Friday, May 30, 2008

Administrative offices in Surat Thani city

In Surat Thani, the administrative offices for the province, municipality and district are located at different places throughout the city, quite in contrast to to Saraburi where they are all located within one block.

The province hall (Sala Klang Changwat) and the provincial court (San Changwat) are located next to each other in two large buildings. Between the two buildings is a stone with the geographical location - 9° 7′ 54.32484″ North, 99° 19′ 53.90800″ East in WGS84 - but strangely this is the coordinate of a location 110 m south of the location of that stone both in Google Earth as well as according to my GPS tracker. In front of them is a large open space covered with grass, used for parades or other ceremonies. At the western side of the field is a statue of King Chulalongkorn (Rama V). The whole complex was build in the 1980s, after the old province hall was destroyed by a bomb planted by communist insurgents on March 19 1982. 5 people died.

The old province hall was located directly at the Tapi river, the place which is now occupied by the city pillar shrine. It was build in 1995 on the open space, which was used as a small sports fields after the old province hall was torn down.

The municipal office is located not far from the old bus terminal of the city. It also has a sports field in front, and one can often see locals doing exercise there in the evening. As one of the tasks of the municipality is the fire protection, the fire station is located directly next to the municipal office.

The last of the administrative offices within the city is the district office of the Mueang district. It is located not far from the city pillar shrine. The most irrelevant news about this office - within the last year it received a new painting, now it has a yellowish color, last year it was still white.

Another place is the official residence of the provincial governor, a villa located directly next to the Tapi river near the city pillar. There are of course many more offices from the central administration, for example the land registration office directly next to the district office, or the juvenile and family court next to the city pillar, but I left out these from both the above list as well as this map below.

View Larger Map

Thursday, May 29, 2008

Satire - 10 new provinces

It's already a bit old, but still a very funny read - Thailand: To Get 10 New Provinces? in Stephen Cleary's column at the Nation written shortly after the plans for the Hua Hin province were made public. Instead of just adding a single new province, he suggested to boldly go faster towards reaching 100 provinces by adding 10 new provinces at once. And each of the new province will dedicated one of the problems in Thailand - one will be exclusively for the tourists, there will be one where each car driver has to follow the driving rules, one with strict protection for endangered animals, and of course one for the cronies of former prime minister Thaksin as a tax-free haven.

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Yet another Google Earth data update

Without any announcement in their blog, Google Earth has added quite a lot new tiles in hires for various parts of Thailand today. Strangely, the new data is already also present in Google Maps, so I cannot use that one to verify which places are new and which not. As usual, the following list is probably not complete, but at least can point you to new places worth browsing now.

  • Surat Thani: Tha Chana, Ban Na San, Vibhavadi and Don Sak - sadly the town Don Sak itself under a cloud. Also, the area around Chaiya, but omitting the interesting part - Talad Chaiya and Phumriang town
  • Chumphon: Sawi
  • Phetchaburi: the town Phetchaburi itself, and also Khao Yoi
  • Samut Songkhram: Amphawa, Bang Konthi
    Ratchaburi: Damnoen Saduak - now finally the floating market can be seen in hires, though it's not really spectacular from above
  • Kanchanaburi: Sangkhlaburi
  • Khon Kaen: Wiang Kao - but which building there is the district office, Wiang Kao is the last district article in Wikipedia which has no coordinates yet
  • Chiang Rai: Mae Fa Luang, including the Doi Tung royal villa.

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Municipal decisions for May 7 2008

Meeting number 32 from May 7 2008 with 12 TAO upgraded to subdistrict municipalities.
  • Phlai Chumphon (เทศบาลตำบลพลายชุมพล), Mueang Phitsanulok district, Phitsanulok province, effective July 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 24 km², 5 villages and 5,920 citizen.
  • Nam Rit (เทศบาลตำบลน้ำริด), Mueang Uttaradit district, Uttaradit province, effective June 30 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 30.13 km², 10 villages and 7,285 citizen.
  • Hat Kruat (เทศบาลตำบลหาดกรวด), Mueang Uttaradit district, Uttaradit province, effective July 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 46 km², 9 villages and 7,816 citizen.
  • Kham Pha-ung (เทศบาลตำบลคำพอุง
    ), Pho Chai district, Roi Et province, effective June 30 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 60 km², 13 villages and 9,035 citizen.
  • Akkha Kham (เทศบาลตำบลอัคคะคำ), Pho Chai district, Roi Et province, effective July 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 36.20 km², 14 villages and 7,885 citizen.
  • Nong Ok (เทศบาลตำบลนกออก), Pak Thong Chai district, Nakhon Ratchasima province, effective June 30 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 60 km², 10 villages and 6,083 citizen.
  • Khok Sung (เทศบาลตำบลโคกสูง), Pak Thong Chai district, Nakhon Ratchasima province, effective July 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 30.46 km², 11 villages and 9,235 citizen.
  • Mueang Yang (เทศบาลตำบลเมืองยาง), Mueang Yang district, Nakhon Ratchasima province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 68.54 km², 12 villages and 8,363 citizen.
  • Lampang Luang (เทศบาลตำบลลำปางหลวง), Ko Kha district, Lampang province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 28 km², 13 villages and 9,832 citizen.
  • Bong Tai (เทศบาลตำบลบงใต้), Sawang Daen Din district, Sakon Nakhon province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 66 km², 15 villages and 9,868 citizen.
  • Nong Ta Khong (เทศบาลตำบลหนองตาคง), Pong Nam Ron Din district, Chanthaburi province, effective July 25 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 128.24 km², 10 villages and 8,736 citizen.
  • Phanang Tung (เทศบาลตำบลพนางตุง), Khuan Khanun district, Phatthalung province, effective July 25 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 65 km², 13 villages and 9,772 citizen.

Monday, May 26, 2008

Gazette announcement data in XML format

Over the last months I worked a lot on finding and cataloging the Royal Gazette announcements, especially adding the entities affected so I can then find all announcements relevant to a specific district or municipality. I also did some coding in C# to assist my works with the announcements, most notably the search for new announcements. So far I concentrated on the actual functions, the user interface is still very crude.

As a small example below is the XML code for the creation of the minor district Vibhavadi in Surat Thani.

<entry description="Creation of King Amphoe Vibhavadi" title="ประกาศกระทรวงมหาดไทย เรื่อง แบ่งเขตท้องที่อำเภอคีรีรัฐนิคม จังหวัดสุราษฎร์ธานี ตั้งเป็นกิ่งอำเภอวิภาวดี" volume="109" page="19" issue="53 ง ฉบับพิเศษ" uri="2535/D/053/19.PDF" publication="1992-04-22" effective="1992-04-01" sign="1992-03-13">
<create geocode="8419" type="KingAmphoe" parent="8408">
<reassign geocode="841901" oldgeocode="840804"/>
<reassign geocode="841902" oldgeocode="840805"/>
</create>
</entry>

It is rather self-explaining I think - the fields inside the "entry" tag describe the announcement, including the date of signature, publication and the date it becomes effective, the URL within the online database, and the citation information volume, issue and page. The child nodes describe what the announcement is about, the creation of a new King Amphoe, which is a subordinate of another district - using the geocode to identify it, which is easier to parse (and easier to type) than the name Khiritat Nikhom. And as part of this creation, two Tambon got reassigned and therefore changed their geocode.

Though I doubt there is anyone else similar crazy about the administrative subdivisions of Thailand, and also interested in programming or at least XML editing, I have uploaded the whole data and code into an open source project at Google code, which offers a project hosting including a version control system. But in case anyone is interested, just look at the Tambon project, any help, comments or ideas are welcome.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

Municipal decisions for May 2 2008

Meeting number 31 from May 2 2008 with 3 TAO upgraded to subdistrict municipalities.
  • Charat (เทศบาลตำบลชะรัด), Kong Ra district, Phatthalung province, effective July 25 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 26.82 km², 9 villages and 6,783 citizen.
  • Tha Sao (เทศบาลตำบลท่าเสา), Mueang Uttaradit district, Uttaradit province, effective July 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 25 km², 10 villages and 13,945 citizen.
  • Huai Hin (เทศบาลตำบลห้วยหิน), Nong Hong district, Buriram province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 63 km², 19 villages and 9,636 citizen.

Friday, May 23, 2008

Muban rename

As mentioned earlier, there were almost no changes in the central administrative units - province, district and subdistrict - for the last almost 10 years. But for the villages (muban) there is still activity, last year there were more than 200 announcements on the creation of new villages, the last bunch dating from September 9. However this year had been quiet with respect to the villages so far, except one single announcement on the rename of a village.

The announcement titled ประกาศจังหวัดน่าน เรื่อง การเปลี่ยนแปลงชื่อหมู่บ้าน (Announce of Nan province on the change of name of village) has been published in Volume 125, Issue 39 ง on Page 238 on April 3, and contains the rename of village 5 of subdistrict Si Phum, Tha Wang Pha district, Nan province from Ban Na Hai (บ้านนาไฮ) to Ban Na Udom (บ้านนาอุดม).

Thursday, May 22, 2008

Khanom district office

Khanom district officeAs almost every time we go to Surat Thani, one day at the beach is part of the itinerary as well. However the coast of the province mostly consists of mud flats, the only sandy beach is either on the islands, or already in Nakhon Si Thammarat province. But going to Ko Samui would include a ferry trip and thus takes longer and is more expensive, so our usual place is the beach in Khanom district, which also has the advantage of being much less crowded with tourists. For more on that beach see the posting in my Travel blog.



But even though we went there several times already, only in our latest trip I managed to get the chance to take a photo of the district office of Khanom. Normally we pass the town Khanom and go to the beach directly, this district office is about 2 km north of the main intersection. I also wanted to take a photo of the municipality (thesaban) office, but unlike the district office there are no signs to that one usually. But luckily we found a helpful guy, if I understand correctly from the police station right next to the district office. He described the way to that office, and also to another municipality a bit farther away.



Municipality office of KhanomThe municipality office of Khanom subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลขนอม) is located near the district office, turning to the right at the intersection with the dolphin statue. Apparently that office was just constructed recently, Google Earth right now still only shows trees at that location, not even a trace of construction. That satellite photo tile dates from February 21 2004 (since Google Earth 4.3 the date of the data is displayed), which give the lower bound for the opening date of the office.



That second municipality mentioned before was Thong Nian (เทศบาลตำบลท้องเนียน), covering the northern subdistrict of the district. I wasn't aware that there was a second municipality within the district, which is no wonder as the TAO Thong Nian was just upgraded to a subdistrict municipality last year, effective August 30 2007. However we did not go there, as it would have meant a larger detour - well, actually, could have gone there and continue on highway 4044, but instead we drove another way.



We passed a TAO office on the way to Don Sak on highway 4142, but all I could see while passing it was the fact it is a TAO office. That part of the district is the subdistrict Khuan Thong (ตำบลควนทอง), so even though I could not read the name fast enough I am quite sure it was the office of TAO Khuan Thong. Sadly I wasn't able to find that office on Google Earth either, but chances are high it's because of the age of the satellite photo again, as the building looked quite new as well. Stupidly I did not click on my new GPS tracker to record the location, which would have made it easier to find it or verify it was built recently. Next time...



There's another TAO within the district, but I have no idea where that office is located - TAO Khanom covering the area of subdistrict Khanom not covered by the subdistrict municipality Khanom. The website of this TAO only lists the address of the office, but sadly no map. I cannot find the street name mentioned on that site - ถนนสายสี่แยก-ในเพลา, Sai Si Yaek-Nai Plao road - on a map yet, but it should be one of the two roads going towards Nai Plao beach. But we drove both already, so the office must be within a side street.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Municipal decisions for May 1 2008

The board number 2 of the Legal Affairs Bureau responsible for the local administrative units has resumed its meetings after the Songkran vacation, and today some new meeting transcripts have been uploaded to the website. In four of the new files it has municipality changes mentioned, which I will summarize here in the next days.

Meeting number 30 from May 1 2008 with 3 TAO upgraded to subdistrict municipalities, all in Surat Thani Province.
  • Thung Luang (เทศบาลตำบลทุ่งหลวง), Wiang Sa district, effective July 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 83 km², 16 villages and 10,482 citizen.
  • Khun Thale (เทศบาลตำบลขุนทะเล), Mueang Surat Thani district, effective July 25 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 81 km², 10 villages and 12,977 citizen.
  • Khlong Cha-un (เทศบาลตำบลคลองชะอุ่น), Phanom district, effective July 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 160 km², 13 villages and 8,842 citizen.

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Tambon area clarifications

I am still monitoring the current announcements in the Royal Gazette in there is anything related to the administrative entities worth noting here, but the last 3 months it was quiet. This of course only includes the announcements I can catch with the search strings I had tried so far and found successful. Just recently I did find what to look for to catch reassignments of villages (muban) from one subdistrict (tambon) to another - เปลี่ยนแปลงเขตตำบล - and another one which I am not fully sure about yet. The title การกำหนดเขตตำบล means something like "specification of area of subdistrict", and the content is mostly a description of the boundary, but sadly without a map for a more visual representation. I am not sure if these announcement just mean a clarification of the boundary which wasn't completely specified before, or also a minor adjustment. But anyway, there were two of these announcements this year already, and the latest one just one week ago.

Monday, May 19, 2008

Most common subdistrict names

While for the provinces and the districts the names are unique (except the 5 districts named Chaloem Phra Kiat), there are many subdistricts with the same name, sometimes even within one province there may be more than one subdistrict with the same name. Thus, out of the total of 7430 subdistricts (both tambon and khwaeng) 2398 have a non-unique name, 800 names are used more than once. The most common name is Nong Bua (หนองบัว), literally Lotus swamp, found 28 times. The second place goes to Nai Mueang (ในเมือง), meaning town center, found 22 times. Below is the list of all subdistricts found at least than 10 times.

Nong Buaหนองบัว28
Nai Mueangในเมือง22
Nong Waengหนองแวง18
Ban Maiบ้านใหม16
Tha Khamท่าข้าม14
Ban Naบ้านนา13
Samrongสำโรง11
Nong Phaiหนองไผ่11
Pak Namปากน้ำ10
Tha Changท่าช้าง10
Phon Thongโพนทอง10
Na Diนาดี10
Wiangเวียง10
Ban Klangบ้านกลาง10

Sunday, May 18, 2008

Municipal decisions from December 21 2007

Meeting number 60 from December 21 2007 with four TAO upgraded to subdistrict municipalities, and one municipality getting renamed. Each of the four TAO covers only the non-municipal parts of the subdistrict, and thus has to renamed as they had the same name the municipality.
  • Rename of TAO Ban Kruat, Ban Kruat district, Buriram province, to Ban Kruat Panyawat and upgrade to subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลบ้านกรวดปัญญาวัฒน์), effective February 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1999, covers 33 km², 15 villages and has 8,722 citizen.
  • Rename of TAO Nong Ki, Nong Ki district, Buriram province, to San Chao Pho Khun Si and upgrade to subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลศาลเจ้าพ่อขุนศรี), effective March 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1999, covers 14.70 km², 7 villages and 3,250 citizen.
  • TAO Sawang Arom, Sawang Arom district, Uthai Thai province renamed to Sawang Chaeng Sabai Chai and upgrade to subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลสว่างแจ้งสบายใจ), effective February 28 2008. The TAO was created in 1999, covers 37.19 km², 9 villages and 3,084 citizen.
  • TAO Na Chaliang, Nong Phai district, Phetchabun province, rename to Chaliang Thong and upgrade to subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลเฉลียงทอง), effective May 15 2008. The TAO was created 1996, covers 66 km², 10 villages and 7,726 citizen.
  • Rename of subdistrict municipality Klang, Selaphum district, Roi Et province to Selaphum (เทศบาลตำบลเสลภูมิ). Cannot find the date it will be effective.

Friday, May 16, 2008

Missing announcements in Royal Gazette database

The Royal Gazette database contains many thousands of announcements, most of which had to inserted into the database manually - just the last few years the announcements were written electronically. It is thus not surprising that some errors occurred during the creation of the database. I have come across a few entries where the announcement title had typing mistakes, which can make it difficult to find a specific announcement using the search interface. One example I had just recently was the rename of the sanitary district Champi to Si That, Udon Thani province, which I could not find at first because instead of สุขาภิบาล it spelled สุขาภบาล - the "i" was missing. Some others seem to have been scanned and stored as PDF, but not indexed in the database, like the creation of the district Fao Rai, Nong Khai province. I could find that one only because the minor districts created in 1995 were all announced together on subsequent pages, but one page was missing in the row. Or for Phrai Bueng district in Sisaket, where the announcement was filed in the same PDF as the page before, and thus not indexed by itself. Another one which escaped me quite long was the creation of Klong Hat in Sa Kaeo - the entry in the database lacked the last part of the title (ตั้งเป็นกิ่งอำเภอคลองหาด), which was the one I was searching for all the time.

As mentioned before I am working on compiling the data of the entities into XMLs, as well as programming some software to help me in compiling data for Wikipedia. For that I have already mirrored around 2000 announcements in PDF format, and severals hundreds I have already processed further, so with my database I can already do things like showing all announcements concerning the administrative entities of a single province.

However in some cases I haven't succeeded to find the announcement in the online database, even though there must have been an announcement. I am listing my problems cases here in the vain hope that someone can help me to get the PDF of the announcement, or at least give the citation of volume, issue, page and publication date. I will probably run into more later, but for districts in the last 30 years these seem to be all I could not find.
  • The creation of Khao Suan Kwang, split from Nam Phong, Khon Kaen province someday in 1978
  • The creation of Plaeng Yao minor district, split off from Bang Khla, Chachoengsao province effective October 16 1978.
  • The rename of Samnak Takhrau district to Thepharak, Nakhon Ratchasima province, not long after its creation in 1995.

Thursday, May 15, 2008

PAO election brochure, Part 1

The pages two and three of the brochure begin with the repetition of the title page as the headline over the two pages.

องค์การบริหารส่วนจังหวัดสุราษฎร์ธานีPAO of Surat Thani Province
ขอเชิญชวนผู้มีสิทธิเลือกตั้งWant to invite people who have the right to vote
ไปใช้สิทธิเลือกตั้งGo use [your] right to vote
สมาชิกสภาองค์การบริหารส่วนจังหวัดCouncilors of PAO
และนายกองค์การบริหารส่วนจังหวัดand chairman of PAO
ในวันอาทิตย์ ที่ ๒๐ เนษายน ๑๕๕๑On Sunday April 20 2551
เวลา ๐๘.๐๐ – ๑๕.๐๐ น.At 8.00 – 15.00 o'clock

The left page then explains that every voter has two votes, one for the councilor and one for the chairman.



ผู้มีสิทธิเลือกตั้งหนึ่งคนจะได้รับบัตร ๒ ใบ โดยทำเครื่องหมาย X ดังมี้Every voter will receive 2 ballot papers to vote as follows
X ใบที่หนึ่ง บัตรเลือกสมาชิกสภา องค์การบริหารส่วนจังหวัด กากบาทได้ ๑ คนFirst ballot paper to choose one PAO councilor
X ใบที่สอง บัตรเลือกนายก องค์การบริหารส่วนจังหวัด กากบาทได้ ๑ คนSecond ballot paper to choose one PAO chairman
ไป เลือก ตั้ง ๑๐ เม.ย. ๕๑Go vote 20 April 51


The right side then explains how to check if one is correctly inscribed in the voter directory, and how to add oneself in case one isn't enlisted already.


ข้อแนะนำก่อนการลงคะแนนเลือกตั้งAdvice on what to do before going to cast a ballot
ตรวจสอบรายชื่อจากบัญชีรายชื่อผู้มีสิทธิเลือกตั้ง ณCheck the name list with the names of the eligible voters at
• ทีว่าการอำเภอทีท่านมีชื่อ• the local district office if it has your name
• หน่วยเลือกตั้งทีท่านมีชื่อทีมีสิทธิลงคะแนน• the local polling station if it has your name as eligible voter
เลือกตั้ง ทั้งนี้ตั้งแต่วันที่ ๓๐ มีนาคม ๒๕๕๑to be able to vote before March 30 2551
เป็นตันไปis over



การเพิ่มชื่อhow to add your name
กรณีผู้มีสิทธิเลือกตั้งพบว่าตนไม่มีรายชื่อIn case an eligible voter finds himself not enlisted
อยู่ในบัญชีรายชื่อผู้มีสิทธิเลือกตั้ง ให้นำสำเนาin the voter register bring a copy
ทะเบียนบ้านฉบับเจ้าบ้าน และบัตรประจำตัวof the house register and a copy of the ID card
ประชาชน หรือบัตรประจำตัวอื่นใดที่ทางราชการor another official identification card.
ออกให้ยื่นคำร้องขอเพิ่มชื่อต่อนายทะเบียนGo and ask for inscription
ท้องถิ่น ณ งานทะเบียนราษฎร์สำนักงานat the local registration office
ทะเบียนท้องถิ่น และที่ว่าการอำเภอ ก่อนวันand district office before
เลือกตั้งไม่น้อยกว่า ๑๐ วัน ทั้งนี้ตั้งแต่วันที่10 days of the voting day, after
๓๐ มีนาคม - ๙ เมษายน ๒๕๕๑March 30 till April 9 2551

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

New satellite images in Google Earth

And again Google Earth added more hires satellite imaginary, including places in Thailand. The official list will come out tomorrow, as they now only have their usual riddle, but none of the locations questioned there seem to be in Thailand.

The places I have noticed to be new in Thailand - Wiang Sa (Surat Thani), the northern part of Khao Sok National Park, the town Chumphon and neighboring Pathio, Cha-Am, Kanchaburi town, the area around Khao Bin cave, half of the town Samut Songkhram till Samut Sakon, Saraburi town, Nan town, a whole strip from Phaya Mengrai (Chiang Rai) down to the north of Lampang, also quite a lot of Lampang province and northern Sukhothai province including Si Satchanalai. But this is probably not the full list, as especially in the northeast I browse more rarely. Let's see what places they will list in their post tomorrow, how many I could catch. At least I will now have some more district office geotags to update.

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Districts named after subdistricts

Usually newly created districts (Amphoe) are named after the main subdistrict, which normally is the subdistrict located in the center, containing the largest settlement and becoming the location of the district office. But there are some cases where the subdistrict which gave the district its name is no longer part of the district, but the district kept its name.
  • Kranuan, Khon Kaen, was named after the subdistrict Kranuan, which has been split off to be part of Sam Sung district in 1994.
  • Bang Rachan is named after the subdistrict Bang Rachan, the site of the historical battle between the army from Ayutthaya and Burma, fought shortly before the fall of Ayutthaya. However, the subdistrict containing the historical location was split off to form the new district Khai Bang Rachan in 1972.
  • The subdistrict Sahatsakhan of Sahatsakhan district, Kalasin province, was split off to form Tha Khantho district in 1962. This subdistrict was further moved to be the central subdistrict of the newly established Nong Kung Si in 1973, and then renamed to Nong Kung Si in 1974. The subdistrict Sahatsakhan of Sahatsakhan district was created in 1982, and is thus named after the district, not the other way round.
  • When in 1935 in Narathiwat province the minor district Pa Cho was created, it received the subdistrict Tomo from Tomo district, but the district Tomo kept its name. 1939 the name of Tomo district was changed to Waeng, and Pa Cho was renamed to Tomo. The minor district was abolished and incorporated into Waeng in 1953, which however kept its name then. 1957 the subdistrict was also abolished and incorporated into the subdistrict Mamong. In 1977, the area of the former minor district Tomo was split off again and formed the new minor district Sukhirin, with Tomo now being just one of the villages (muban) of subdistrict Phukhao Thong.
  • There are also cases where the name gets applied the other way round, a newly created subdistrict gets the same name as the district it is located. One example for this can be Krasae Sin, the district was created in 1978, the subdistrict named Krasae Sin in 1995.
The above list of course are only examples and not the full list of such cases, but they illustrate the sometimes confusing ways of district and subdistrict namings.

Monday, May 12, 2008

Planned new provinces - Mae Sot

Map of Tak province highlighting the district set for Mae Sot provinceOut of the several provinces which are apparently planned, only Mae Sot make it into the English language press so far - even though The Irrawaddy in their article from June 2007 only mentions half of the plans for the Mae Sot, the upgraded municipality.

The plan, at least as of June 2007, is to create new province named Mae Sot covering the five districts of Tak province which border to Myanmar (Burma) - from north to south these are the districts Tha Song Yang, Mae Ramat, Mae Sot, Phop Phra and Umphang, as depicted in the map. For a better administration, also the creation of three minor districts has been suggested, Ruam Rat Khiri (กิ่งอำเภอรวมราษฎร์คีรี) from Phop Phra, Mongkhon Khiri (กิ่งอำเภอมงคลคีรี) from Mae Sot and Haeng Mai Laeo (กิ่งอำเภอแห่งใหม่แล้ว) from Tha Song Yang. But as all three minor districts aren't named after a subdistrict and the source does not mention it, I cannot say which part of the districts will be split off.

Additionally, the town Mae Sot as the main border crossing to Myanmar is supposed to become a metropolis (มหานคร), which is supposed to be a special administrative area similar to Bangkok and Pattaya, so outside the normal municipal (thesaban) system. But what the differences between this metropolis and a thesaban nakhon are suppose to be - I have no idea. Anyway, this metropolis is planned to cover the subdistricts Mae Sot, Mae Pa and Tha Sai Luat of Mae Sot district. The current town of Mae Sot (เทศบาลเมืองแม่สอด) covers only the subdistrict Mae Sot.

All the above is from an article in Thai newspaper The Manager from May 22 2007. Just one thing the article does not mention - when will that new province become reality?

Saturday, May 10, 2008

Municipal decisions from April 4 2008

Meeting number 27 from April 4 2008 with the upgrade and rename of 6 TAO to subdistrict municipalities, and the upgrade of further 4 TAO to subdistrict municipalities.
  • Phan Don (พันดอน) upgraded and renamed to Kong Phan Phan Don (เทศบาลตำบลกงพานพันดอน), Kumphawapi district, Udon Thani province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 51.23 km², 18 villages and 11,768 citizen. The new municipality covers the parts of the subdistrict which are not yet part of the subdistrict municipality Phan Don (เทศบาลตำบลพันดอน).
  • Lo (ลอ) upgraded and renamed to Wiang Lo (เทศบาลตำบลเวียงลอ), Chun district, Phayao province, effective April 21 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 47 km², 11 villages and 6,692 citizen.
  • Khok Khram (โคกคราม) upgraded and renamed to Khok Khram Phatthana (เทศบาลตำบลโคกครามพัฒนา), Bang Pla Ma district, Suphanburi province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 31 km², 11 villages and 5,919 citizen. The new municipality covers the parts of the subdistrict which are not yet part of the subdistrict municipality Khok Khram (เทศบาลตำบลโคกคราม).
  • Chumphon Buri (ชุมพลบุรี) upgraded and renamed to Thung Si Chumphon (เทศบาลตำบลทุ่งศรีชุมพล), Chumphon Buri district, Surin province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 115 km², 22 villages and 10,658 citizen. The new municipality covers the parts of the subdistrict which are not yet part of the subdistrict municipality Chumphon Buri (เทศบาลตำบลชุมพลบุรี).
  • Tamot (ตะโหมด) upgraded and renamed to Khao Hua Chang (เทศบาลตำบลเขาหัวช้าง), Tamot district, Phattalung province, effective July 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1995, covers 175.87 km², 12 villages and 6,264 citizen. The new municipality covers the parts of the subdistrict which are not yet part of the subdistrict municipality Tamot (เทศบาลตำบลตะโหมด).
  • Khuan Khanun (ควนขนุน) upgraded and renamed to Nong Pho (เทศบาลตำบลหนองพ้อ), Khuan Khanun district, Phattalung province, effective July 23 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 24.43 km², 9 villages and 6,200 citizen. The new municipality covers the parts of the subdistrict which are not yet part of the subdistrict municipality Khuan Khanun (เทศบาลตำบลควนขนุน).
  • Lan Khoi (เทศบาลตำบลลานข่อย), Pa Phayom district, Phattalung province, effective May 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 59.75 km², 9 villages and 7,850 citizen.
  • Ban Phrao (เทศบาลตำบลบ้านพร้าว), Pa Phayom district, Phattalung province, effective July 25 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 44.13 km², 10 villages and 7,913 citizen.
  • Na Khayat (เทศบาลตำบลนาขยาด), Khuan Khanun district, Phattalung province, effective July 25 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 49 km², 12 villages and 8,068 citizen.
  • Huai Khan Laen (เทศบาลตำบลห้วยคันแหลน), Wiset Chai Chan district, Ang Thong province, effective May 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1997, covers 25.20 km², 6 villages and 3,412 citizen.

Friday, May 9, 2008

Duplicate announcements in the Royal Gazette

While working through the minor district creations of 1981, strangely I found the district Santi Suk in Nan province to be announced twice. Both are titled identically "ประกาศกระทรวงมหาดไทย เรื่อง แบ่งท้องที่อำเภอเมืองน่าน จังหวัดน่าน ตั้งเป็นกิ่งอำเภอสันติสุข" (Announcement by Ministry of Interior about split Mueang Nan district Nan province to create Santi Suk minor district), the first one in issue 125 ง, page 2579 on August 4, the second in issue 130 ง, page 2703 on August 11. But it does not seem that the second one is a correction to the first one, because I failed to see any difference in the two PDF - except the header with the volume, issue, page and date of the announcement. So it seems to me that this announcement was simply published twice in mistake.

The same had apparently happened once before as well, as for the creation of the minor district Ban Khwao in Chaiyaphum province in 1955 I also have two announcements with only few days between their publication and apparently identical contents - one from March 8 and one from March 1.

Thursday, May 8, 2008

Municipal decisions from December 7 2007

Meeting number 56 from December 7 2007 with 2 TAO upgraded to subdistrict municipalities.
  • Phluang Song Nang (เทศบาลตำบลพลวงสองนาง), Sawang Arom district, Uthai Thani province, effective January 12 2008. The TAO was created in 1999, covers 66 km², 8 villages and 5,354 citizen.
  • Nong Sa (เทศบาลตำบลหนองสระ), Thap Than district, Uthai Thani province, effective October 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1999, covers 19 km², 7 villages and 2,100 citizen.
Additionally, there's a correction to the upgrade and rename of TAO Sikhio to Mueang Sikhio (เทศบาลตำบลเมืองสีคิ้ว), Sikhio district, Nakhon Ratchasima province, originally decided in Meeting 52 on November 23 already.

PAO election brochure

PAO election brochure, title pageFor the recent elections of the Provincial Administration Organization (PAO) council and chairman I could get a small leaflet teaching the voters on the regulations and technicalities of this election. The brochure does not explicitly say who published it, but from the emblem on the title page I guess it was written on behalf of the PAO itself.

I plan to transcribe and translate the brochure completely, as it's a nice challenge to improve my Thai reading, typing and language skills, but this will probably take quite some time as the pages inside contain lots of text, and probably also some technical vocabulary, so I will have to use the Longdo online dictionary a lot. However the title page has just few lines of text and thus is relatively fast to translate, only that different font slowed me down quite a bit. So as an appetizer as well as to commit myself to pursue this project here is the first part of the text of this brochure. The words in brackets are omitted within the Thai text, but in English they are needed to make it understandable.

เรียน....Learn....
ท่านเจ้าบ้านYou [be the] Master
....จังหวัดสุราษฎร์ธานี....[of] Surat Thani province
องค์การบริหารส่วนจังหวัดสุราษฎร์ธานีPAO of Surat Thani Province
ขอเชิญชวนผู้มีสิทธิเลือกตั้งWant to invite people who have the right to vote
ไปใช้สิทธิเลือกตั้งGo use [your] right to vote
สมาชิกสภาองค์การบริหารส่วนจังหวัดCouncilors of PAO
และนายกองค์การบริหารส่วนจังหวัดand chairman of PAO
ในวันอาทิตย์ ที่ ๒๐ เนษายน ๑๕๕๑On Sunday April 20 2551
เวลา ๐๘.๐๐ – ๑๕.๐๐ น.At 8.00 – 15.00 o'clock

Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Municipal decisions from March 28 2008

Meeting number 25 from March 28 2008 with the upgrade of 6 TAO to subdistrict municipalities.
  • Ban Sa (เทศบาลตำบลบ้านสา), Chae Hom district, Lampang province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 128.03 km², 10 villages and 5,244 citizen.
  • Si (เทศบาลตำบลสิ), Khun Han district, Si Sa Ket province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 16 km², 5 villages and 2,645 citizen.
  • Nong Kheng (เทศบาลตำบลหนองเข็ง), Bueng Kan district, Nong Khai province, effective July 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 66.80 km², 11 villages and 6,430 citizen.
  • Nong Hua Raet (เทศบาลตำบลหนองหัวแรต), Nong Bun Mak district, Nakhon Ratchasima province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 93.99 km², 15 villages and 8,265 citizen.
  • Nong Sarai (เทศบาลตำบลหนองสาหร่าย), Phanom Thuan district, Kanchanaburi province, effective May 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1997, covers 26.95 km², 9 villages and 3,474 citizen.
  • Wiang Kham (เทศบาลตำบลเวียงคำ), Kumphawapi district, Udon Thani province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 102.70 km², 18 villages and 9,929 citizen.
There's also a correction to the creation of Phra Song, decided on February 29.

Tuesday, May 6, 2008

PAO election results for Surat Thani

PAO Election poster, list 3 of constituency 5, Mueang districtOn the website of the Provincial Administration Organization (PAO) of Surat Thani it now has the results of the elections held on April 20, both for the PAO members as well as for the chairman. However as they put scans of printouts into the PDF, they are quite large, and due to the slow connection it took me some hours and many retries of a download tool until I could finally get the files, despite having a broad width speed net connection here. It would have been smarter to put the PDF created from the spreadsheet directly, then they would be just few kilobytes instead of several megabytes. And it would make it possible to copy-and-paste, or for the google bot to index it. Or just directly the XLS files. Sadly neither of the documents includes the extend of the constituencies as mentioned earlier, just the complete list of them. I have also checked some other PDFs from the PAO website without luck. At least in another PDF it has the names of the candidates as text and not just as graphics, so I don't need the type the Thai letters manually.



Anyway, the results are as follows.


  • For the chairman election, the voter turnout was 53.57%, or 355,017 of 662,728 who did cast their vote. The winning candidate is Thani Thueaksuban (นายธานี เทือกสุบรรณ), who was candidate number 2 and the one endorsed by the Democratic Party. He got 194,543 votes or 59.3% of the valid votes. The candidate of list 1 made it second with 111,138 votes, and number 3 got 22,437 votes.

  • For the PAO council, 30 members were elected in the 30 constituencies. Out of these, 17 were won by the candidate from list 2, probably also the ones from the Democratic Party. So it seems the council will have a majority of Democratic Party members - though I cannot be sure, as at least in one of the Mueang constituencies the Democratic Party candidate had the number 4 instead of the 2. Anyway, a Democratic Party dominance in the south of Thailand is nothing surprising.


The candidate on the poster above, Chathurong Sukmueang (นายจัตุรงค สุขเมือง), was the least successful of constituency 5 of Mueang district, receiving 1,576 of 8,744 votes.

Monday, May 5, 2008

Local government entities of Surat Thani province

Working through the Tambon administrative organizations (TAO) creations, I have now completed the province Surat Thani, the one I am most interested in. The full list of these entities would be quite lengthy, so I only mention the most important ones and the notable changes until recently.

The numbers of the various entities are as follows.
  • 2 cities (Thesaban Nakhon) - Surat Thani and Ko Samui
  • 2 towns (Thesaban Mueang) - Tha Kham and Na San
  • 25 subdistrict municipalities (Thesaban Tambon)
  • 113 Tambon Administrative Organizations (TAO)

To be complete, one also has to mention the Provincial Administration Organization (PAO), which is also a local government entity, in contrast to the provincial administration as a central government structure. All of the above local government entities have an elected council, however its number of members, tasks and budget differ between the different types.

Before the 1990s there were just three municipalities in the province - the town Surat Thani established in 1930 as a sanitary district and upgraded to town in 1935, the subdistrict municipality Na San created in 1940, and subdistrict municipality Tha Kham created as a sanitary district in 1955 and upgraded to a municipality in 1986.

In 1999 the 18 sanitary districts were changed into subdistrict municipalities. A somewhat special case was the sanitary district of Ko Pha-Ngan. This was originally created in 1973, when the sanitary district Ko Samui was split, abolished in 1976 and recreated in 1990. 8 of the sanitary district dated back to the 1950s, 2 from the 1960s, 5 the 1970s, and finally 1 from 1989, 1990 and 1991 each.

Talad Chaiya subdistrict municipality officeThe TAO were created in three steps - 11 in 1995, 20 in 1996, and 89 in 1997, altogether 120 TAO. 2004 three TAO were abolished and their area added to the neighboring municipality - Talad Chaiya into Talad Chaiya (the photo shows the municipality office of Talad Chaiya), Khao Pang into Ban Chiao Lan, and Phang Kan into Phanom. Three further TAO were since upgraded into subdistrict municipalities - Wat Pradu and Khao Niphan in 2005 and Chang Sai in 2007. Also in the last years were four upgrades of municipalities - 2000 Tha Kham became a town, 2004 Na San became a town, 2007 Surat Thani became a city, and just few weeks ago Ko Samui became a city as well.

In case you read closely - there were 120 TAO, of which 6 where abolished or upgraded. However above I say there currently are 113 TAO, so there must be one missing. This is the TAO Bang Kung, which was listed in the 1995 TAO creations, but actually the complete area of that subdistrict was added into the town Surat Thani in 1994. So either the 1995 creations were actually effective before the enlargement of the town, and the abolishment of the TAO was forgotten in the announcement, or it was listed in error in the creation list.

As there are 131 subdistricts within the province, most of them are administrated by a TAO. Only 19 have no TAO for itself. Of these, there are 8 municipalities which cover exactly one subdistrict - of course the three upgraded TAO, and further Kanchanadit (Kadae), Talad Chaiya, Phum Riang, Ban Chiao Lan (Khao Pang) and Na San.

Somewhat special is also the district Ko Samui, which completely forms the municipality Ko Samui, thus none of the 7 subdistricts have a TAO. Other subdistricts which have neither a TAO nor municipality centered in them but in a neighboring subdistrict are Bang Kung (Surat Thani) and Phang Kan (Phanom).

As the municipalities and sanitary districts originally only covered the densely settled areas and not full subdistricts, there also several subdistricts partially administrated within a municipality, and partially by the TAO named after the subdistrict.

Finally, there also 6 TAO created in 1958, which were later changed into Tambon Councils - Makham Tia, Tha Thong Mai, Maret, Thung, Khlong Sai and Maluan.

One website on the local government units in Surat Thani is the one of the Suratthani Provincial Office for Local Administration (สำนักงานท้องถิ่นจังหวัดสุราษฎร์ธานี), but as it is completely in Thai I don't know what is the purpose of that office.

The map below shows all the locations of the offices of these local administration entities I know so far, which are sadly just 8 out of 141. I have also added a photo and the URL into the placemarks. While many of these entities have websites, they rarely add a location map, and getting the location from a Thai address is far from trivial. So any additions for the map are welcome, I will update it whenever I have anything new.

View Larger Map

Sunday, May 4, 2008

Municipal decisions from December 13 2007

Meeting number 57 from December 13 2007 with 4 TAO upgraded to subdistrict municipalities.
  • Nong Khai Nam (เทศบาลตำบลหนองไข่น้ำ), Mueang Nakhon Ratchasima district, Nakhon Ratchasima province, effective February 28 2008. The TAO was created in 1999, covers 43.44 km², 8 villages and 5,792 citizen.
  • Na Yom (เทศบาลตำบลนายม), Mueang Amnat Charoen district, Amnat Charoen province, effective February 29 2008. The TAO was created in 1999, covers 34.80 km², 8 villages and 5,064 citizen.
  • Ang Khiri (เทศบาลตำบลอ่างคีรี), Makham district, Chanthaburi province, effective March 1 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 62.70 km², 8 villages and 4,835 citizen.
  • Ban Dan (เทศบาลตำบลบ้านด่าน), Ban Dan district, Buriram province, effective February 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 49.50 km², 20 villages and 12,003 citizen.

Saturday, May 3, 2008

Municipal decisions from March 21 2008

Meeting number 23 from March 21 2008 with the upgrade of 6 TAO to subdistrict municipalities.
  • Song Chan (เทศบาลตำบลสองชั้น), Krasang district, Buriram province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 72.075 km², 17 villages and 11,976 citizen.
  • Chan Dum (เทศบาลตำบลจันดุม), Phlapphla Chai district, Buriram province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 68.34 km², 18 villages and 10,377 citizen.
  • Yai Yaem Watthana (เทศบาลตำบลยายแย้มวัฒนา), Chaloem Phra Kiat district, Buriram province, effective July 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 81 km², 16 villages and 8,616 citizen.
  • Nong Teng (เทศบาลตำบลหนองเต็ง), Krasang district, Buriram province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 71.17 km², 18 villages and 11,945 citizen.
  • Krok Kaeo (เทศบาลตำบลโกรกแก้ว), Non Suwan district, Buriram province, effective April 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 30.25 km², 10 villages and 3,803 citizen.
  • Bang Kung (เทศบาลตำบลบางกุ้ง), Mueang Suphanburi district, Suphanburi province, effective May 28 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 17 km², 4 villages and 2,023 citizen.

Friday, May 2, 2008

Book excerpt: Thailand - Das neue Siam (translated)

Cover of the bookAs there was some interest in the English version of the book excerpt I posted earlier here, below I add the translated text. While the machine translators like Babelfish or Google Translate are fine to get an overview over a text, they usually add so many wrong translations - broken grammar, wrong words when it has more than one possible translation and so on, so for any real usage a manual translation is still mandatory. Sometimes a machine translation creates simply hilarious texts, like this commercial leaflet where they translated technical terms or brand names as well, creating things like "software in 32 pieces" instead of "32 bit software". However, I really hope either Babelfish or Google Translate will add a Thai to English translation, it'd help me a lot searching for the right information in Thai.
... Till then Thailand was subdivided into muang (provinces). These were led by hereditary sovereign, former commendable military or civil cofficers. They were nearly independent in their decisions, like the taxation or the jurisdiction, so they were independent from the central governance and the real rulers of the muang under their leadership. To break the despotic rule of these province leaders called chao muang and to get the under the central governance the top level administrative entity monton (circle) was created. Each monton consisted of several changvat (provinces). Placed on top of a monton was a person close to the royal house, usually a prince. The leaders of the respective changvat had to subordinate the monton leader. The changvat split down into several amphör (districts), which had a nai amphör (district officer) sent by the government installed as the leader. Each amphör consisted of several tambun (communes), with a kamman (commune headman) at its top. The tambun constisted of several muban (villages), which was administrated by a puyaiban (village headman). In this lowest administrative entity the local administration was already realized, as the puyaiban were elected in a general election by all men and women above 20 years old living in the respective muban. These in turn elected the kamnan.

Thursday, May 1, 2008

Municipal decisions from March 14 2008

Meeting number 21 from March 14 2008 with the upgrade of 6 TAO to subdistrict municipalities and one municipality upgrade.
  • Khok Yai (เทศบาลตำบลโคกใหญ่), Non Sang district, Nong Bua Lam Phu province, effective March 5 2008. The TAO was created in 1999, covers 38.73 km², 7 villages and 3,701 citizen.
  • Kho Laen (เทศบาลตำบลคอแลน), Buntharik district, Ubon Ratchathani province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 244.54 km², 18 villages and 12,274 citizen.
  • Wang Sai (เทศบาลตำบลวังไทร), Pak Chong district, Nakhon Ratchasima province, effective July 18 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 134.34 km², 18 villages and 11,197 citizen.
  • Thang Phun (เทศบาลตำบลทางพูน), Chaloem Phra Kiat district, Nakhon Si Thammarat province, effective July 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 41 km², 6 villages and 9,161 citizen.
  • Khung Taphao (เทศบาลตำบลคุ้งตะเภา), Mueang Uttaradit district, Uttaradit province, effective April 17 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 37.46 km², 8 villages and 8,732 citizen.
  • Nong Phue (เทศบาลตำบลหนองผือ), Chaturaphak Phiman district, Roi Et province, effective April 4 2008. The TAO was created in 1996, covers 37.03 km², 11 villages and 7,788 citizen.
  • And finally, the upgrade of Ko Samui to city status (thesaban nakhon), which had been topic here before, now was approved, so the last attempt to block it by the governor of Surat Thani wasn't successful. The upgrade is already effective, it was set to April 19.