Monks break through barricades
Supporters mobilise over DSI’s search
Thousands of monks and followers broke through barricades to enter Wat Phra Dhammakaya in Pathum Thani as temple devotees launched a campaign on social media to mobilise hundreds of thousands of supporters nationwide to pressure officials into ending the temple search.
The incident occurred before the 3pm deadline given by the Department of Special Investigation (DSI) for people and monks who are not residents of Wat Phra Dhammakaya to leave the temple to enable searches as DSI officials and police have sealed off the temple to control movements in and out.
The Facebook page “Thai Monks” posted a message yesterday calling Dhammakaya supporters nationwide to gather at the temple within 48 hours to oppose an order issued under Section 44 of the interim constitution to enable the temple searches.
The Facebook page is meant to show that monks from all regions of the country are ready to support efforts to pressure officials if they use force against the temple. About 500,000 followers from the Central region are expected to turn up in support, according to the Facebook page.
The Facebook page also posted a message: “The government is broke! Want to disrobe all the Dhammakaya monks and take eight tonnes of golden [Buddha] statues.”
About 1pm yesterday, followers and monks breached the barricades at Gates 5 and 6 on Bang Khan-Nong Sua Road in Khlong Luang district and managed to enter the temple’s compound before boarding vehicles parked inside the temple to reach the inner areas through a special entrance.
During the breach, a follower threw a news agency camera belonging to a correspondent, worth about 300,000 baht, to the ground, breaking it.
About 10 minutes later, followers and temple monks emerged from inside the temple. Wearing face masks, they cut open Gate 5 and formed a human shield confronting police.
Pol Lt Gen Charnthep Sesavet, commissioner of the Provincial Police Region 1, tried to negotiate and calm the situation. Scuffles lasted for about 20 minutes before each side backed off.
At 3.30pm, temple followers and monks set up a tent near the Khlong L 2 canal outside Gate 5 and Gate 6 to welcome additional followers who were coming in to support the temple.
Standoffs between police and followers and monks continued into the evening.
Pol Lt Gen Charnthep said police needed reinforcements to control the situation and prevent any ill-intended parties from triggering an incident. He said officials had taken pictures of people who broke through their barricades and would later take legal action against them.
DSI deputy spokesman Woranan Srilam denied claims on social media that officials would seize temple assets including golden Buddha statues.
Pol Maj Woranan warned that anyone who instigates resistance against officials will face legal action.
DSI director-general Paisit Wongmuang later issued a summons for 14 senior monks of the temple to report to him at the Region 1 Border Patrol Police Bureau in Khlong Luang district at 6pm.
They include its former abbot
Phra Dhammajayo.
Pol Col Paisit said non-resident monks and lay people were ordered to leave Wat Phra Dhammakaya by 3pm yesterday or they would be considered as having defied an order of the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) and be liable of up to one year in jail and/or a fine of up to 20,000 baht.
Since Thursday, DSI and police have searched the 2,300-rai temple compound for Phra Dhammajayo, 72, who is wanted for forest encroachment in connection with his meditation centres in several provinces, money laundering and receiving stolen assets in connection with the multi-billion-baht embezzlement at Klongchan Credit Union Co-operative.
Meanwhile, Phra Ajarn Thammasak, who claimed to be a monk at Wat Phra Dhammakaya for 30 years, held a media briefing outside Gate 5, revealing that Phra Dhammajayo used a car to escape arrest on Feb 16 — the first day the raid began.
Phra Thammasak said the former abbot has fled but not gone far because he is sick. He also said he was ready to lead reporters to see the former abbot’s escape route. He did not say where he had gone.
Phra Thammasak said he decided to come forward because he was not satisfied with the temple’s management, who were aware the former abbot was not inside the temple, but still let the DSI search go on.
This could have led to clashes between followers and officials and the DSI would have been blamed for any losses, the monk said.
Meanwhile, Phra Sanitwong Wutthiwaso, the temple’s communication head, asked officials not to cut off the water and power supply, saying the temple’s management had cooperated well with the searches.
Anyone who instigates resistance against the work of officials will face legal action.
Is Phra Dhammajayo, the elusive former abbot of Wat Phra Dhammakaya, still within the vast reaches of 2,300-rai compound of the temple, playing hide and seek with the authorities trying to bring him to the court to face charges ranging from embezzlement and money laundering to receiving stolen property and forest encroachment?
Or was he spirited out of the temple months ago when the temple was not cordoned off by authorities as it is now after being declared a restricted zone and placed under siege?
No one in the government seems to have the answer, but most believe he is still in the kingdom — if not hiding somewhere inside the temple which is yet to be thoroughly searched. They dismiss suggestions he may have slipped out of the country because “he does not have a passport”.
Even Prime Minister Prayut Chan-ocha does not seem to care whether the elusive monk is arrested or not. “If he is still in the temple, he will be arrested. If not, he will not be arrested,” he said in response to a reporter’s question about whether the search of the temple by officials from the Department of Special Investigation and police will manage to locate him.
The prime minister said that what is more important in this Wat Phra Dhammakaya drama is not the arrest of Phra Dhammajayo, but how to weed out bad elements from our monastic circle.
I can’t agree more with the prime minister. This huge operation in which more than 4,000 men from the Department of Special Investigation, the police and the army have been deployed, plus the use of Section 44 of the interim charter, to look for one single rogue monk is overkill.
The real objective of the operation, I believe, is to clamp down on the temple, to strangle the Dhammakaya cult until it is no longer active and does not pose a threat to Buddhism for its distorted Buddhist teachings.
What is the point of or what benefits can be gained from putting Phra Dhammajayo on trial? At the end of any trial, which likely will drag on for years if the case or cases run through the three levels of courts of law, he may be convicted and sent to jail. His situation of having to live like a fugitive, hiding from the authorities and, perhaps, shifting from one place to the other to evade the authorities is not much different from being incarcerated — complete
with lack of freedom of movement that he once enjoyed.
But imagine the scenario when thousands of his followers, including monks, show up in front of the court to give him moral support, to chant prayers before both the local and foreign media. More importantly, the trial of Phra Dhammajayo — if there is one — is not the trial of the monk as an individual. It can also be seen as a trial of our own monastic order for its failure to rein in the monk and for its complacency that allowed the monk and his sect to grow so strong they can defy the state and the monastic order with impunity. This does not mean there are no other rogue monks who have misbehaved, but they were deemed a lesser threat than Phra Dhammajayo and the Dhammakaya cult.
I honestly don’t think the trial of Phra Dhammajayo will bode well for the clergy and the government even though there is slim chance that he will be arrested or voluntarily surrender. I don’t think
he subscribes to the notion that there is an opportunity in any crisis that he may seize upon to reverse the situation to his favour by turning himself into a martyr instead of a convict.
Wat Phra Dhammakaya is more than a temple. It qualifies as an empire. Besides the main headquarters in Pathum Thani with its golden dome that looks like a flying saucer on top of a grand hall, there is a 3km long underground tunnel through which water from a lake is pushed by over 230 pumps up a wall 14 stories high to splash down and form an artificial waterfall, and a building topped with a globe-like structure. It has spread its wings to reach out to the world with meditation centres overseas and across the country, most of which encroach on forest reserves or parks.
Wat Phra Dhammakaya branched out in a similar fashion that a business branches out to get a bigger share of the market.
For the cult, its goal is to attract a bigger following and spread its adulterated Buddhist gospel to encourage its followers to make donations under the slogan that the bigger the amount of the donations, the higher the plane to heaven for the donors.
What the preachers didn’t tell their gullible followers is that some of them may find hell in this life before they may or may not go to heaven in the after-life.
Phra Dhammajayo is on the run. His empire is crumbling and may collapse. But that does not mean that the clergy will be any better off.
Or perhaps they will earn more trust and respect from the lay people if there is a real reform among our monks, starting from the top down.
After all, Phra Dhammajayo and the Dhammakaya cult are just one major problem that poses a threat to Buddhism in this country.
Wat Phra Dhammakaya is more than a temple. It qualifies as an empire.