Thailand

At the age of 18, Natthapan Saengtab crashed her motorcycle into a stranger's car. It set off a chain of events that would see her parents lose their land, sending the family on a downward spiral. But against all odds, the fateful accident set Natthapan on the path to becoming a prominent land rights defender in southern Thailand. 

Alisa, who goes by the nickname Fon, went to a high school located right at the beach, prompting her to develop a deep interest in the coastal communities of her hometown. She then became inspired to pursue a career in law, hoping to bring the voices of local communities into the country's environmental laws and regulations. Today, the young activist is one of the pioneers of encouraging young people in Thailand's South to raise their voices for change. She became one of the few youth representatives in national politics dedicated to community struggles in the country’s coastal areas. 

Until the second grade, Songseang Supanya did not see a problem with commuting to school in a saleng, a three-wheeled cart her parents used for scavenging in the streets of Bangkok. Then, in third grade, she switched to a school van, supervised every morning by teachers. "One day, I overheard a teacher talk about picking me up from home. 'She lives in a slum!' she said. I felt terrible. I questioned whether living in a slum meant I was not a [good] student," Songeang recalls.

Yureesa Sama was a high-school student when the police officers showed up at her doorstep for the first time in 2010. Her family lived in a small house surrounded by rice paddies in a Malay-Muslim community in Pattani province in Thailand's Deep South. The officers questioned her parents, family members and neighbours. Then they left, only to return the following week, the one after that and so on. Sometimes they just hung around the house for hours watching who came and went. Yureesa sensed her parents' concern and knew something was wrong, but she didn't quite understand what was going on. Finally, she was told not to worry and focus on her studies. In most other places in Thailand, the officers' conduct would have raised eyebrows, but the Deep South has been ruled by martial law since 2005. Growing up in a region affected by a prolonged separatist insurgency, Yureesa was taught not to ask too many questions. 

Sitting in front of Songkhla’s city hall, a seaside city in southern Thailand, a young woman dressed in a hijab wrote a letter to the country's prime minister. Choosing each word with care, she called on him "to listen to the stories of the fisherfolk’s children who grew up and bonded with the sea, protected and took care of it." It was in May 2020, two days before a week-long public hearing session for the Chana Industrial Estate project that is poised to transform the quiet fishing villages of Songkhla province into an industrial zone.

Homophobia, prejudice and hatred marked Patchara Kumchumnan's childhood. It's taken him a few years and some hundred kilometres to escape the prejudice and hatred in his hometown. But, while the scar of discrimination never faded completely, the experience became his driving force to defend the rights of others.

One of the most radical political artists in the Thai scene, 34-year-old  Tada Hengsapkul ties together nationalism, often-ugly politics, and the bruises of the Cold War in provocative, thought-provoking art. In the current political climate where police violence against pro-democracy protesters has been increasingly rampant, his past works still ring true.

A Photo Essay by Amphon Chansirisri