The big issue: Sacred space

The big issue: Sacred space

Muang district of Pattani is one of Thailand’s loveliest provincial capitals, and of course one of its least visited, what with the inconvenient war and all.

It has a decent university, modern shopping, a terrific mosque and nearby historical sites, malls, excellent oceanside beaches — heck “Pattani” in Yawi means beach — the most sheltered harbour on the southern coast, karaoke and beer bars.

There is little pollution, the studies say. The 127,531 residents (2014 census) would argue with that. They maintain there is none.

Recently, some influential people in Pattani professed that something is missing. Two things, really. They still don’t have Google Street View. Also they don’t have a 10-metre Buddha image in a hundred-rai park. That’s what they need. And so the battle was joined.

The junta-appointed head of peace-keeping in the deep South pushed plans to build the nation’s second Buddha Monthon, after the one in Nakhon Pathom province at the eastern edge of Bangkok. Phanu Uthairat, secretary-general of the Southern Border Provinces Administrative Centre, convinced the appointed Pattani governor Weerapong Kaewsuwan and Phra Siri Jariyalangkarn, head of the Pattani Buddhist clergy, to join his push.

The leaders are important because while citizens are free to practice religion, government officials come under much tighter rules. Mr Phanu, governor Weerapong and Phra Siri kept plans for the Pattani Buddha Monthon to themselves. It was later argued they should have been in close contact with their bosses in the government, first and foremost Interior Minister Gen Anupong Paojinda.

Muang district is roughly 90% Muslim, maybe a bit more. There is a Chinese shrine, three major wats including a Buddhist monastery and the Rom Phrakhun Pattani Church, which serves a Christian minority so small it is not actually recorded in the census. The central mosque is the largest in Thailand, and of course there are numerous small mosques dotted around town and along roadsides.

The vast majority of the population was not friendly to the idea of a Buddhist park that would be grander than any mosque or collection of mosques, and dominated by a tall Buddha image. Temples yes, but modesty counts. Mr Phanu suggested switching the name from “Monthon” (conveying the sense of a unitary religious state) to Jedi Ruam Jai (pagoda for the unity of all people). That changed no minds.

Contrary to popular opinion expressed in the media and forums over the past couple of disputatious weeks, there is definitely a similar but opposite case of Muslim-Buddhist community. It was revealed in Bangkok Post Sunday’s Spectrum section exactly a year ago this weekend.

No comparisons are exactly alike but the parallels between the two cases are striking.

In brief, a tiny Muslim group in Nan province in the North obtained some land at rural Buppharam village. After several years, with support chiefly from Muslims in nearby Lampang province, they decided to build a mosque.

This decision took the village by surprise and caused instant and apparently visceral opposition.

Phu Phiang district has about 40,000 people, served by several notable wats and many smaller ones. Most of the people are Buddhist, but there is a significant Christian population, and they can attend services at two churches, of a total of about 20 or so in the province.

There are an estimated 100 Muslims, apparently never counted by a census. People who go anywhere in Nan province looking for a mosque are directed to Uttaradit’s Pakistan Mosque, 148km to the south, by road.

For this reason, the Muslims wanted the first mosque in Nan province. The village people assembled at Wat Buppharam and gathered their arguments against it.

The main difference between the current brouhaha at Pattani and the Nan confrontation is only that last year’s problem was not widely known, and certainly did not attract the attention of the general prime minister.

Other than that, the people at Pattani and Nan reacted remarkably similarly. There has been no violence, indeed not a raised voice so far as anyone remembers. Arguments against “the others” were almost indiscernibly alike. The long-time residents had no problem with new residents moving in, or with their religion. But they didn’t want to see major construction that would bring an entirely new addition to the skyline, with the implied threat of bringing in day visitors eager to push religion on the residents.

There are many ways to put this. Muslims in the South, Buddhists in the North are very tolerant — yet only to a point. People welcome gradual change, not sudden alteration. Religion is a private matter, until the bulldozers and the hammers start clattering.

Now and then, local people made identical decisions about the similar cases.

In Nan, Muslims agreed to put plans on hold, and come back to the Buddhists at a later time to discuss a new mosque. In Pattani, Buddhists agreed to put plans on hold and come back to the Muslim leaders at a later time to discuss whether a Buddhist park is feasible.

Many will hold up religion as the focus of dispute. These kindred cases actually show something quite different. It is that local communities are far better at solving important issues and preventing potential violence.

Alan Dawson

Online Reporter / Sub-Editor

A Canadian by birth. Former Saigon's UPI bureau chief. Drafted into the American Armed Forces. He has survived eleven wars and innumerable coups. A walking encyclopedia of knowledge.

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