People’s Party alleges Phuket official transfer was staged amid Bang Tao land encroachment dispute

The People’s Party on June 17 accused the government of staging the transfer of a senior Phuket provincial official, saying the move did not address alleged local influence networks linked to public land encroachment at Bang Tao Beach.

Pokmon Nunanant, a party-list MP and chair of a House committee on political development, mass communications and public participation, and Phuket MP Chalermpong Saengdee received a complaint from the founder of the Phuket local Facebook page “Hod Jung Changwat Phuket.” The page’s founder said they were facing a lawsuit after exposing alleged encroachment on public land at Bang Tao Beach and the transfer of officials who had tried to act against influential figures in the area.

Pokmon said the influential figures cited in the complaint were connected to the recent transfer of a deputy governor. She referred to remarks by the prime minister at an Interior Ministry meeting, saying the deputy governor had a close associate allegedly linked to benefit-seeking and encroachment on public land, and that the person suing the Phuket local media outlet was close to that associate.

She said the transfer was “just one scene in a play,” arguing that people with power and operational roles in the area remained in place. She called on the government and the prime minister, as the minister in charge of the Interior Ministry, to show sincerity toward the public and answer questions over whether the transfer of Phuket officials was part of a broader political reshuffle in the province.

Pokmon also questioned why, given what she described as serious allegations surrounding the deputy governor’s transfer, there had been no publicly known disciplinary or criminal investigation. She said the public was less interested in personal conflicts than in whether benefits, influence and illicit payments in Phuket would be dealt with.

She criticized the transfer order by saying that, in her view, officials facing clear allegations are normally moved to a smaller province, but in this case the deputy governor was transferred from Phuket to Nakhon Si Thammarat, which she said was a larger province and also the official’s hometown.

Pokmon further alleged that political forces she described as the “blue regime” were seeking to expand their power in the Andaman region, with Phuket the only Andaman-side province not yet under their control. She said the transfer of the governor was part of a new power arrangement ahead of the next election. The source article uses the term “blue” as a political reference in Thailand.

Chalermpong said the problem of influential figures in Phuket was longstanding and had persisted despite repeated changes of governors. He said Phuket residents had endured the problem for decades and should be allowed to elect their own governor to determine the province’s future.

He also said prime ministers and senior leaders had visited Phuket several times and should already know where the problems lay, adding that the public wanted concrete action rather than rhetoric. He said he would continue pursuing the issue as Phuket’s representative.