Kwah Dao’s legal assistance continuously benefits its target groups

On June 2nd and 3rd, 2024, Kwah Dao had the opportunity to work jointly in a training relevant to youth fundamental rights and citizenship law in Chiang Mai organized by Shan Youth Power. Around 35 students participated in this training. Most of them were born to immigrant families or refugee parents from Shan State of Myanmar. Although these students are now living a better life in a democratic country where it is safe from fighting, human rights violations, oppression, torture, and genocide, they are still facing many obstacles since the time they were born or moved to Thailand. As most of their parents entered the Kingdom of Thailand unlawfully, so these students did not acquire Thai citizenship by birth. Without Thai citizenship, these students have to experience a lot of pressure and disappointment such as being prohibited from travel across the control area unless permission is given by the district official, being ineligible to apply for scholarships or student loans provided by government agencies, being ineligible to apply to for some majors in colleges, being limited to career choices by the law, lack of access to equal legal protection, and so on.

On this occasion, Kwah Dao sent its lawyer to educate the participants on the must-know Thai Criminal Code, Civil and Commercial Code, Computer-related Crime Act, Citizenship Act, Civil Registration Act, and Immigration Act on the topics that were considered crucial to both the students and their families.

The Criminal Code covers a wide range of topics as follows:

Offenses relating to the security of the Kingdom
Offenses against officials
Offenses relating to public order
Offenses causing public dangers
Offenses relating to sexuality
Offenses against life and body
Offenses against liberty and reputation
Offenses against property

The above-mentioned topics are considered crucial because they can help prevent these students or their parents from involving unwanted incidents such as participating in political events that might be relevant to insulting or defaming the Royal Family, fighting or obstructing the police officers while performing lawful duties, forming criminal gangs and committing acts that will harm the community’s peace, committing sexual harassment especially among the students, involving in physical violence both among the student or with other teenagers in the communities who have different races or cultures, unlawful detention, trespassing, stealing and many more. On the other hand, this legal knowledge can also help protect them or their families from being violated bodily rights, property rights, privacy rights, and so on.

The Civil and Commercial Code covers a wide range of topics as follows:

Principles of contract
Sale agreement
Lease-purchase agreement
Employment agreement
Hire of work agreement
Loan for use agreement
Torts

These topics were selected because these students or their families have to deal with or be involved with such contracts very often such as the students purchasing things (mobile phones, laptops, printers) needed for communication or study purposes, or their parents lease-purchase motorbikes for the transportation of their children to school or for the parents to go to work, or the students need to do the part-time job during school break and need to deal with employment or hire of work contract. Sometimes in tort cases where some of these students or their family members might suffer loss and injuries from automobile accidents, dog bites, being harmed by unsafe products or services, nuisance from neighbors, etc. This legal knowledge is sufficient for them to bring justice for themselves and their families.

The Computer-related Crime Act covers the topics as follows:

Unauthorized computer access
Spam
Importing false information into computer system
Defamation through media

The legal knowledge relevant to Computer-related Crime focuses mainly on the use of social media. The students learned how to post, share, or comment in ways that will not violate others’ rights as well as learned to exercise their legal rights when being violated by others.

The Citizenship Act covers the following topics:

Acquisition of Thai citizenship under section 7 bis paragraph 2, and section 23
Acquisition of Thai citizenship through marriage
Acquisition of Thai citizenship through naturalization

As for knowledge relevant to the Citizenship Act, Civil Registration Act, and Immigration Act, we selected the topics specifically for the descendants of immigrants both who were born in the Kingdom of Thailand and who were born in Myanmar but have migrated to Thailand since they were kids. Those who were born in Thailand had a chance to learn the eligibility and requirements, process, and obstacles to acquire Thai citizenship under section 7 bis paragraph 2, and section 23 as well as learned how to deal with corrupt officials who are responsible for the application consideration. Or for those who were not born in Thailand, they learned how to acquire Thai citizenship by marriage or naturalization so they can plan for it in advance.

The Civil Registration Act covers the following topics:

Applying for birth certificates for those who were born in Thailand but not at the hospital
Applying for “Person with No Registration Status” ID cards for those who are undocumented

The Immigration Act covers the following topics:

Applying for permanent residency

Besides the legal knowledge regarding the acquisition of Thai citizenship, the students who were not born at the hospital also learned how to prepare the witnesses and relevant documents before applying for their birth certificates. Furthermore, they also learned how to apply for permanent residency which they can apply this knowledge to help their parents acquire better residency rights. After the training, the students were given time to ask questions regarding individual legal matters, and the legal advice for each case was provided.