
Ninety-five percent of the more than 900,000 people who took part in an online survey oppose revoking the protected status of 265,286 rai (425 square kilometres) of land in Thap Lan National Park, according to the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation (DNP).
The survey, billed as a public hearing, was carried out on the department’s website between June 28 and July 12, with 922,898 responses, said Attapol Charoenshunsa, the department’s director-general.
He said 96.9% of participants were members of the general public, with the remainder comprising local residents from the national park area and those directly associated with it.
Participants were asked in the online poll whether they agreed with the proposal to alter the park’s boundary line, which was approved by the cabinet of the previous government on March 14 last year.
The proposal was put forward by the Office of the National Land Policy Board (ONLPB) following updates to the boundary lines of state land plots. The changes were part of a government initiative to consolidate mapping systems used by nine different agencies into the One Map system, adopted in 2000.
According to Mr Attapol, 879,595 participants, accounting for 95.3% of respondents, disagreed with the proposal, while 43,303 participants (4.7%) expressed agreement.
He said the online results would be combined with those from onsite hearings held on Thursday and Friday in Nakhon Ratchasima, Prachin Buri and Sa Kaeo.
The combined results will be submitted to DNP committees, with the process expected to be concluded soon, he added.
Thap Lan sprawls over almost 1.4 million rai (2,235 sq km) of land in four districts of Nakhon Ratchasima and one in Prachin Buri. The disputed land is in Soeng San and Wang Nam Khieo districts in Nakhon Ratchasima. Wang Nam Khieo is well-known for its resorts.
The debate over Thap Lan has been particularly heated. Of the 265,286 rai in question, around 58,000 rai (93 sq km) has been occupied by local people since before it was declared a national park four decades ago.
The issue is further complicated by the fact that some of these local residents sold land to people who developed resorts, which was not supposed to be allowed. In a related development, Damrong Pidech, a former DNP chief, urged Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin to rescind the cabinet’s approval of the proposal to shrink the park.
Otherwise, he threatened to submit a petition to His Majesty the King, along with private organisations and citizens nationwide, to protect the park’s land.
Mr Damrong said that local residents in Thap Lan National Park already have the right to use parkland for farming under Section 64 of the National Park Act BE 2562.
Therefore, transferring the disputed area to the Agricultural Land Reform Office to grant land titles to local people is unnecessary, as they already possess usage rights, he argued.
Such a transfer, he contended, would enable locals to sell their land to investors and businesses instead of using it as intended to support those facing financial difficulties who rely on farming.
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