[Police arrested six senior monks after raids on several temples in May. Among them were members of the Sangha Supreme Council, the governing body of Thai Buddhists, and Phra Buddha Issara, a right-wing activist monk thought to be close to the prime minister.]
By George Styllis
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Officers
escort Phra Buddha Issara, 62, an activist monk, at the Thai Police Crime
Suppression
Division headquarters in Bangkok on May 24. (Reuters)
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BANGKOK
— Lurid tales of monks
involved in sex, drugs and stolen money have crowded the newspapers here for
years, to the seeming indifference of governments. But Thailand’s ruling junta
has stepped up its offensive to destroy what it sees as a rot that has long
been allowed to fester in the upper echelons of Buddhism and corrode the
country’s moral core.
Police arrested six senior monks after raids
on several temples in May. Among them were members of the Sangha Supreme
Council, the governing body of Thai Buddhists, and Phra Buddha Issara, a
right-wing activist monk thought to be close to the prime minister.
The monks have been defrocked and charged
with offenses related to embezzlement, fraud and robbery.
One monk remains at large, having fled to
Germany, where he is seeking asylum. The national police chief has traveled to
Europe twice to seek his extradition.
More investigations and arrests are expected
to follow, with 30 temples suspected of involvement in financial crimes running
into the millions of dollars.
The raids, carried out by more than 100
police officers, follow a similar mission last year to arrest the abbot of
Dhammakaya temple, Thailand’s biggest and wealthiest Buddhist sect, excoriated
for promising followers good karma and a noble afterlife in return for big cash
donations.
Police laid siege to the vast domed Dhammakaya
temple on the outskirts of Bangkok in what became a cat-and-mouse game that
dragged on for several weeks to arrest Phra Dhammajayo on embezzlement charges.
The former abbot, subsequently stripped of
his monastic rank, managed to evade capture and flee the country. The
government quietly retreated as criticism mounted over its heavy-handed
tactics.
It may have lost out on a big catch, but the
government dealt a blow to the sect’s credibility and broke the historic taboo
of state action against monks.
In Thailand, there are about 40,000 temples,
which generate billions of dollars a year in donations.
But scholars say true piety among monks and
lay people has waned and been replaced by an emphasis on donations and gestures
that yield instant karma.
At Wat Saket, one of the temples in Bangkok
raided by police, tourists blithely ring enormous bells, chatter, and chomp on
ice cream at the temple’s peak. Spirituality is palpably lacking.
Duncan McCargo, a Thailand expert and
professor of political science at the University of Leeds, said corruption in
the monastic community is endemic, with the temples that were raided having
drawn negative attention.
“The particular temples and monks that are
the focus of these raids are controversial and have been on the outs for some
time. This is especially true with Wat Saket, a top-ranking temple that no
member of the royal family has visited for decades because it has long been
seen as untrustworthy,” he said.
Stories of monks engaging in unseemly
pursuits have spawned considerable cynicism among younger Thais.
“I don’t go to temples much these days. I
don’t feel I believe in them,” said Pannaporn Ketsawat, 27, a call-center
worker.
Thai identity has long been self-defined by
the institutions of “Nation, Religion, Monarchy.” But Buddhism here has been in
a state of crisis for many years.
Latent sectarian divisions have for decades
created something of a power struggle between the dominant Thammayut and Maha
Nikaya sects, the former enjoying a reign that paralleled that of the late King
Bhumibol Adulyadej, who died in 2016.
Hailing from the Maha Nikaya order,
Dhammakaya has grown rapidly, with hundreds of thousands of followers, and
poses a political and constitutional threat, not least because it has been
closely associated with former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a populist
who was accused of corruption, branded as an authoritarian and deeply opposed
by the military and elites.
The country’s lack of secularism means the
line between religion and politics is often blurred.
“Although it may appear that the secular
government is imposing its own views on religion, it is certain that there are
also religious considerations behind the scenes,” said Gregory Seton, a
professor in the religion department at Dartmouth College.
Since coming to power in a bloodless coup in
2014 on the back of a pledge to sweep out corruption, the military has sought
to exercise more control over Buddhism.
The government has moved to inspect the
finances of all temples and requires monks to keep smartcards that identify
their political and religious backgrounds, said Paul Chambers, an expert on
Thai politics at Naresuan University in northern Thailand.
“The raids are motivated by a junta desire to
control Buddhist monks of all persuasions,” he said.
Officials from the government and relevant
state agencies did not respond to requests for comment or could not be reached.
The arrest of Phra Buddha Issara targeted a
monk who would seem to have been on the same wavelength as the junta. He helped
lead the anti-government marches that paved the way for the toppling of the
government of Yingluck Shinawatra, Thaksin’s sister, and has been a staunch
advocate of cleaning up Buddhism.
He served in the 21st Infantry Regiment,
Queen’s Guard, which Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha formerly commanded. There
was no career overlap, said Mano Laohavanich, a former monk and outspoken
critic of Wat Phra Dhammakaya, but they are known to be close. Prayuth has
publicly denied this.
Buddha Issara has been charged with the
serious crime of forging the late king’s royal insignia to stamp amulets and
supporting robbery during demonstrations against Thaksin’s sister.
The forgeries allegedly happened in 2011 but
were brought to the attention of police in 2017 by the Buddhism Protection and
Promotion Organization, whose members claim to be defenders of the religion.
Suraphot Thaweesak, a Buddhism scholar, said
the fact that the accusation and charge in the alleged forgeries have only
recently come to light suggests the “situation wasn’t ripe” to expose it
earlier.
“There’s nothing certain in Thailand. It
depends on when the power holder thinks it’s time to execute,” he said.
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