan garnered 2,763
votes and Pongpichet just 849. Despite low voter turnout of just under 32
percent, official Election Council certification is expected within 30 days.
The council member-elect said he was excited to have won
the opportunity to serve the Nongprue Municipality and will focus on
obtaining funding to improve roads, support all religions and grow
employment in the area so the many residents who could not vote as they have
to work outside Nongprue could find jobs closer to home.
Naklua Market vendors unnerved by recent fire want improved city safety efforts
The New Naklua Market - residents are worried it gets too
crowded there and blocked access roads could lead to an increased risk of
fire devastation.
Phasakorn Channgam
The recent fire behind the new Naklua Market has unnerved
vendors there who, afraid of another, even more devastating fire breaking
out, are urging the city to better regulate vendors and traffic there.
About 50 market businesspeople complained to deputy
mayors Wutisak Rermkitkarn and Ronakit Ekasingh April 21 that vendor sprawl
would make battling a fire in the area difficult and that traffic,
particularly during Naklua’s Sunday market, would stop emergency vehicles
from getting to fires quickly.
Wutisak told the vendors that the city will begin
stationing a small Public Disaster Prevention Division fire truck in the new
market area and equip officers stationed there around the clock with
additional fire extinguishers to improve response times. The city will also
study moving the Sunday market to a different area.
New market area residents and business owners became
alarmed after a fire broke out behind the market April 16 in a two-storey
commercial building. The fire quickly spread to an adjacent building,
leaving three full blocks in flames. No one was killed in the blaze, but one
woman was hospitalized and more than 2 million baht in damage was done.
Vendors say the market stands scattered everywhere have
resulted in blocked access roads and an increased risk of fire. They want
police to better manage stand placement, manage traffic flow and tow any
cars or motorbikes blocking access that could be used by emergency vehicles.
They also want the city to return an area to the current
market for just the Sunday sales. After the city took back this area, the
new Naklua Market became too crowded, they say, and a Sunday afternoon fire
could be devastating.
Pattaya steps up fire prevention with new station, public extinguishers
The fire station on Soi Chaiyapruek is scheduled to
operational soon.
Vimolrat Singnikorn
Pattaya is stepping up its fire-prevention efforts by
opening the new Soi Chaiyapruek station and installing fire extinguishers in
busy market and entertainment areas.
Deputy Mayor Ronakit Ekasingh said April 23 that the new
station, which will cover Jomtien Beach, should be fully operational within
a month with 50 firefighters on staff. The Soi Chaiyapruek facility will
complement Pattaya’s two other fire stations in Naklua and South Pattaya.
Those stations boast a total of 130 firemen with 10 fire engines and
hook-ladder trucks.
The renewed fire-safety push comes after a large blaze
April 16 behind the new Naklua Market and five other smaller fires during
the Songkran period. Ronakit reminded the public that the hot, dry months
bring more risk of fires, particularly from faulty electrical systems pushed
to the max by heavy air conditioner use.
In addition to opening the new firehouse, the city also
plans to station a small engine full time at the Naklua Market and equip
officers there with fire extinguishers in case other engines cannot reach a
blaze there quickly.
The city will also install public fire extinguishers on
Walking Street and other in entertainment areas to better improve response
to fires. The new equipment will coincide with training seminars for people
in those areas.
Good Thai Samaritan
returns Belgian’s wallet
Theerarak Suthathiwong
A Belgian tourist who lost his wallet had his Pattaya
holiday saved by a Thai man who found it floating in the sea.
Weerawat Uamphakdee (center) returns the wallet he found
to Philippe Dacquet (right) as a policeman looks on.
Philippe Dacquet, 28, reported his wallet lost April 25,
the same day as 31-year-old Weerawat Uamphakdee, visiting Pattaya from Samut
Prakan, turned into authorities a wallet he found while swimming off Jomtien
Beach. Containing 2,620 baht, five credit cards and other valuable
documents, the wallet was the same one Dacquet lost.
Dacquet thanked Weerawat for returning the wallet, saying
his honesty was much appreciated. Weerawat said he turned in the wallet
immediately after finding it by calling the Pattaya 1337 Call Center.
Irishman attacked by 6 Iranians after ‘rescuing’ Thai woman from fight
Boonlua Chatree
A Persian-Irish man who thought he was helping a damsel
in distress may have, in fact, been set up by her for a beating and robbery.
Emergency workers tend to Reza Shiraz, the latter having
allegedly been attacked and robbed by Middle Eastern men.
Reza Shiraz, 31, suffered stab wounds and other injuries
after being jumped by six Iranians on Pratamnak Soi 6 in the early hours of
April 26. He was also robbed of about 1,500 baht.
The incident stemmed from a fight between a Thai woman
and several Middle Eastern men at the Arabian Beer Bar group near Soi Marina
Plaza and Pratamnak Road. Shiraz broke up the fight and offered to take the
woman to the hospital. However, en route, she received a phone call and
asked her rescuer to make a stop on Soi 6.
There the six men on three motorbikes attacked and robbed
Shiraz, a story confirmed by a construction worker who had been sleeping
nearby.
Police are now investigating whether the attack was an elaborate plan to
rob the Irish national.
Growing up homeless
in the shadow of luxury
Patcharapol Panrak
Although she grew up in the shadow of luxury, Sarocha
Chompoo has known none of it during her 14 years on earth.
Social workers visit with young Sarocha Chompoo at her
“house” next to Sukhawadee Mansion in Pattaya.
Raised in a series of ramshackle huts in the Wat Chonglom
cemetery next to the 300 million baht Sukhawadee Mansion in Pattaya, the
14-year-old washes dishes and collects garbage to support herself and father
Thongplaew, 36. She no longer attends school, due to both a persistent
toothache and because she lost all her school uniforms and books when her
hut burned down for the third time.
The plight of “Nong Sai” is well known. She and her
father were discovered living in the cemetery in November 2007 by a security
guard at Sukhawadee, the opulent, French-style tourist attraction built by
Saha Chicken Farms President Panya Chotithewan. She was only 11 then and
still attended Pattaya School No. 2 where her teacher set up a bank account
to donate what money they could to help her. Panya also sent staff to give
her food from time to time.
The charity was not enough to get them out of the
cemetery, however. When a Pattaya Mail reporter went back to Wat Chonglom
April 22 there she was; now 14, out of school and searching for materials to
rebuild the family hut after yet another fire.
There is supposedly some money left in the bank account
her teacher set up and she said her father, who has to rely on friends to
even get enough food for the two to eat, is allegedly checking to see if
there is enough cash left to get his daughter uniforms and books for the new
semester.
Sarocha’s bank account is at the Government Savings Bank’s Banglamung
branch, account 03-2105-20-112608-2.
Maid electrocuted by newly installed water heater
Theerarak Suthathiwong
A 42-year-old housemaid was killed when she was
electrocuted while cleaning the bathroom of a Pattaya home.
Sirirat Manjai was pronounced dead by paramedics in the
second floor bedroom of her employer’s Soi Chalermprakiat 21 house April 21.
She was lying on the floor next to the bed, her left hand and arm bearing
signs of an electrical burn.
Homeowner Duanpen Chanlert, 48, said Sirirat had been
cleaning the bedroom, which belonged to her Japanese stepson, while he was
at work at the Mabtaput Industrial Estate in Rayong. Duanpen said she heard
the maid scream for help and found her on the bathroom floor, still alive.
She pulled Sirirat into the bedroom to provide first aid, but the maid died
before help arrived.
Police assumed Sirirat was electrocuted when she touched
the ungrounded water heater, which had been installed just a month ago.
Aussie arrested for working without a work permit
 Boonlua
Chatree
The Australian owner of the Kilkenny Budget Hotel & Bar
on Soi LK Metro got an unwelcome visitor in the form of Chonburi Immigration
Police who arrested him for working without a work permit.
Ronald Bruce Cahill allegedly was caught serving
customers in the Kilkenny Budget Hotel & Bar on Soi LK Metro.
Ronald Bruce Cahill, 59, allegedly was caught serving
customers in the pub of the 16-room guesthouse April 26. While he did have a
valid retirement visa, he was found not to have a permit to work in the
hotel or bar, which he took over in October.
Immigration police took various company papers and copies
of Cahill’s passport before taking the Australian to Pattaya Police Station
for processing.
Briton whacked with high heel for meddling in bar girl negotiation
Boonlua Chatree
A British man who meddled in negotiations between a bar
girl and her customer got a high-heeled shoe to the head as reward for his
advice.
Chuthathip Lippanon tearfully confessed to the Soi
Buakhao beer bar attack.
Tony Hickey, 52, suffered a bloody cut to the skull from
the heel of 28-year-old Chuthathip Lippanon in the early hours of April 29.
Chuthathip tearfully confessed to the Soi Buakhao beer bar attack, admitting
she was incensed that Hickey had attempted to void an agreement she had made
with his friend, who she’d met in another bar.
Hickey explained to police that he’d bumped into his
mate, who’d asked him if the 1,000 baht he’d agreed to pay the girl to stay
the night with him was too much. Hickey advised his friend to pay only half
that much. Saying that not only was Hickey’s suggested fee insulting, he was
sticking his nose where it didn’t belong. So she smacked him.
Hickey declined to press charges, but negotiated his own fee of 3,000
baht, leaving the bar girl without a customer and a good chunk of her coming
month’s salary, which she agreed to pay Hickey if they meet again later.
5 Aussies inflict ‘Outback justice’ on drunken countryman
Boonlua Chatree
A drunken Australian suffered serious cuts to the back,
neck and head after a group of his fellow countrymen decided to settle their
dispute like they do in the Outback.
Anthony Gayunld (right) talks with police about what had
transpired to leave him dazed and bloodied near Soi 6.
Anthony Gayunld, 29, was found by police and paramedics
outside a bar at the corner of Soi 6 and Second Road shortly after midnight
May 1. Severely intoxicated, Gayunld refused to go to the hospital and was
instead taken back to his residence by police to clean up.
The victim told police he’d gotten into an argument with
four or five fellow Aussies who then beat and slashed him with a knife.
Police invited Gayunld to return to Pattaya Police Station once he’d
sobered up to file a full report.
Thai Red Cross marks
117 years in Sriracha
Theerarak Suthathiwong
The Thai Red Cross celebrated its 117th anniversary at
its birthplace by giving out free blood tests and plants.
Surat Sitthipongsri, deputy director of Queen
Sawangwattana Memorial Hospital and friends visit the exhibit of Thai and
international Red Cross history.
Surat Sitthipongsri, deputy director of Queen
Sawangwattana Memorial Hospital presided over the ceremony at the Sriracha
facility where the Thai Red Cross was started on April 26, 1893. The
celebration also saw an exhibit of Thai and international Red Cross history.
Attendees also were able to take advantage of blood tests to check
physical mass and sugar levels. Also, 500 plants were given out as gifts.
Khao Kheow penguins think high temps for the birds
Tourists help feed the “hot” penguins at Khao Kheow Open
Zoo.
Theerarak Suthathiwong
Steamy temperatures have penguins at the Khao Kheow Open
Zoo dreaming of Antarctica.
With the thermometer pushing 40 degrees Celsius most
days, the cold-weather birds have been suffering. Zoo Director Syriya
Sangpong said zookeepers are working overtime to keep the penguins’ pen as
cool as possible by dropping grated ice into their pool.
Syriya said ice blocks would last longer but officials
were afraid the birds would instinctively fear the cubes, thinking they were
part of a dangerous glacier. That might keep them out of the water and too
hot to perform for tourists, he said.
Pakistani ambassador tours Darul Ibadah Mosque
Pakistan’s ambassador to Thailand HE Sohail Mehmood (5th
left) receives a warm welcome from Faruk Wongborisuthi (4th right) and
members of the Chonburi Islamic Commission.
Thanachot Anuwan
Pakistan’s ambassador to Thailand visited Pattaya’s Darul
Ibadah Mosque to see first-hand how seven years of ongoing construction have
reshaped the 66-year-old mosque.
Sohail Mehmood was escorted on his April 25 tour by Faruk
Wongborisuthi, vice president of the Chonburi Islamic Commission. The
ambassador attended a religious ceremony and enjoyed dinner at the mosque.
The first mosque in Pattaya, Darul Ibadah was first built
on the Sukhumvit Road-Central Pattaya Road location in 1943. It was replaced
by a two-storey wooden building and, then again, by a single-story concrete
structure 30 years ago. But that mosque had fallen into disrepair and the
current Darul Ibadah was built in 2003. Construction on its facilities
continues to this day.
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