Pattani Place : A new educational opportunity for the Deep South?
Story by Somsak Hunngam
Despite the seemingly endless violence which has gripped the three southernmost provinces for almost six years, the region may have its first shopping mall-cum-education complex within a year “if everything goes as planned”.
Named the Pattani Place, the 500-million baht project is to be developed by DRS Development Company Limited, is located on a ten-rai plot on Charoenpradit Road in Muang district of Pattani, just about 200 metres from the Pattani campus of Prince of Songkhla university.
The project houses a five-storey building for the international education centre which will include language institutes, a four-star hotel to be named the Pattani Hotel, four condominium buildings, 13 units of home office and an outdoor hall for educational or trade exhibitions or other activities.
Piling work is expected to start early next year and construction is due to be completed by yearend the soonest.
Worawit Baru, a senator and former lecturer at the Pattani campus of Prince of Songkhla university, said that had the developer had no confidence in the feasibility of the project, he would not have initiated the project in the first place.
“If the project proves to be a success, it constitutes a solution to the unrest problem in the deep South. But for the project to be successful, the developer must understand the soul of the locality,” said the senator, adding that although Pattani is Muslim-predominated, the province cannot afford to reject development while striving to protect its Islamic values.
Senator Worawit also suggests the Abhisit government to take a look at neighbouring Malaysia to see how the country has been developing economically. “Malaysia has embraced modern development but its development is based on Islamic foundation. This is the Islam that we can accept,” he said.
He noted that development in the deep South implemented by successive governments had always encountered problems because all the development projects had ignored the Islamic foundation although they had the blessing of the chamber of commerce or the Federation of Thai Industries.
“The launch of the Pattani Place project indicates that the people in the region are interested in education. This goes contrary to the traditional belief of the state that the people here are not interested in education. As a matter of fact, people here maintain that they have been learning for years, but there are no jobs for them. Why is that?,” he asked.
The senator said that most Malay Muslims in the region had wanted their children to be grown up within religious framework. But since the government has not been able to meet their wish on this aspect, they have their children sent to the religious schools which they built themselves.
He further noted that the shortage of job opportunities in the region had sent many young Malay Muslims who have graduated from abroad to open up more religious schools in their communities as a means to provide themselves with employment.
He insists that most Muslim students do not want to further religious studies abroad but want to further their studies at home provided that the standard of the education is improved.
From his own survey, Senator Worawit said that he discovered that most Muslim parents wanted to send their children to religious schools at young age even if they claimed they could hardly afford the tuition fees instead of the government-run primary or kindergarten schools because they wanted their children to grow up as good Muslims and free from narcotics. In the meantime, they also want their children to have quality education.
He suggests it is about time for the government to enact a law to endorse religious schools in order that the schools which are prolific in the deep South can be developed into centres of learning not just about religious faith but also about non-religious courses.