Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Surachate "Big Joke" Hakparn yet again. This is definitely an individual who one way or the other sort of stays in the headlines because I just came across a recent article from the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Big Joke's House Searched by Cyber-Crime Police. This is a developing story so I am going to quote directly from this Bangkok Post article. As per usual, I urge those who are watching this, go over there and check that out on your own because there's a lot more information in there. I am going to quote a few excerpts here but a lot of good detail in there as per usual from the Bangkok Post.

Quoting directly: "Cyber-Crime investigation Bureau (CCIB) Police searched the house of Deputy National Police Chief, Gen Surachate "Big Joke" Hakparn in Bangkok on Monday morning after he was allegedly found to have been involved in gambling site operations." Quoting further: "The search was part of a larger operation code-named "Big Cleaning Day". Quoting further: "In operation "Big Cleaning Day", a number of Officers, including a Police Major General and a Police Colonel, in a team of investigators under Pol Gen Surachate were reportedly arrested. They were expected to be taken to Metropolitan Police Division 5 headquarters on Sathorn Road for questioning." Quoting further: "Pol Gen Surachate said he cooperated and the search of his home found nothing illegal. He had never received any money from any gambling website, and acted only to suppress the operations of such websites. He was confident of his subordinates’ innocence." Quoting further: “Asked if he was worried about his prospects for the job of National Police Chief, Police General Surachate said he was not a candidate. After the search he planned to go to work as usual." 

So interesting that he himself apparently has said he is not a candidate for the National Police Chief role and I can only comment on that insofar as we have been talking about for the last few weeks, a lot of remarks that this same person made with regard to the possibility of changing Retirement Visa protocols and if indeed he is not currently or not going to be or is not a candidate for the top spot of Police Chief here in Thailand, National Police Chief, then it seems to me that at least for the moment, there isn't a lot of reason to presume that he would be making a great deal of policy changes even if he maintains his current role because presumably I would think that whoever became the National Police Chief ultimately, would be sort of making those decisions if that's even sort of something they would want to do, change the Retirement Visa protocols. 

So for those to have been kind of keeping track of this from the standpoint of how it might impact retirees here in Thailand, I am not going to sit here and say that this is particularly good news for General Surachate Hakparn. Obviously nobody wants to see their home searched as a result of apparently a search warrant but for retirees what I would say is at the moment, I don't think that there's a lot of fear that needs to be held that there will be any imminent changes to Retirement Visa policy at least in the immediately foreseeable future.