Thailand 'Walk To The Future' - a struggle for a truly democratic Constitution.

In Thailand, the people are fighting for a truly democratic Constitution, and below is a statement issued by the Thai NGO Coordinating Committee on Development - as they exercised their right of peaceful assembly in the 'Walk To The Future'  

Statement on the First Day of “Walk to the Future”  byThai NGO Coordinating Committee on Development (NGO-COD)

Today marks the first day of Walk to the Future, a collective journey of the people demanding a new, truly democratic constitution. This walk is not only a physical movement across distance — it is a political declaration that the future must be written by the people themselves.

We, the People, are Water. Politics is the Obstruction of Water.

 

By its very nature, water flows freely. Yet politics slows, delays, stores, diverts, and blocks water—so that Bangkok may remain dry while Ayutthaya, the land on which we now begin our first steps, has been submerged for more than four months. People have lost their homes and farmland. They have been displaced, distressed, impoverished, grieving, sick, and dying.

Politics, therefore, manufactures tragedy and disaster, only to perform a drama of moral rescue afterwards—demanding gratitude from the very people who suffer. Yet it is we, the people, who create politics—not politics that creates the people.

 

This is no different from the people’s demand for a completely new Constitution, drafted by a fully elected Constituent Assembly. But politics stands as an obstruction once again, offering only a committee that is not elected by the people.

 

We, the People, are Water. Each drop joins another to form a current—a mass movement—that will push through every obstruction. Like water flowing freely, we carry our collective dreams to declare loudly that:

“We do not agree with amending the Constitution through a Constituent Assembly that is not fully elected by the people.”

Because “whoever writes the law writes it for their own class.”

 

We, the People, are Water. Good politics is good water governance—allowing floods to spread naturally across floodplain cities such as Bangkok and other economic centers, letting the water pass through without creating tragedy. It is not the creation of man-made obstructions that divert water and impose disaster upon the people of Ayutthaya and other provinces.

We, the People, are Water. Each drop becoming a current—a movement. If today and tomorrow politics continues to place barriers in the path of water, preventing our free flow, then the natural cycle of water will persist regardless. Water will evaporate into vapor, rise into clouds, accumulate moisture, and return as rain, giving life to all living things.

If today we cannot yet obtain a fully elected Constituent Assembly, then tomorrow the sky will burst open upon politics in a torrential downpour—creating a political reckoning that forces the will of politics to align with the aspirations of the people.

 

The life cycle of we, the people is long—generation after generation without end. Politics, in contrast, has a short life cycle when viewed from the people’s perspective. It cannot be relied upon as a sustainable source of hope.

 

We walk to accumulate victories.

We walk to change the future.

We walk to break through political obstacles with hope and fierce determination—because a good Constitution must be written by the hands and feet of the people themselves.

 

With respect,

Thai NGO Coordinating Committee on Development (NGO-COD)

6 December 2025

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