Warner Music Thailand hit by social networkers’ rage
Facebook page appears to insult Constitutional Court judges after Move Forward dissolution
Warner Music Thailand has angered Thai social networkers for allegedly ridiculing and insulting the nine Constitutional Court judges as “rotten apples”.
On Friday, the Facebook page of Warner Music Thailand made a post to promote Spotify and YouTube links of a new song by its Thai artist Charli XCX, but the accompanying photos were of the nine judges in the Constitutional Court room reading the dissolution verdict against the Move Forward Party on Thursday.
The new song by Charli is titled “Apple”.
The post combined two photos of the nine judges on their benches into one photo – one on top of the other with a caption in the middle, saying both in Thai and English “I think the apple’s rotten right to the core.”
In the doctored photo, the faces of the nine judges were superimposed with photos of apples. The graphic personnel who made the photo for the post also edited the two judge photos by using the word “Brat” and a green background to hide the faces of Their Majesties Kings Rama IX and X and the court logo in the middle of the bench.
On Saturday, the post was removed but many social networkers have already used it to attack Warner Music Thailand.
They also warned that the administrator of the page and executives of the company could face jail terms for contempt of court.
Many also threatened to file a complaint with the police against page.
So far, Warner Music Thailand has not issued any statement to respond to the criticisms from Thai Facebook users.
Many users asked why the page removed the post without apologising and wondered if the page was paid for by a foreign government to attack the Thai court.
Many also cited Article 198 of the Criminal Code to warn that a person insulting presiding judges of a case could be liable to one to seven years in jail and a fine of between 20,000 and 140,000 baht.
