Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggest, we are discussing the issue of foreign businesses using "Thai nominees" here in Thailand. I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Bangkok Post, that is bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Thai truckers under pressure from influx of Chinese Companies. Quoting directly: "Local freight truck operators have claimed their businesses are being badly hurt by an influx of lorries (that is trucks) from China and the operations of Chinese warehouses and freight companies using Thai nominees. Land Transportation Federation of Thailand (LTFT) Chairman Thongyoo Kongkhan on Sunday called on the Government to step in to protect local truck operators. He plans to send a letter requesting a meeting with Transport Minister Suriya Jungrungreangkit to find ways to deal with the problem. Mr. Thongyoo alleged that Chinese businessmen have built warehouses and operated "full-scale" freight truck businesses with the help of Thai nominees. It is estimated that the Chinese trucks account for 1% of total truck numbers in Thailand, about 10,000. That number is expected to continue to increase at an average of 1% per year." 

To be clear, inland transportation is one of the most jealously guarded internal labour functions here in Thailand. The Thais take it very, very seriously. Internal transportation, trucking, is considered to be something to be very restricted from foreigners, that needs to be understood. And that's all foreigners. It doesn't have anything to do Chinese, whoever else. Thailand, as a policy matter does not want to have their inland shipping system dominated by outsiders and quite honestly, it is one of the reasons I like living here; that's a good policy. Quoting further: "It's estimated that the Chinese trucks account for 1% of total truck numbers in Thailand, about 10,000. The number is expected to continue to increase at an average of 1% per year." Which 10,000 year on year on year, that's a lot of trucks. Quoting further: "The Department of Land Transport (DLT) issued a statement citing Section 24 of the 1979 Land Transportation Act which stipulates that any juristic person wanting to secure a license to operate a non-fixed-route delivery trucks business must register under the Thai law and have its Head Office located in Thailand. No less than half of the Board Members must be Thai nationals, and no less than 51% of the company's capital must be held by shareholders who are Thai individuals. It said the license applications have been strictly examined and approved in line with the laws. As for concerns over Chinese warehouses or import and export businesses suspected of using Thai nominees, the DLT will ask the Commerce and Finance Ministries to oversee and prevent any disadvantage in the business operations of local truck companies." So again, this is very serious from a policy standpoint within the sort of Thai paradigm if you will. I have to say this is something that I'm a bit passionate about because I do believe that Thailand should insulate her labour market from outside incursion. Again our inland transportation market or inland transportation infrastructure should not be dominated by foreigners and outsiders; it should be Thai quite frankly.

Now again I've discussed in some other videos that we are kind of in a state of flux right now because the Prime Minister has now been removed from office. We have a Caretaker Government; we are sort of waiting around to see if they vote somebody new in. We are also kind of waiting around to see what the aftermath of that is going to look like, so stay tuned for that. But long story short, I do believe that at least at some level, a lot of the talk of the relaxation on restrictions for foreigners doing business in Thailand may have been at least indirectly possibly the cause of the consternation that resulted in the Prime Minister being removed. Again legally speaking he was removed because of the Constitutional Court decision. But look, at the end of the day, political pressure is what it is and when a lot of pressure builds up in the opposition to something, especially something as grassroots important as things like inland transportation or just Thai jobs, you can bet that there are probably going to be political ramifications.