Thap Lan National Park chief Taywin Meesap strolled through piles of windows, doors, lamps and other wreckage from bulldozed buildings at Ban Pha Ngam Resort last month.
Law of the jungle: Thap Lan National Park has successfully reclaimed forest land from 37 resorts, but officials are waiting to demolish a further 51 properties embroiled in court cases. (Photos by P Praiwan)
He was inspecting demolition progress before leaving his old workplace behind to take up a new job at Khao Laem National Park in Kanchanaburi province.
The Parks Department transferred him from Thap Lan after opponents of his efforts to stamp out forest encroachment reportedly hired gunmen to kill him.
The park chief smiled and laughed with other officials as he surveyed the remains of the resort. The destruction of the property marks a successful outcome for him and for the government of Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha, which is leading a renewed drive to remove illegal buildings and structures from forest conservation areas.
The demolition coincided with the government’s “return forests to the nation” campaign, unveiled by the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry on Jan 14.
Ban Pha Ngam resort housed 21 buildings over 126 rai. Mr Taywin ranks it among the most difficult encroachment cases he has ever encountered. Both he and his subordinates were threatened with legal proceedings as they fought to reclaim the land for the park.
Although the removal of Ban Pha Ngam officially took place under the government’s National Forest Resources Protection Master Plan, the demolition came after a long legal battle, dating back to 2000. The Supreme Court recently ruled in favour of park officials and finally ordered the resort be destroyed.
Ban Pha Ngam is not the only illegal resort which is fighting against closure in court. In Thap Lan alone, there have been 443 arrests for encroachment since Mr Taywin took up his post at the park in 2011.
According to a directive issued by the Parks Department and the Royal Forestry Department, people who encroach on national parks and forest reserves face criminal and civil charges. Section 22 and 25 of the Forest Reserves Act also states that properties found encroaching upon park or forest land must be removed.
But if a legal challenge is under way, park chiefs wait until the court delivers its verdict to enforce the removal. As such, forest encroachers often choose to fight their cases in court. That way they can prolong the life of their businesses before seeing them destroyed.
In Thap Lan, 51 properties waiting to be demolished have been embroiled in court cases. The park has successfully reclaimed forest land from 37 resorts, and in 63 minor cases concerning temporary shelters and cassava fields. Up to 292 cases are still with police and have gone nowhere, since formal charges are yet to be laid. It’s a lengthy process, even with the renewed anti-encroachment drive.
“The plan and the NCPO orders are helpful in pulling together forces and resources from different agencies and speeding up arrests, but for cases like we have in Thap Lan, people tend to fight in court, so it takes time to see forest land taken back,” Mr Taywin said.
Wilderness defender: Thap Lan National Park chief Taywin Meesap was transferred to a job in Kanchanaburi after opponents of his efforts to stop encroachment threatened to kill him.
MILITARY MUSCLE
Since the National Council for Peace and Order staged the coup in May last year, tackling forest encroachment has been high on its agenda. The regime’s order No 64 instructed the military and the Internal Security Operations Command to help reclaim and rehabilitate forest land. It later issued order No 66, asking those agencies to target “large” forest encroachers and spare poor villagers.
In August, the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry was charged with drawing up a 10-year master plan for forest management, with the goal of increasing forest cover to 40% of the country. According to the plan, forests covered 53% of the country, or 171 million rai, in 1961. But that had shrunk to just 31.5% of the country, or 102 million rai, by last year.
Part of the problem is that poor villagers opened up forest land for farming and then sold it to big investors to build resorts or grow crops. This is complicated by the fact that many disadvantaged villagers claim to have lived in the forests long before the land was designated as protected.
A 1998 cabinet resolution said locals living in the forest prior to that date could continue to do so. But those who moved in after that, and residents of areas at environmental risk, were to be evicted or relocated. People were allowed to remain living in the forests on a temporary basis, pending verification.
The complexities of unravelling forest encroachment are being played out at Sirinat National Park in Phuket, where several controversial plots of “encroached” land are contested by “owners” who hold land deeds.
Sirinat covers around 13,750 rai of land. About one third, or around 3,500 rai has allegedly been encroached upon and divided into plots. At least 710 of these plots have land ownership documents, either land title deeds or the confirmed certificates of use known as Nor Sor Sam Kor. Long legal battles are expected before any hope of reclaiming the land.
Room with a view: In Thap Lan park alone, there have been 443 arrests for encroachment since 2011.
LEGAL WRANGLING
Samak Donnapee, director of the National Parks Department, is leading forest land examinations in Sirinat. He has asked the Department of Special Investigation to help uncover what happened with the 710 disputed plots.
Mr Samak says the Land Department has also set up a committee to consider revoking land ownership documents submitted to them by the Parks Department. However, none have actually been revoked, pending the outcome of legal battles.
The government’s forest master plan says the principal tools for suppressing forest encroachment will be the NCPO’s orders and the 1998 cabinet resolution, along with a 2002 map produced to determine forest land coverage after the resolution. In other words, officials are looking for deforestation or encroachment beyond what was identified in 1998, so they can take swift action against encroachers.
Major Gen Ronnarong Kotdamrong, deputy director of Isoc’s Operations Coordination Centre 4, said that the authorities are committed to identifying encroachment cases and seeing the land reclamation process through until the bitter end in court.
In a bid to improve their performance, the Parks and Forestry departments have been told to develop “area operations” plans, in order to prioritise cases.
But figures from these plans show that only a small number of cases have been brought to a conclusion in court. According to summaries of the plans, seen by Spectrum, the Parks Department is dividing encroachment work into four key categories for the 73 million rai of forests it supervises.
The first category is for cases that have been concluded and ruled on by the courts. Forest land in this bracket comes to around 2,400 rai nationwide. The second relates to cases in which court proceedings are under way, covering about 128,200 rai. The third category is for forest areas where officials suspect encroachment and are undertaking examinations. This bracket takes in 5.98 million rai of land. The rest of the land — around 66 million rai — is classed as forest area in need of protection.
The area operation plan drawn up by the Royal Forestry Department also shows the extent of the challenges facing park officials. It says that property demolitions are poised to be carried out on around 29,000 rai of land in 53 provinces. Nationwide, court proceedings relating to 366,100 rai of land are still under way, while examinations are being carried out on about 10 million rai. The plan suggests that national forest area in need of protection amounts to around 59.5 million rai.
Living off the land: Longtime park chief Taywin Meesap says the ongoing cycle of forest encroachment will only be broken when disadvantaged villagers are given land rights and the opportunity to build sustainable communities.
BREAKING THE CYCLE
Parks Department director-general Nipon Chotiban said the master plan has at least provided a framework for state agencies to work together. To deal with sophisticated encroachers more effectively, forest officials need support from law enforcement colleagues, he said. For example, asset seizures by other agencies can help cut off sources of funding that support illegal businesses in forests.
“The directive means we can now pull together all the resources, personnel and legal measures necessary to solve the problem,” Mr Nipon said.
Assistant professor Khwanchai Duangsathaporn, deputy director of the Forest Research Centre at Kasetsart University, warns the country’s forest encroachment problem has reached a critical point. A study by his staff found resort developments have played a major role in shrinking the forests over the past 10 years.
He believes the master plan sets the right direction for suppressing forest encroachment, in parallel with other strategies, particularly efforts to reform the way forests are managed.
For Mr Taywin, who has first-hand experience of fighting aggressive encroachers, several things need to be done. He wants forest laws to be amended so offenders face harsher penalties.
He said that the cycle of forest encroachment, in which disadvantaged villagers are exploited by developers, must be broken. To help the poor escape this cycle, they need the right to land, where they can live in a sustainable manner. Mr Taywin said this requires policy planning that looks beyond the singular issue of forest protection.
“As a park chief I have seen this endless cycle where the poor end up encroaching on forest again and again because they cannot save their land,” Mr Taywin said. “It’s about inequality in our society. The rich have money to buy everything, including the land security of the poor. The thing we will all end up losing is our forests.”