As Thai authorities prepare to revive peace talks with separatists in the far South, signals are already emerging from both sides which indicate the morass of impractical expectations and false hopes will continue.
After the talks were suspended last year, many stakeholders in the conflict consider Bangkok's latest move to establish a new committee to handle negotiations as little more than a rebranding effort.
The Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN), the authorities' main counterpart in the negotiations, has been attacked by its own members for having "no brain and no skeleton", a reference to its lack of unity, and for lacking any clear strategy to boost its bargaining position.
Gen Akanit Muansawat, the newly-appointed chief negotiator for Thailand and a veteran of the fight against the southern insurgency, has challenged the BRN to streamline its organisation and consolidate its strategy so it would be in a better position to negotiate with authorities.
But it is not just southern residents who doubt the new peace talks structure. Military officers who have been dealing with more than a decade of violence — which has left 6,159 people dead and 11,094 injured as of the end of June — are also sceptical.
One of the most contentious points remains who exactly government authorities should be talking with.
"The new chief negotiator and the National Security Council (NSC) people are familiar with a faction of the Pattani United Liberation Organisation (Pulo), of which Kasturi Makhota is a spokesman, but do not have any direct links with the BRN which controls the most powerful and influential rebels on the ground," according to a BRN-linked youth leader.
Before the last NSC-BRN meeting was suspended in the middle of last year, a Pulo faction represented by Lukman Binlima was already sitting at the bargaining table alongside the BRN delegation led by Hassan Tayib.
After a bomb blast near Ramkhamhaeng University in May last year — which some believed was linked to the southern violence — efforts were made to also include Mr Kasturi's Pulo faction in the BRN delegation. But that gave rise to questions of which other factions to include — such as a Pulo faction represented by Samsudin Khan — as well as who would represent the Barisan Islam Pembebasan Patani (BIPP), the Islamic Liberation Front of Patani and the Gerakan Mujahideen Islam Pattani (GMIP).
The BRN youth network leader said the BRN executive council, dubbed the DPP, whose members are mostly old and living in Malaysia to avoid arrest warrants in Thailand, have yet to devise a better strategy for dealing with the "weakening" Thai state. Internal divisions make it difficult to form a united front.
"It's their nature not to communicate with one another," he said. "Those who are for peace talks are now talking and pushing their agenda, but others have been unable to achieve their goals. So now they are discrediting one another or they just sporadically instigate terror attacks against random targets — if they can't attack authorities, civilians will do."
A Thai military source familiar with the talks said: "If Thailand could table a wish list to Malaysia to meet up and liaise directly with, say, commando super leaders Abdul Munee or Poh Suloh and Dulloh Waemanoh, or bring in other spiritual leaders like Sapa-ing Baso with some safety guarantee provided, then we can say that we are riding the right horse.
"We need to ask ourselves whether we just want understanding or whether we want more than that. If we need only superficial PR, talking with any faction is OK. But if we really want to negotiate peace, we need the BRN's political, military and spiritual fronts on board," said the colonel, who asked to remain anonymous.
A pro-talks intermediary from the separatist side conceded the so-called "KL process" of peace talks, which began on Feb 28 last year, didn't blend both sides well, "so each came up with their own demands prematurely".
He said that "although there are many groups on our side, an initiative is under way to organise and unify the rank and file of the fighters for a 'Patani Malay Community' that will serve as a spearhead body representing all of the groups, big and small. In the future the Thai [authorities] will face this PMC, and not only the BRN as in the past."
Tuwaedaniya Tuwaemae-ngae, deputy director of Academy of Patani Raya for Peace and Development (Lempar), said the ultimate goal of the separatist movements remain independence. If the peace dialogue dilutes or reduces their capacity to achieve the goal, they will turn to terror.
"The winning factor for merdeka [separatists] is the people, and so far they have accumulated a critical mass of support. Whether it is talks or terror, it is just a means to an end for them," he said.