Transcript of the above video: 

So "Big Joke" is back in the news yet again. This has been sort of an interesting thing to watch from the sidelines especially from a procedural standpoint. For those who are unaware, Surachate "Big Joke" Hakparn, I've been following him, he was the Deputy National Police Chief, then he was suspended and now it looks like he's being reinstated although that is still sort of somewhat up in the air. I started following him going back to when he came on my radar when he took over Thai Immigration and made a lot of changes there; shook things up a lot; really started enforcing relevant Immigration Law and really started scrutinizing applications for certain type of visas. 

That said, I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Suspended 'Big Joke' demands PM reinstate him. Quoting directly: "Suspended Deputy National Police Chief Police General Surachate Hakparn (that's "Big Joke") said on Monday he would petition the National Anti-Corruption Commission, (NACC), for an investigation unless Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin completes his reinstatement. Police General Surachate Hakparn aka 'Big Joke', said the Prime Minister was also chairman of the Police Commission and as such could have the commission revoke the suspension order." Just sort of an aside, procedurally the suspension was not correctly invoked in the first place. Is "Big Joke" then suspended at all? I don't know the answer to that. Apparently he is, but again, when you get into procedural issues, you can start getting into trying to adjudicate and decipher and discern really fine points of procedure, but again I think it is a valid question. Quoting further: Quote: "The Prime Minister said that the order was incomplete... If the Prime Minister is negligent and fails to abide by the law, I must take legal action against the Prime Minister in accordance with the law," Police General Surachate said". Quoting further: "Police General Surachate also said that he would file a complaint with the NACC against the person who signed off on his suspension, without naming Pol Gen Kitrat. Police General Surachate said there were obvious attempts to treat him badly and if he were reinstated, he would review the dismissal orders against 70 - 80 other Police Officers". Quoting further: "Police General Kitrat said on Monday that he based his suspension decision on the seriousness of the case involved, relevant facts and related laws." So interesting here. 

Again "Big Joke's' career has just been sort of, I don't mean to laugh, but it has really been something to watch because it's very anomalous for a Law Enforcement Officer here in Thailand to be quite this boisterous, flamboyant, to sort of see him, it has also been interesting to watch, what's the line from the song Hallelujah? I think it was by Leonard Cohen where he said, "it goes like this, the fourth, the fifth, the minor falls and the major lifts." We have just seen ups and downs throughout this whole thing with "Big Joke" so it has been interesting to watch. I am still following this because I find the procedural aspects that he brings up with regards to the internal workings of the Royal Thai Police to be fascinating quite frankly. It really sheds a lot of light on something that in the past was a bit obscure. 

Now that said, how does it pertain to your average expat? Not a lot. This is sort of internal police procedure within the Police Department. I don't think any expats are really going to bump up against any procedural issues for themselves anytime soon. That said it is interesting; it's interesting law enforcement news and we will certainly keep people updated on this channel as this situation evolves.