2023-10-17 12:11:31
Thailand
Police officers allowed to grow their hair
To “modernize” its image, the Thai police allow its members to have up to five centimeters of hair on the top of their heads. This will save them money.
PublishedOctober 17, 2023, 2:11 p.m.
Thai police officers are now allowed five centimeters of hair on the top of their heads and one centimeter on the sides and back.
Thai police officers, forced by the military junta to keep their heads shaved, can now grow their hair slightly, an innovation supposed to help them in their daily work. This relaxation of the rules introduced in 2018, by the junta then in power, aims to “modernize” the institution, the police indicated Tuesday, the day it came into force.
The standards “have been adjusted to make the police appear more in tune with today’s world,” she said. From now on, “male police officers” are allowed to grow “up to five centimeters of hair on the top of their head and up to one centimeter on the sides and back”.
“This change will help police officers save money by going to the hairdresser less.”
Sorat Klapwila, dean of social sciences at the Police Academy
In Thailand, a conservative country, civil servants must comply with strict rules governing their appearance. Last week, the new chief of the national police, inducted in September, highlighted the practical virtues of hair reform. “I fear that the only possibility for investigators to infiltrate is to pose as Buddhist monks” with shaved heads, Torsak Sukvimol joked.
“It’s a good first step,” responded progressive MP Rangsiman Rome, whose party, Move Forward, campaigned in the spring to fundamentally reform the security forces associated with corruption and cronyism. For him, police officers should have the right to choose their hair style.
“Cosmetic reform”
The new rules should prove popular among police officers, said Sorat Klapwila, dean of social sciences at the Police Academy. Previously, police officers had to go to the hairdresser every week, and “this change will help them save money,” he said. In Thailand, newly recruited police officers earn less than 10,000 bahts (a little less than 250 francs) per month.
“It’s just a haircut,” said Wuttipat Cheunjampla, 50, a police officer in an upscale neighborhood of Bangkok. “Maybe there is something else the authorities can do to improve the living conditions of junior officers.”
The reform is just cosmetic, thinks Sumontip Chitsawang, a professor at Chulalongkorn University. “In people’s eyes, it’s not important,” he said, believing the general public is more interested in the effectiveness of the police in fighting crime.
(AFP)Show comments
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