A former Thai lawmaker allegedly shot a local government chairman and his driver on Monday, and then, apparently feeling the moment deserved an audience, called into a live YouTube stream to announce what he had done. This is a real thing that happened. In a country that just watched a 14-year-old gun down eight people at a school four days ago.
The Part Where He Calls the Livestream
According to CBS News, citing BBC News reporting, Chalong Riewrang did not flee. He did not lawyer up. He called a political commentator who happened to be broadcasting live on YouTube at the time and told her, on camera, in real time, that he had carried out the attack. The presenter, former journalist Anchalee Paireerak, was visibly shocked. She told him to stay put and wait for the police.
That is not the behavior of someone who thought this through. That is also, somehow, not even the most alarming gun story to come out of Nonthaburi this week.
Chalong was arrested and taken to the local police station, Nonthaburi police chief Dejrapee Kongdee confirmed. Police said they were still investigating his motive. Local media floated a private dispute as the likely cause, though the police chief declined to confirm that.
Who Got Shot and How Bad
The two victims were the chairman of the Nonthaburi local government administration and his driver. CBS News reports the chairman was "seriously injured." The driver's condition was not immediately disclosed. Police had not confirmed any deaths as of Monday.
The alleged shooter, Chalong Riewrang, is a former member of Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul's party. So we have a former ruling party MP, a wounded local official, a driver caught in the middle, and a YouTube host who is probably still processing her Monday.
This is the part of the story where you pause and read that back.
Four Days After the School Massacre
This shooting happened in the same province, Nonthaburi, where on Friday a 14-year-old boy shot and killed the grandparents who raised him, then took a gun to school and killed at least six more people before turning the weapon on himself. Eight people dead in a single day. At a school.
Thailand has an estimated 10 million firearms in circulation, according to CBS News. That works out to roughly one gun for every seven people, one of the highest rates of gun ownership in the region. The government made promises of stricter gun laws after Friday's massacre. Thai officials have made those promises before. CBS News notes that previous pledges have failed to prevent repeated shootings.
So: two mass shootings in four days, same province, same promises, same outcome.
The Pattern Nobody Wants to Name
Thailand is not a country without gun laws. It has them. What it apparently does not have is any reliable mechanism for making those laws mean something. Ten million firearms and a legislative track record that amounts to "we'll get to it after the next one."
The school shooting on Friday produced swift public outcry and government statements about reform. That was Friday. By Monday, a former parliamentarian was calling into a YouTube stream from a crime scene. The cycle is so compressed it barely qualifies as a cycle anymore.
CBS News reports that officials have repeatedly promised stricter gun laws after previous shootings, and those promises have repeatedly gone nowhere. That is not an accident. That is a policy choice, dressed up as grief.
The Dingo Take
A former member of parliament allegedly shoots two men and then phones a live broadcast to say so. You are supposed to read that sentence and find it shocking. The problem is it fits perfectly into the week Thailand is having.
Four days, eight people dead at a school, a wounded local official, a driver who presumably did not sign up for any of this, and a government that has been promising gun reform since the last time, and the time before that. Ten million guns don't accumulate in a country of 70 million people because the system failed. They accumulate because the system worked exactly as designed, for exactly the people it was designed to serve.
The YouTube host told Chalong to wait for police. He did. At least someone followed instructions. The Thai government could learn something from that. When a situation is this obviously out of control, you stop, you stay put, and you actually do the thing you said you were going to do.
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