The Concerns of Youth in Conflict-Stricken South Thailand

Nurainee

Nurainee Jangoe was 13 when bombs and bullets ripped through the neighborhood surrounding her school in Thailand’s southern province of Pattani in 2004. 

“There were bombings, shootings, and arguments between the police and army, and people at that time,” she told Peace News Network.

Thailand’s ‘Deep South,’ which includes the provinces of Yala, Pattani, and Narathiwat, as well as four districts of Songkhla province, is the center of an ongoing conflict. Muslims make up 76% of the region, with Buddhists comprising around 23%, and Christians and other religious groups making up smaller percentages of the population. The majority of Thailand’s Muslims are ethnically Malay. Muslim separatist groups, most notably the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN), wish for the region to secede from the rest of Thailand.

Between January 2004 and March 2022, 3,686 people were killed in violent incidents related to separatism or politics in the Deep South, according to the NGO Deep South Watch. Another 10,872 were injured. When also counting killings related to drugs, other crimes, resource conflicts, and other such causes, the numbers stand at 7,344 deaths, and 13,641 injuries. The violence has impacted South Thailand’s youth in a number of ways, particularly in education. Analysts and academics say that students in the region face a number of challenges, including underfunded schools, and threats against activities on university campuses.

Nurainee, now a data analyst at Deep South Watch, said that the Thai government provides less funding for Islamic public schools than other Thai schools. 

“Most of the teachers, or good teachers, don’t want to teach at Islamic public schools,” she said. “If the government can support the budget more for good teachers at Islamic public schools, it would make teachers interested in teaching students in Islamic public schools. This can help students get more knowledge and education.”

Growing up around these issues, Nurainee became determined to make things better for her community. She founded a summer camp for youth from the Deep South. The camp, TU Southern, encourages youth to study at universities in other areas of Thailand, in order to help widen their horizons. 

Nurainee noted that in the past, many Muslim parents did not want their children to study far away from the Deep South, since they worry about other environments not being friendly and supportive towards strict Muslim values. However, Nurainee says she sees most parents’ attitudes on this topic have shifted, since they have seen that the atmosphere in Bangkok is indeed friendly and supportive toward Muslims. 

Another issue for youth in South Thailand is threats against activities on university campuses.  On June 7, 2023, a student group in South Thailand held a mock referendum for a separate state in Thailand’s Deep South. The group, Pelajar Bangsa, made headlines across Thai media for the event. The deputy commander of Thailand’s 4th Army Region, Major General Pramote Prom-in, said the event was prohibited based on Section 1 of the country’s 2017 constitution, which states that Thailand is one indivisible kingdom. It was reported that security agencies were considering legal action against the group. 

Pelajar Bangsa is reportedly a reassembly of student activists that formed after the Federation of Pattani Students, known as PerMas, was disbanded.  A lecturer at the university’s Institute for Peace Studies, Rungrawee Chalermsripinyorat, said that Pelajar Bangsa is an umbrella organization for the region’s Malay Muslim students. She said the event was not surprising, since Malay Muslims “have been vocal about the right to self-determination for many years.”

However, two unnamed Pelajar Bangsa leaders told Thai media that there was no political motive for the mock referrendum.They said that it was meant to gauge opinions on how to end the long-standing violence in the Deep South.

Daungyewa Utarasint, a visiting assistant professor of political science at NYU Abu Dabai, who formerly worked at Prince of Songkhla University, provided some insights on her conversations with the group after the mock referendum. She told Peace News Network the group wanted to recruit more students and become better known. 

“They said their purpose was, according to their words, to find something interesting to invite more students to come and join. It was just more of a fun activity to do as students,” Daungyewa said.

Surveys from recent years indicate that most people in the Deep South don’t want the region to separate from the rest of Thailand. 

The Peace Survey Network, a network of 23 academic institutions and civil society organizations, conducted a survey on public opinions on peace and solutions in the Deep South in 2019. The survey questioned 1,637 respondents. The largest group of respondents, 23.3%, wanted a system of governance that reflected their unique identity which would still fall within the boundaries of Thai laws. The second-largest group, 20.7%, said they wanted to keep the incumbent governance system. The third-largest group, 17.9%, wanted decentralization of power like in other regions of the country.  Only 10.1% of the respondents wanted the Deep South to secede as an independent state from Thailand. 

On the topic of cultural representation, Nurainee said that southern Thai Muslims want their language, Kelantin-Pattani Malay, to be an official language, instead of only having Thai as an official language. She added that youth in the Deep South also want officials to stop imposing curfews in their area.

Daungyewa said that based on conversations she has had with some youth in the region, many have changed their minds about politics.

“They really believe in democracy, They really believe we should fight on the ground, not under the ground. And they really see that anything that goes through Parliament can really change what’s going on in the south, more than the underground tactics,” she said.

“Any acts or regulations that can go through the Parliament can actually help people in the southern part of Thailand more than the separatist movement.”

The peace process is still moving slowly among officials. In April 2022, one insurgent group, Pattani United Liberation Organization (PULO), refused to negotiate with Thai officials if the Deep South’s separation was off the table. This was after PULO committed a double bombing attack in Pattani that killed one and left three injured. In March 2023, BRN representatives failed to show up for scheduled peace talks in Malaysia. 

Civil society and ordinary people, however, have continued to fight for peace. In November 2022, Muslims and Buddhists demanded peace at a rally in Narathiwat province. The group We Peace mobilizes women in the Deep South to collaborate on projects promoting peace.