Worrying 'insecurity game' in Thailand's south

Janadas Devan, The Straits Times, Asia News Network, Singapore

Thailand should not be experiencing a "Muslim problem".

For one thing, more than almost every other Southeast Asian country, it has successfully assimilated its many ethnic and religious minorities. The fact that its current prime minister and many of his ministers come from the country's ethnic Chinese minority is evidence of that success. To a remarkable extent, the very notion of a "Thai" identity has become a cultural, not an ethnic, marker.

For another, Thailand's Muslim population is not monolithic. Official figures estimate 5 percent of the country's 60 million population are Muslim. Some experts cite a higher figure -- as much as 7.3 percent of the population, or 4.5 million. Whatever it is, they include Chinese Muslims in the north, Cambodian Muslims in the center, and Arab, Indian and even Afghan Muslims elsewhere. None of these groups is waging pitched battles with the Thai state.

Only Malay Muslims in Thailand's five southern border provinces, where they constitute about 65 percent of the local population, are doing so. Why? How serious is the conflict? Can it escalate into another Mindanao or Aceh-like insurgency, destabilizing the region?

Thai experts as well as diplomatic observers in Bangkok cite a number of reasons for the recent upsurge of violence in Thailand's southern provinces. Prof. Chaiwat Satha-Anand of Thammasat University, for instance, lays great stress on the history of the Thai state's relations with its southern provinces.

Pattani, one of the provinces, was "involuntarily annexed" by Siam less than 100 years ago, in 1909. Bangkok's control of the area, he points out, has long been semi-colonial in nature. A combination of neglect and injustice has left the region poorly developed. In 2002, 34 percent of the residents in Narathiwat were found to be living below the poverty line, compared to the national average of only 10.4 percent.

Attempts by Bangkok after World War II to impose a cultural uniformity on the south helped spawn a violent separatist movement. This movement "declined in parallel with the gradual extension of democratic politics" from the mid-1970s, according to Prof. Pasuk Phongpaichit of Chulalongkorn University, "but the rump of the organizations continued to exist and to command some popular sympathy".

The expansion in recent decades of so-called "pondok" schools in the area -- Islamic boarding schools, funded often by Arab- Muslim money and with a marked Wahhabist bent -- further accentuated the area's sense of cultural difference from the rest of Thailand.

The geographical proximity of the area to Malaysia acts as another external pull. The Golok River separating Kota Bahru in Kelantan from Narathiwat in Thailand is "normally seen as nothing more than an inconvenient monsoon drain in the eyes of locals with relatives, associates and interests on both sides", Prof. Satha-Anand notes.

A report last week indicated Malaysian charity funds may have been diverted to southern Thailand. And a report this week indicated videotapes of impassioned Parti Islam SeMalaysia politicians condemning the Thai government's use of force against alleged Islamic insurgents have been circulating in the area.

The government of Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has not been blameless for the recent increase of violence in the region, culminating, on Oct. 25, in the death of 78, mostly peaceful Muslim demonstrators. They were found, packed like sardines, in trucks, the victims evidently of asphyxiation, though Thai human rights activists assert there is credible evidence -- such as broken necks -- that they had also been brutalized before their deaths.

Many scholars and diplomats blame the Thai uniformed services for much of the violence. The region has long been prone to violence, and even now, with separatists acting up and possibly jihadists as well, about 50 percent of the violent incidents are due to criminal activities in which both the army and police are deeply involved, a diplomat told this newspaper.

Turf battles between the two uniformed services have not helped, with each openly accusing the other of being involved in the cross-border smuggling of various goods, including drugs and arms, as well as in prostitution.

Thaksin, a former policeman himself, tried to end this turf war early last year by giving the police the lead in the region -- a step that only infuriated army soldiers and their local gangster allies, who found themselves holding the short end of the stick. "The insecurity industry in the south directly benefits a large number of people," Prof. Satha-Anand told The Straits Times.

The insecurity industry also happens to be politically profitable. Opinion polls indicate Thaksin's popularity has grown since his Cabinet explicitly rejected in April the moderate approach, emphasizing political accommodation and development, urged by Deputy Prime Minister Chaturon Chaisaeng, in favor of one emphasizing force. This trend in public opinion "of approving the government's use of violence in the context of the increasing distance between Muslims and non-Muslims in the area is a most disturbing change in present-day Thai society", Prof. Satha-Anand said.

The Thaksin government's mixed signals worry diplomats and scholars as much as do the intentions and capacities of the separatists and jihadists. The southern region has become a "political theater" for Thaksin, Prof. Satha-Anand told me, concerned that the "insecurity" there is being exploited for both business and political reasons instead of being dealt with as a cultural, economic and development problem.

"There is no evidence as yet that either Jamaah Islamiyah or al-Qaeda is involved," one Asian diplomat told this paper, emphasizing that the lack of evidence doesn't mean they aren't, or won't be soon enough if the situation continues to deteriorate. He feared the Thai establishment will choose to emphasize the use of force, and predicted the security situation will deteriorate after Thaksin is re-elected to another term in February.

If it does, it will not remain a purely Thai problem. That is the nature of insurgencies led or inspired by radical jihadists. Every such insurgency, from Palestine to Mindanao, has attracted a multi-racial, multi-national Islamic following.

Unlike communists, whose multi-racial practice hardly ever matched their rhetoric, Islamic jihadists have repeatedly been able to successfully leverage on the genuine multi-racial nature of the Islamic ummah to wage multi-national struggles.

"What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba, that he should weep for her?" Well, little -- but he will weep for her in any event.

Similarly, Southeast Asian Muslims will weep for Thai Muslims and transform a local problem into a regional one.