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Writer's pictureManushya Foundation
Dec 10, 2021

Are we back to Absolute Monarchy?


Today is #HumanRightsDay but also #ConstitutionDay in Thailand! Can we really celebrate it? Aren’t we back to Absolute Monarchy? Find out in our new post! ⬇️


⚠️ #HumanRightsDay 🕊️ It is 2021 and it is very difficult to celebrate Human Rights Day in Thailand. Instead of commemorating the achievements of the past years, we are worried about the future. Thailand has gone backward. Years. Maybe almost a century. Are we seriously back to the absolute monarchy? And what does it even mean?


Here are some quick facts ⤵️


👉🏼 Thailand was officially proclaimed a constitutional monarchy in 1932 following the Siamese Revolution


👉🏼 the Revolution was led by a law student, Pridi Banomyong who saw the importance of placing the King within the law under a constitution


👉🏼 Everyone, including the monarch, was guaranteed equal rights


Where are we now?

🚨 Instead of democratic constitutional monarchy, we witness quickly disappearing democratic space and silencing of inconvenient opposition voices. We see a travesty of justice where underaged youth are arrested and detained for calling for a reform of this sickening system. Monuments and buildings that commemorate the 1932 Revolution are slowly being removed. Meanwhile, King Vajiralongkorn breaches all imaginable boundaries - for example by asking Cabinet Ministers to swear an oath to him rather than to the Constitution. Where is the constitutional monarchy?


🚨 On 10 November, the whole of Thailand stood in shock. The Constitutional Court issued a verdict that considers all calls for a reform of Section 112 of the Criminal Code, the 'lèse majesté' law, unconstitutional. From now on, it is not only a criminal offense to insult, defame or threaten the King, the lèse majesté law itself becomes a saint-like entity that cannot be touched, changed or abandoned.


"L'État, c'est Moi" - I am the State. A famous quote by the French absolutist King Louis XIV became far too relevant in Thailand after the Constitutional Court verdict. The absolute monarchy in France ended with a revolution in 1789. But the Thai pro-democracy movement is not calling for a revolution - we want reform, a modernization of the monarchy that would mean a real democracy where everyone is guaranteed their human rights and treated as Equal Human Beings ✊🏼


📣 At Manushya Foundation, we believe #WeAreManushyan - Equal Human Beings. "We Are The State" and we all must #SaveThaiDemocracy III


✊🏼 We believe in freedom, in human rights and in the power of the people.


✊🏼 We stand by all pro-democracy activists and protesters, by every single community, organization and civil society group that tirelessly defends democracy against absolute monarchy and fights for a better future.


✊🏼 We stand by the marginalized and the disenfranchised who have had enough of the elitist regime that only favours the rich, the 1% Capitalists over the People and the Planet.


#WeAreManushyan ♾️ Equal Human Beings!





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