The national police spokesman says he had no idea why the smiling face of immigration with the funny nickname had been summarily fired and gone missing from social media.
Krissana Pattanacharoen told reporters he didn’t know why Lt. Gen. Surachate Hakparn was effectively suspended and transferred to police headquarters by order of the national police chief.
The order was published Saturday and gave no explanation for the decision.
His social media profiles, including his Instagram and Twitter, have gone dark, leading the internet to collectively ask #WhereisBigJoke?
On Sunday, a plastic surgeon accused of disfiguring dozens of patients in a high-profile case Surachate was involved in denied any responsibility.
Surachate, 48, was popular with the public and had only been put in charge of immigration six months ago.
Surachate was known as a tireless bureaucrat who seemed almost to teleport from raid to raid nationwide. Most famously, he roundups of illegal immigrants and visa scofflaws in near-weekly episodes of an operation called “X-Ray Outlaw Foreigner.”
In January, he became an object of global attention when he intervened to protect and ultimately free a Saudi woman who fled her family and barricaded herself inside Suvarnabhumi Airport to avoid deportation. In a rare move for high-ranking bureaucrats, he took a principled stand on a human-rights basis, saying Thailand wouldn’t “send someone to their death.”
In parallel to his job running a massive department responsible for the nearly 40 million people passing through the kingdom annually, Surachate also helps lead the police cybercrime unit, where he has taken credit for busting scammers.
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