An Open Letter to the Prime Minister of Thailand

Posted on December 5, 2006 by admin
An Open Letter to the Prime Minister of Thailand - The Nation, December 5, 2006
...About a month ago, the scheduled speaker at the SEAWrite Awards, Nobel Prize Winner Woye Soyinka, abruptly cancelled his appearance.  His reason was that he wanted to protest the fact that Thailand was no longer a democracy.  I was asked to speak in his place.
In my speech, I expressed outrage that an outsider would dare to posture about protecting my freedom when I was in fact, perfectly free.  I vigorously defended the recent politics of this country, and I stated that, "I am proud to stand here, in front of my prince, my peers, and my compatriots, and tell the world that right here, in this place and time, I have never felt more free."
...Unlike what many international papers have reported, not one note of my opera was cut.  The full integrity of my work as conceived by me and as staged by Hans Nieuwenhuis was preserved.
Even though I signed the document, other attempts were made to silence the production, including claims by the TCC that a secretary had mistyped the Royal Agenda leaving out the scene and that it was now too late to put it in, and an anonymous "poison pen" fax that was sent to HRH Princess Maha Chakri Sirindorn's office which urged Her Royal Highness not to preside over the event because its text was "obscene".  This sort of dirty, underhanded sabotage has always been typical of the way things are done in this country and is certainly not the fault of the current administration...
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