Bangkok - 5 September 2018

Violence again broke out yesterday evening in the vicinity of Government House when two groups of protestors clashed over whose turn it was to hold the country to ransom.

The People’s Union for Revisionist Veganism, some of whose members call for cheaper meat prices and some of whom campaign for a strict form of anarchism, arrived outside Government House at 6.30 pm.  Wearing distinctive blood-red and cream clothing, insignia and banners, and armed peacefully with butcher’s cleavers, they demanded the immediate overthrow of the current government. 

That government was put in place by the Popular Mass Uprising Against Lethargy, which has occupied Government House for the previous week.  Political observers expressed surprise that their government lasted so long, given that the group consists of no more than half a dozen pot-bellied old men who sleep most afternoons. 

However, their threats to bring the nation to a standstill, this time through the occupation of all men’s toilets in the country, had proved as effective as the disruptive tactics of the previous 487 groups that have, by turn, occupied the seat of government over the past 10 years, ever since the People’s Alliance for Democracy was successful in establishing mob rule as the standard form of government in Thailand. 

Military and police forces, authorized under the ongoing State of Emergency, now in its 57^th extension, had expressed their determination not to use force in preventing toilet blockades.  ‘It would not be appropriate for our soldiers to take their weapons into toilet cubicles’, said an army spokesman.  ‘Besides, you never know how the people inside might retaliate.’

Trouble broke out when the Vegan group (or PURVs) discovered that another group had arrived with exactly the same objective of occupying Government House.  This group was the Federation Opposed to Opposition Lobbyists (FOOLs), an obscure group with apparently self-contradictory aims. 

The FOOLs are reported to be a splinter group that has broken away from the Federated Lobbyists Opposed to Politics (FLOPs), which had occupied Government House in late September of 2016 on a policy of promoting lobbyists as a major pillar of government, provided they were in no way connected to politics.  The FLOPs had achieved their aims by engineering a nationwide shortage of rubber bands, without which much of the retail trade of Thailand had ground to halt. 

The FOOLs, whose 5 spokesmen gave differing accounts of their objectives, appear to want to amend the constitutional amendments passed by the FLOPs, but without amending the constitution.  Their supporters wore their uniforms inside out as, they said, a symbolic gesture of defiance.  It was not immediately clear who they intended to defy. 

The FOOLs demanded the right to occupy Government House and threatened to close Haad Yai airport if they did not get their way.  When it was pointed out to them that Haad Yai airport had been closed for 10 years, ever since the People’s Alliance for Democracy had blocked access, the FOOLs quickly started an internet search for an airport that was still functioning that they could close.  They had just located a private airstrip in Chonburi when the FOOLs clashed with the PURVs.

The police quickly stepped in, using their extensive powers under the State of Emergency, and attempted to separate the two opposing groups using a piece of string.  This was not proving very successful and scuffles had broken out when an official from the Government House Occupation Scheduling Taskforce of the Internal Security Operations Command appeared on the scene.

The GHOST officer quickly pointed out that due to a clerical error, two mobs had been inadvertently booked to occupy Government House at the same time.  In a hastily arranged compromise, it was agreed that since neither group comprised more than a couple of dozen followers, and the area inside Government House was adequately large, both groups should share the occupation.  ‘This kind of situation is not unusual,’ said the official, ‘especially in slums like Thamniab has become.’

By midnight, calm had returned to the scene and observers expect no further trouble until the next mob arrives.