Decentralization - or not?

Last week had two interesting new article on a single day, both around the buzzword decentralization.

At first, the opposition Phuea Thai party has announced her Thaksin-approved election program, and among utter nonsense like a town on land reclaimed from the sea (to be drowned with global warming) one point they kept from former member and leader Chavalit is the idea of giving the three southern Muslim dominated provinces some kind of autonomy or increased self-government.

Pheu Thai MP for Yala Sukarno Matha said yesterday the party would go ahead with the policy of establishing a Pattani City - as well as pushing for the drafting of a Pattani Bill to set up a new administrative zone covering the border provinces of Yala, Pattani, and Narathiwat.
He said the proposed law would allow local residents to elect their provincial governors and give more power to local administrations.
[Source: The Nation, April 27 2011, "Pheu Thai to retain Pattani City plan"]

As usual, the newspaper article does not contain any hard facts on what is actually meant by this, whether it means just an elected province governor, a change of the whole province administration into something like the Bangkok city administration, what this means to the already existing local government units like PAO, TAOs and municipalities. And to me the main question - why should only the three southernmost provinces get an improved local government - only because the insurgents shed the light on the lack of any powerful local administration?

This is where the second article comes in, same newspaper, same date.

A plan to decentralise local administration - proposed recently by the National Reform Committee led by former premier Anand Panyarachun - met fierce opposition and outrage from the Government Officers Association of Thailand yesterday.
They said if such reform was carried out, Thailand would cease to exist as a unitary state and collapse and lose its sovereignty.
[Source: The Nation, April 27 2011, "Strong opposition to reform plan"]

Now it is not that much surprising that the existing bureaucracy is quite happy with the status quo and don't want any loss of their powers towards local administrations. And quite some more interesting quotes from the same article.

Kamol said the proposed reform did not make sense, as local people would not be ready even "50 years from now".

Reminds me on what I read about the start of Thai democracy after the 1932 coup, with the parliament having appointed members until the voters get mature enough to choose correctly.

Senior members of the association claimed the plan would see an end to the role of the Interior Ministry in appointing village headmen, kamnans, as well as district chiefs and provincial governors.

Strangely, both village headmen as well as kamnan are elected, and that for a long time already. Its only that as they serve as subordinate within the central administration, they have to confirmed by the Ministry of Interior. Might be too much condensed writing in the article which lost this detail, but also distorted the facts then.

The association, which met and discussed the matter, concluded that local people were not ready to elect representatives at all levels and they had concerns that people running for local polls were corrupt. Local people needed to be supervised by the Interior Ministry's appointed officials, they argued.
[...]
"The worst thing would be to abolish [the appointed] village headmen and kamnan who are local representatives [of the Ministry]. Are those elected representatives really representing the people? Those who voted for the Tambon Administrative Organisations (TAO) chiefs were told they had already received money [for voting for a vote-buying candidate] so they couldn't make any demands [for assistance] afterwards. Our kamnans and village heads are different, however."

The appointed headmen are immune to vote-buying unlike the elected local administration? Well, at first the headmen are elected as well, and of course there have been (see e.g. the book Democracy, Development and Decentralization in Provincial Thailand by Daniel Arghiros) and with all likelihood still are illegal activities in these elections. Besides, it's a strange viewpoint to think of the cash given for votes being the only thing a politician is doing for his electorate, in a normal democracy someone is elected for the things he will do in the upcoming term in office.

It will be interesting to see if all the discussion around decentralization will continue after the next national elections are done, or if it was just empty promises to get more votes in the elections.

Government officials in deep south

Widely ignored by the international press, and also only rarely found in any of the English newspapers in Bangkok, the insurgency in the three southernmost provinces does continue unabated. One of the common victims of drive-by shootings or bomb attacks are government officials, especially those on the lower levels who get far less police protection than the province governors or district officers. In order to remember the victims, below is a incomplete list of case which I had noticed in the press in the last year.

• On May 6, Musor Daeworsanung (มูซอ แดวอสะนุง), village headman of Mu 6, Yaha subdistrict, Yaha district, Yala province, was shot on his return way from a meeting in the district office.
• On April 14, Salae Jae-useng (สาและ เจ๊ะอูเซ็ง), village headman of Mu 5, Talo Kapo subdistrict, Yaring district, Pattani province, was injured when being shot at while fishing together with his son.
• On November 6, Sakulsak Mada-oh (สกุลศักดิ์ มะดาโอ๊ะ), chairman of the TAO Pasemat (website currently unsafe!), Su-ngai Kolok district, Narathiwat province, was seriously injured in a drive-by shooting.

100th anniversary of Tak Bai district

The district Tak Bai in the southernmost province Narathiwat did just celebrate its 100th birthday. I only became aware of this event by an article in the official news published by the Public Relations Department on the last day of the ceremonies. Titled Narathiwat province district celebrates 100th anniversary, it only mentions the base of the celebrations with a single sentence

The 100th anniversary commemorates the district which played an important part in preventing the country being colonized by the British during king Rama the 5th’s rule.

On the video channel of The Nation, it also has a video on the celebrations.

But much more interesting than the celebrations is the actual history of the district and the events which led to the creation of the district in 1909. On March 10 1909 the Anglo-Siamese Treaty was signed, which finalized the boundary between Siam and the British colony Malaysia. The area of Tak Bai belonged to the Mueang Kelantan, but since the boundary was chosen to run along the Kolok river this part of Kelantan became part of Mueang Bang Nara, the old name of Narathiwat province. In August the territorial administration of the area was defined. Published on August 22 in the Royal Gazette was an announcement titled ประกาศกระทรวงมหาดไทย ประกาศตั้งอำเภอสะเดาและอำเภอตากใบ, which was signed on August 12. Sadly it does not state on which day it became effective, but since the celebrations ended on August 10 it must have been few days before the announcement was signed.

Those who can read Thai will notice, that together with Tak Bai also the district Sadao was established, as here part of Mueang Saiburi (Kedah) was added to Songkhla. But I am not aware of any celebration in there, but since it was announced at same date it should have its anniversary at the same time.

According to the data I have, the next district to celebrate its 100th anniversary is Rueso, also in Narathiwat, which was created as a minor district on September 24 1913 [Gazette]. If however only the full district status counts, then the next are already next month - Wiang Sa and Rong Kwang were upgraded from minor districts to full districts on September 12 1909 [Gazette].

Nakhon Pattani

The ISRA news site has a quite detailed analysis of the various proposals for a regional autonomy or a special administrative area for the three Muslim dominated provinces. It guess far beyond the vague proposal from Chavalit Yongchaiyudh earlier this year, and mentions concepts discussed in seminars at Chulalongkorn university in June and at Prince of Songkhla University earlier this month. Maybe the most important part of the article is the part where actual details on the suggested administrative structure are given

In essence, the proposed administrative model calls for the dissolution of all the existing provincial administrative organizations, the tambon administrative organizations and the municipalities on ground that they are duplicating one another and they have little access to the people.
Instead, it proposed the creation of three “nakhons” (cities) namely the Pattani City, Yala City and Narathiwat City, each with its own administrators to be elected by people in the three provinces. The three special zone cities will coordinate with the central government in Bangkok through the Southern Border Provinces Administrative Centre, an independent body answerable to the prime minister.
Another model, to be called “Pattani Maha Nakhon” (Greater Pattani City) which combines the three southernmost provinces plus four districts of Songkhla together under one single administrative body, has also been floated. It was further reported that a law calling for the creation of this administrative model was being drafted by Akkacha Promsoot, a member of the Political Development Assembly

Thus the first proposal is very similar to the administrative structure in Bangkok, which is well-established there, and should not pose that much legal difficulties to create it in other parts of the country as well.

The Asia Foundation survey I mentioned yesterday already suggests that further steps to decentralization are rather popular - 75% prefer to elect the provincial governor instead of having them appointed by the Ministry of Interior, 69% say more decentralization is better than keeping the current system, and even a slight majority of 48% say that further decentralization or limited autonomy can help to ease the conflict in the deep south.

However given the current political situation in Thailand with the two factions in so deep political battles I don't see any chance for steps towards more decentralization - that would give more power to the local population away from the elites and central government.

Village headman life in the deep south

Yesterday I discovered the website deepsouthwatch featuring independent news on the three southernmost Muslim provinces troubled by the insurgency since 2004. Most welcome is of course the English section of the site. I only checked the captions yesterday however, so it was via Bangkok Pundit that I became aware of an interview with a village headman (Phu Yai Ban) showing the depressing situation these official are working in.

Dee, the leader of Ban Salo (บ้านสโลว์) village, Village 7 of Rueso subdistrict, Rueso district, Narathiwat province, became village headman in 2007 after insurgents killed his father, who was the headman before. Aged just 28 he is probably one of the youngest headmen in the whole country, but has to work under a continuous threat of loosing his life.

It is well-known that being a village head man is one of the riskiest positions. You do not have to have any statistics to prove this statement. For Leader Dee’s case, he was attacked 4 times and survived. If he were a Buddhist, he would have called it a miracle or, he might pray a thousand times to his Buddha amulet hanging around his neck. But as a Muslim, he believes that this is a test from “Allah”.

Not surprisingly he is shown in the photos wearing a bullted proof vest, and His place was surrounded by sandbags and the curtain trees; it was similar to the military camps in the three southernmost provinces. But despite the martial look, he is doing his best to return peace into his small realm.

“It’s a mess. We don’t know what’s going on. The people who are in the middle become victims of the group that intended to use violence for their own benefits.” He concluded.

Because of these reasons, after Leader Dee announced officially to fight as the village headman, he also announced that he will decrease the number of violence in this village and will protect the life of every soldier that camped in this area.

I can only recommend to read the interview completely, it gives the conflict a face which in the news reports is only numbers of dead people.

Pattani autonomy in discussion again

The idea of solving the problem with the insurgency in three southern-most Muslim-dominated provinces by giving the area some kind of autonomy has made it into the main news again this week, after opposition leader Chavalit Yongchaiyudh publicly proposed this approach.

Puea Thai Party chairman Chavalit Yongchaiyudh is proposing the establishment of a special administrative area comprising the three troubled provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat.
The former prime minister said he would put forward the idea at meetings with local leaders during his trip to the far South, which begins tomorrow.
[...]
He was proposing the three provinces form a self-administration area. As in other special administrative areas, legislation would have to be passed to enable it, he said.
Bangkok Post, November 2 2009, Chavalit pushing special zone for South

When this idea was first picked up by a leading politician in January 2008, it was quickly denied. Interestingly in June this year prime Minister Abhisit himself proposed some kind of autonomy without going into any details, but now the idea was brought up by the opposition he has to deny it.

However as usual the articles around this issue fail to deliver to tell what is actualy meant by this "autonomy", which responsibilities of the central administration should be transferred to the newly created body. It somehow seems that since some of the articles call about a "Pattani city" it means something modeled after the central administrative zone Bangkok, where the elected administration has many of the responsibilities otherwise in the hands of the centrally appointed provincial administration. A small quote from another article indicates that Chavalit thinks about more decentralization

On Tuesday, Gen Chavalit defended his "Pattani City" model, saying that all he meant was a form of local government not an independent Pattani state, as it was being interpreted by the government. (Bangkok Post, November 4)

I don't know whether the decentralization of the second half of the 1990s with the creation of the TAO, new tasks for the PAO, upgrade of the sanitary districts to municipalities did fulfill the expectations, but continuing the decentralization at province level only in the deep south does not make sense for me, why shouldn't the other parts of the country not deserve elected province governors or a really powerful provincial parliament instead of the weak PAO.

The central point of the very recommended book Tearing apart the land : Islam and legitimacy in Southern Thailand by Duncan McCargo is that the insurgency is mostly caused by a lack of legitimacy of the administration, so a decentralization may help. But why the previous steps of decentralization did not prevent the violence to erupt after many years of relative peace.

Abolish of Saiburi province

When I wrote about the administrative history of Pattani I already mentioned shortly that till 1932 the deep south had an additional province named Saiburi (สายบุรี).

In the article Tradition and cultural background of the Patani region by Worawit Baru (วรวิทย์ บารู) alias Ahmad Idris (in: Regions and National Integration in Thailand, 1892-1992), the author starts to give a short historical background of the region. This ends with the following

After the transformation from absolute Monarchy to Democracy in 1932, Saiburi which used to be a cangwat was incorporated as an amphoe (district) into Cangwat Pattani (Nanthawan 1978:9).

This however is at best an overly simplification, or just wrong, because the province Saiburi wasn't changed into a district and placed into Pattani. In fact, since the administrative structure was established all over the country in about 1910, in every case an administrative entity was abolished this meant that the subdivision of the entity were reassigned to a new parent, and not that the entity was reduced in status. The only downward status change was district (amphoe) to minor district (king amphoe).

Thus in the case of Saiburi, the announcement from 1932 says

๗. ให้ยุบเลิกจังหวัดสายบุรี รวมท้องทีเข้าไว้ใน ปกครองของจังหวัดปัตตานี เว้นแต่ท้องที่อำเภอบาเจาะ ให้ยกไปขึ้นอยู่ในปกครองของจังหวัดนราธิวาส

To abolish the province Saiburi add area to govern by Pattani province except Bacho district, which is separated to be governed by Narathiwat province

Thus the southern half of the province, i.e. the district Bacho, came to Narathiwat, while the district Saiburi together with the minor district Kalapho (กิ่งอำเภอกะลาพอ) came to Pattani. As a minor district is a partial subordinate of a full district, counting Kalapho and Sai Buri as a single district is at least not totally wrong, but Bacho was definitely left out in the above statement.

I don't know whether the mistake was done by the author of the above paper, or already exists in the cited source (Nathawan Phusawong, ปัญหาของชาวไทยมุสลิมในสี่จังหวัดภาคใต้, Paper presented at The Social Sciences Association of Thailand, 1978) as I have no access to that one; but it can simply serve as an example that one always needs to check several sources, as even academic papers can contain mistakes.

In the map I have tried tried to give an idea of the extend of the province, note however that the boundaries are those as of today, so transfers of villages or subdistricts (though I am not aware of any) might have changed the boundary. It also only shows the extend at the abolishment, the districts Yi-ngo and Mueang Narathiwat were part of the province till about 1909. I also could not add the minor district Kalapho in the map - according to the Taluban municipality website the minor district became the subdistrict Tro Bon (same problem as above, it probably should say the minor district only comprised the subdistrict Tro Bon at its abolishment), and I only know the subdistrict Bue Re to be split off from Tro Bon - but since the minor district was in the northwestern corner it should at least also include the subdistricts Thung Khla, otherwise the boundary looks to strange. Sadly, the announcement on the abolishment of the Kalapho does not say anything about the subdistricts within the minor district.

Special administrative area for the Muslim provinces

Last week the special administrative zone for the troubled southern Muslim provinces made another resurfacing. The last time it was suggested in beginning of 2008 it was quickly shelved again since it was only the interior minister thinking aloud without clearing with prime minister Samak beforehand.

Now prime minister Abhisit brought this proposal back into discussion, though that news article actually does not say what is meant by special administration. Only a self-rule is ruled out, something which is successfully done in Europe, for example in South Tyrol, the part of northern Italy with a German language majority. There are some parallels with the history of the Pattani area - the area came to Italy despite stronger ties with neighboring Austria, there also was a strong nationalistic trying to suppress the German heritage, followed by separatism terrorism, and since the regional autonomy in 1971 the area became quiet. But of course such a regional autonomy is halfway to a full secession, something no Thai politician could accept, remember the ongoing Preah Vihar issue on just a few square kilometer.

Sanitsuda Ekachai, Assistant Editor at the Bangkok Post, wrote in her opinion column The South: Consult the locals first that it is most important to consult the people in the troubled provinces first before creating yet another new scheme to solve the problems from far-away Bangkok. I'd think for most of the Muslim the important thing is to have their culture respected - things like the suppression of the native Jawi language is something which must be stopped for sure. But this is nothing which depends on the administrative structure, so maybe elected provincial governors are something which could be meant by the proposal.

Districts and provinces in the deep south around 1909

My post on the administrative history of Pattani has found at least one reader very interested into the topic. He has even digged out an old map dating from the time of the 1909 boundary treaty between Siam and the United Kingdom fixing the boundary the way it still is today.

Of the five points he stumbled upon in this map, I can at least answer some relatively easy with the sources available to me.

• Tak Bai belonged to Kelantan before 1909, but as the Sungai Kolok river was chosen as the boundary line, the area of Tak Bai district stayed under Thai control. In August 1909 the creation of the district under the province Narathiwat was announced in the Royal Gazette.
• The same Gazette announcement also includes the creation of Sadao district by merging together the subdistrict Sadao with the minor district Prink (กิ่งปริก), which was a subordinate of Nuea district (now named Hat Yai). Originally, Sadao belonged to Changlun and was part of the ''Mueang'' Saiburi, better known as Kedah. Due to the 1909 contract Changlun became Malay, while the northern part of it became Thai and thus was made the district Sadao. Strangely the history of the district in amphoe.com must be wrong, as that claims the district was created in 1917, and at the same time the subdistrict was renamed from Changlun to Sadao. Yet the Gazette announcement dates it to 1909, and also does not mention the name Changlun at all. As the Wikipedia article was originally based on amphoe.com this researched could at least fix the history in there.
• Thepha was drawn as a separate province in that map, which must be a misunderstanding of the mapmaker. Here amphoe.com gives a detailled history, according to which Thepha was a forth-class Mueang and subordinate of Phatthalung in 1786, when the governor of Thepha had to present the tribute as a golden and silver tree to the governor of Phatthalung. In the reign of King Rama II it was upgraded to third-class Mueang and placed under Songkhla. But no trace of the alleged reassignment of this district from Pattani to Songkhla as it was claimed by the anonymous Wikipedia editor.
• Also Chana was drawn separately. As the website of the district (there are only very few districts with a website, and this is a very good one) has a long history text including a list of all the past governors and district officers. This history is quite similar with Thepha, as Chana also was at first a subordinate of Phatthalung and then became reassigned to Songkhla. The town was moved around often - last location was in Pa Ching subdistricy before the district was created in the thesaphiban reforms. The first district office was in present-day Na Thawi district, but since the location was inconvenient it was moved to Ban Na, and the district was renamed to Ban Na then. While the website gives no date, the rename was announced in 1917 in the Gazette. In 1924 the name change was reverted, as there were two more districts with the same name already.
  

The two things I cannot answer is the fact that Perlis is shown divided into two entities, and Raman and Rangae's extent into current Perak and Kelantan respectively. The Wikipedia article on Perlis does not mention any division, but the second one I can at least suspect that it might be similar to the above mentioned case of Sadao and Tak Bai where the 1909 boundary does not follow the historical boundaries of the Mueang.

Monthon Pattani Scout Flag

15 of the Monthon had a flag of the regional troop of the scouts, which are interesting since they first use symbols which later got used in the provincial seals. As the first of these flags I now feature the one of Monthon Pattani, the administrative entity which covered the area of the three southernmost muslim provinces - though at that times it still were four provinces: Pattani, Narathiwat, Yala and Saiburi.

Quoting the description of this flag from the book ธงไทย เล่ม ๑ (Thai flags volume 1)

พื้นธงสีเขียวใบไม้ ขอบสีเหลือง กลางธงมีรูปปืนนางพญาตานี ซึ่งเป็นปืนที่พระยาตานีนำมาถวายโดยความจงรักภักดีต่อพระมหากษัตริย์ในราชวงศ์จักรี ทั้งนี้เพื่อให้ลูกเสือในมณฑลนั้นได้ระลึกถึงความจงรักภักดีของพระยาตานีไว้เป็นตัวอย่างอยู่เสมอ พระบาทสมเด็จพระมงกุฎเกล้าเจ้าอยู่หัวได้พระราชทานเมื่อวันที่ ๑๓ มิถุนายน พ.ศ. ๒๔๕๘ ในคราวเสด็จพระราชดำเนินประพาสปักษ์ใต้

The ground of the flag is leaf green, the border yellow. In the middle is a picture of the cannon Phaya Tani, which is the cannon the ruler of Tani presented for show allegiance with the great King of the Chakri dynasty. Thus the scouts of this monthon can keep the memory of the loyalty the ruler of Tani as a constant example. King Rama VI (Vajiravudh) give on January 13 1916 on occasion of a royal journey to southern Thailand.

The emblems of the provinces were announced in the Royal Gazette in in 2004, though this wasn't on the original adoption of these emblems. Nevertheless, the short description of the Pattani emblem reads as follows.

รูปปืนใหญ่ หมายถึง ปืนพญาตาณี ที่มีขนาดใหญ่ที่ศุค (ขนาดยาว 3 วา ศอกคืบสองนิ้วครึ่ง กระสุน 11 นิ้ว) ซึ่งเป็นปืนใหญ่ กระบอกสำคัญที่ใช้ป้องกันเมืองปัตตานีตลอดมา ชาวเมืองจึงถือว่าเป็นคู่บ้านคู่เมืองมาแต่สมัยโบราณ

The picture of the cannon is Phaya Thani, which is the largest cannon (length of 3 wa, volume 1 palm leaf 2 and a half inch, bullet 11 inch). It is an important cannon used to protect Pattani long time. The citizen thus consider it as respectable from old times.

The cannon is a very important item from the history of Pattani. Phaya Tani is the Thai name, locally it is however know as Seri Pattani. It was cast in the early 17th century, and in 1785 it came to Bangkok as booty after Pattani was put under Thai suzerainty again. It is now located in front of the Defense Ministry, close to the Grand Palace. I had taken that photo some years ago, however I am not fully sure it actually depicts this cannon or its Thai copy Narai Sanghan - I haven't come to that part of the town for quite some time to update my photo. By the way, now the cannons no longer point towards the Grand Palace, they were turned to point north and south in 2004.

A bit strange - the first source spells the cannon as พญาตานี, while the second one พญาตาณี - yet both spelling have the same pronunciation.

Administrative history of Pattani

The three southernmost provinces of Thailand - Pattani, Narathiwat and Yala - have always been a trouble area, not just with the onset of the current sprawl of terroristic attacks since 2004 and the sometimes brutal reactions of the Thai military or police, like the Tak Bai incident. One of the keys to understand these problems is the history of the area, and as I focus on the administrative subdivisions in this blog I will just list the main changes within these provinces in the past.

The sultanate of Patani - even during its heyday in the 17th century under the consecutive rule of four queens - was required to pay tribute to the Siamese king in Ayutthaya, but also tried to liberate itself by rebellion which were always fought back, so it only had short intervals of independence. The woodcut to the right titled "Triumphal procession near the city of Patani" dates from this most glorious period of Pattanis history. After the fall of Ayutthaya Patani enjoyed its last period of independence, until it was returned into submission by the vice-king of Rama I. During this campaign the important cannon named Phraya Tani (or Seri Patani in Malay) was taken as booty to Bangkok, where it is still on display in front of the Ministry of Defense.

Further attempts of rebellion then made King Rama II divide the sultanate into 7 Mueang to reduce the power base of the ruler of Patani and introduce competitions and power struggle between the new city states.

The seven Mueang created in 1817 were Pattani, Nong Chik, Sai Buri (Teluban), Yala (Jala), Yaring (Jambu), Ra-ngae (Legeh) and Raman. They all were made subordinate of the governor of Nakhon Si Thammarat (Ligor) and later of Songkhla.

The incorporation of these seven states into a centrally governed country began 1874-1892, when the area became known as Khaek Chet Huamueang (แขกเจ็ดหัวเมือง, Seven Malay States). With the thesaphiban reforms under the first minister of Interior, Prince Damrong, this integration was put further. In 1901 the name for the are was changed to Boriwen Chet Huamueang (บริเวณเจ็ดหัวเมือง), and in 1906 the area power of the Malay province governors was reduced considerably with the creation of the Monthon Pattani (see Gazette announcement). The monthon governor was a government official sent from Bangkok, while the province governors till then was a mostly hereditary post of a local aristocracy. After the hereditary provincial governor died they were replaced with government official sent from the central government.

The 1909 treaty with Britain on the southern boundary of Siam finalized the inclusion of Pattani into Siam, and is thus often quoted as the annexation of Pattani. In fact it was just the last step of the integration into the modern nation state, which already begun with the defeat in 1785.

Sometime between around the set up of the Monthon and 1917 three of the seven Mueang were abolished, but I haven't yet found the details on this, especially the year and the Royal Gazette announcement - sadly the announcement on the monthon creation does not list the constituent provinces. I could however find the last mention of Mueang Raman in the Gazette in 1909, yet that wasn't on its abolishment. The center of Ra-ngae was also changed towards the coast in this time, and in 1915 it was renamed from Bang Nara (บางนรา) to its modern name Narathiwat (Gazette announcement).

Finally in 1932, the Monthon Pattani was incorporated into the Monthon Nakhon Si Thammarat (Gazette announcement), and just a year later the Monthon system was abolished altogether.

Together with the abolishment of Monthon Pattani, the province Sai Buri was abolished, reducing the former 7 Mueang finally into the modern day 3 province. The northern part of Sai Buri was attached to Pattani, the southern part went to Narathiwat.

There is one piece I could not confirm yet - in the Wikipedia article on Songkhla someone claimed that the tree districts at the border to Pattani - Chana, Thepa and Saba Yoi - were reassigned from Pattani to Songkhla, but instead of a year it was only quoted as "recently". When I found the list of all districts in 1917 I could at least rule out that recently means in the last decades but if correct it happened at the beginning of the 20th century. But so far I could not find the relevant Royal Gazette announcement on this.

To go down one administrative level, that 1917 list gives the names of all the districts within the Monthon Pattani, a total number of 19 district and 2 minor districts - today there are 33. Of the districts existing in 1917 just one has been abolished - the minor district Kalapho (กะลาพอ) in Sai Buri was abolished in 1938 (Gazette announcement) and incorporated into Taluban (now named Sai Buri) district. All the other listed in 1917 have only experienced name changes, area changes and new districts splitting off. There was one more district which only existed temporarily - in 1935 the minor district Pa Cho (ปาโจ) was created covering the western part of the district Tomo (โต๊ะโมะ, Gazette). 1939 Tomo was renamed to Waeng, and Pa Cho to Tomo (Gazette), and in 1953 Tomo was abolished (Gazette). Most of its former area now forms the district Sukhirin.

The two-volumed book Hikayat Patani is on the chronicle of the sultanate, however this source end in the first half of the 19th century. The second book on the history of Pattani was written under a pseudonym, nothing is know about the author. For the early history it relies on the Hikayat Patani, but it continues till the middle of the 20th century.

No regional autonomy for now

As already foreseen earlier, the idea of a special administrative area for the three southern provinces has now been withdrawn.

Interior Minister Pol.Capt.Chalerm Yubamroong (เฉลิม อยู่บำรุง) says the establishment of the three Southern border provinces as special governing zone has been withdrawn.

Mr Chalerm says the ministry has given up on the special governing zone project due to objections by many people who are concerned that the project may lead to conflicts in the society.

Regional autonomy for the deep south?

The Nation just had a report on the idea of new Interior Minister Chalerm Yoobamrung to deal with the ongoing insurgency in the three Muslim provinces Pattani, Narathiwat and Yala by establishing a special administrative area (เขตปกครองพิเศษ).

Earlier the day, Chalerm said support for the establishment of a special administrative zone..

He said all government agencies concerned would have to help him study which should be the best model of special administrative zone for Yala, Pattani, and Narathiwat.

The zone could be modelled after China or Germany, he said.

I know of the special administrative areas in China, but these are for the economic boom areas only, and in Germany there's definitely no special administrative area. In Germany, all of the provinces (Bundesländer) have quite a lot of autonomy with an elected parliament, quite contrary to the Thai provinces which are just units of the central administration. Decentralization in Thailand is often talked about, but things like elected provincial governors never got implemented.

As in this short new report there are no details about what Chalerm means with his special zone, and also as prime minister Samak already called him not to rush with it, it will probably take quite some more time till a more concrete plan comes into public. But as the military could not solve this problem since it erupted in 2004, a new approach is IMHO a good idea.

A similar approach was already discussed last year in the 2bangkok forum, where Khun Wisarut suggested the recreation of the Monthon (circle, มณฑล) Pattani. This circle was established in 1906 and covered the area of the three provinces, at that time still divided into seven Mueang. It was abolished in 1932 and included into the Nakhon Si Thammarat circle, and one year later the circles were abolished altogether.