Varsity satire parade comes under close junta scrutiny

THE POLITICAL satire parade at the traditional annual football match between the country’s two elite universities yesterday faced strict censorship from security officers.

The move seemed to be a fallout of last year’s parade where a junta-chief-like figure took the football field under the cover of a Middle East Islamic State figure.

Yesterday, a figure looking like chief constitution drafter Meechai Ruchupan holding a constitution above his head, as if he was throwing it to a puppet under a giant machine gun, needed urgent modification less than an hour before the parade was staged. Security officers asked students to remove the gun because it could be interpreted as relating to the military.

After a couple of rounds of negotiations, students agreed to cut off the pistol grip and the magazine parts to make it look less like a machine gun. Without the modifications, the figure would not have been allowed to enter the stadium.

Also, a banner with the acronym NCPO, standing for the National Council for Peace and Order, was seized by officers who at the last minute also closed the stadium gate to stop the political satire parade for a final security check.

Besides banners reading political parody messages, there were five major figures. The first featured the famous Star Wars character Darth Vader of the dark side of the force serving the evil that seeks to create an empire.

Second was a popular Thai Facebook figure ‘the yellow chicken’ with a message “We [heart emoticon] Thai Military” – though the chicken is notorious for bringing bad luck to whoever it supports.

Third was a dragon featuring the China-Thai speed train deal, which would cost Thailand Bt3 trillion.

Fourth was a coconut shell with an arrow featuring international news agencies and social networking sites trying to pierce through.

And the last was the embattled figure featuring the machine gun and the constitution, which the students explained signified how the constitution was exploited to favour one group of people and suppress the other.

None of the figures were banned and all passed through the gate to join the traditional football match between Thammasat and Chulalongkorn universities. This year marked the 71st anniversary of the event.

When the parade was going out of the exit gate, students carrying the last figure together raised the three-finger sign as a sign of resistance to the junta. The sign, taken from the famous film Hunger Games, is a symbol of revolution and resistance to dictatorship and injustice.

There were also hidden banners at the stadium. One read: “What is the military for?” and the other answered: “For banning political satire banners.”

Undercover security officers yesterday wore Chulalongkorn and Thammasat jerseys.

Some active political activists from Thammasat University also joined the ceremony. 

Among them was Sirawith Seritiwat who was later yesterday detained by officers as he had an arrest warrant for taking the trip to the Rajabhakti Park |in Hua Hin late last year to symbolically examine the case of corruption.