PHUKET: An armed Navy escort accompanied Royal Forest Department officials on a visit to the barred gates leading to Freedom Beach on Phuket yesterday.
It's a signal that the National Council for Peace and Order intends to enforce laws governing public places and public access.
Justice will follow, authorities told Phuketwan at the gates to the highly-prized property.
Freedom Beach, south of Patong, is at the centre of a prolonged controversy over a suspicious land title deed valued at billions of baht and a proposed road, approved by local officials, that would allow swift access to any development on the foreshore.
At present, tourists are charged 100 baht to descend a steep track to the beach, which can also be reached by sea.
Leading yesterday's visit to the area were the new Director General of the Royal Forest Department, Theerapat Prayurasiddhi, the department's Chief of Preservation-Protection, Cheewapab Cheewatam, and a detachment of armed Navy staff under Captain Pornprom Sakultem of Royal Thai Navy 3.
Investigations over the Freedom Beach property title, which has a growing value as Phuket prized coastal property becomes rarer, now centre on the department's own staff and the Phuket Land Titles office.
According to officials, two satellite mappers working with as many as four Land Titles Office officials are now alleged to have forged documents connected with the property title.
The stench may be real.
Along one access road to the gates of the property lay piles of rotting trash. It's a seldom-visited part of Patong.
The other way in by rough road ascends a steep hill, past the homes of local taxi drivers and a Burmese migrant worker shantytown.
A local resident said that a Patong Council garbage truck driver had been arrested for dumping the trash instead of taking it to the island's only rubbish disposal site in Phuket City.
Earlier in the week, reporters were told that one million tonnes of trash already await destruction at the garbage incinerator facility, which is now full.
The trash near Freedom Beach seemed a fitting metaphor for the intense activities by the ruling NCPO on many fronts around Phuket
Everyone now seems to recognise what's causing the problems, but there's a lot of cleaning up still to be done before the air is fresh again.
It's a signal that the National Council for Peace and Order intends to enforce laws governing public places and public access.
Justice will follow, authorities told Phuketwan at the gates to the highly-prized property.
Freedom Beach, south of Patong, is at the centre of a prolonged controversy over a suspicious land title deed valued at billions of baht and a proposed road, approved by local officials, that would allow swift access to any development on the foreshore.
At present, tourists are charged 100 baht to descend a steep track to the beach, which can also be reached by sea.
Leading yesterday's visit to the area were the new Director General of the Royal Forest Department, Theerapat Prayurasiddhi, the department's Chief of Preservation-Protection, Cheewapab Cheewatam, and a detachment of armed Navy staff under Captain Pornprom Sakultem of Royal Thai Navy 3.
Investigations over the Freedom Beach property title, which has a growing value as Phuket prized coastal property becomes rarer, now centre on the department's own staff and the Phuket Land Titles office.
According to officials, two satellite mappers working with as many as four Land Titles Office officials are now alleged to have forged documents connected with the property title.
The stench may be real.
Along one access road to the gates of the property lay piles of rotting trash. It's a seldom-visited part of Patong.
The other way in by rough road ascends a steep hill, past the homes of local taxi drivers and a Burmese migrant worker shantytown.
A local resident said that a Patong Council garbage truck driver had been arrested for dumping the trash instead of taking it to the island's only rubbish disposal site in Phuket City.
Earlier in the week, reporters were told that one million tonnes of trash already await destruction at the garbage incinerator facility, which is now full.
The trash near Freedom Beach seemed a fitting metaphor for the intense activities by the ruling NCPO on many fronts around Phuket
Everyone now seems to recognise what's causing the problems, but there's a lot of cleaning up still to be done before the air is fresh again.
how about the horrible smell at the south end of nai harn beach due to the concrete above ground septic tanks just several meters from the ocean?these need to be drained and the concrete taken down.lots of trash litter nai harn still.
Posted by Anonymous on July 27, 2014 09:51