The news follows Weerawit Kreuasombat, President of the Patong Entertainment Business Association (PEBA), earlier this week calling for officials to regulate touts, illegal vendors and even ladyboys on Bangla Rd.
The request came at a meeting on Tuesday (Nov 22), chaired by Phuket Provincial Chief Administrative Officer (Palad) Somprat Prabsongkram, held to discuss ways to reduce factors on Bangla Rd that annoy tourists.
The meeting was intended to focus on people using motorbikes with sidecars to illegally sell products on Bangla Rd, including people selling alcoholic beverages from foam boxes along the popular nightlife street.
Mr Weerawit, however, wanted to broaden the range of people, and activities, that are to be brought under control.
“I would like the relevant agencies to address all the wrong things on Soi Bangla at the same time, to create a good image for Soi Bangla,” he said.
“I therefore would like to propose to organise the ladyboys who come to harass guests on Soi Bangla. There are at least 100 of them waiting at various points along the street, propositioning prostitution to tourists. Sometimes they steal from tourists,” Mr Weerawit said.
“People come from Pattaya and Bangkok who do not know who is who, and think that in Soi Bangla there should not be ladyboys who sell prostitution to tourists,” he added.
“If we are unable to manage them, it would be wise to have them registered to know who is there. If anything happens, we would be able to track them down,” Mr Weerawit explained.
Mr Weerawit asked for touts on Bangla Rd to be treated the same: “This includes touts soliciting customers. There are a lot of them as well.”
“Touts often harass tourists, and often offer prices higher than what it actually costs at the store. Some of them have weapons, sell drugs to tourists, and sometimes they are involved in problems involving physically assaulting tourists,” Mr Weerawit said.
“This group, too, should be controlled. They should be registered and it should be recorded which venue they work for, instead of letting them work freely like ‘ghosts’ as it is today,” he added.
“All these things destroy the image of Soi Bangla Walking Street,” Mr Weerawit said.
Mr Weerawit also called for the parking of taxis, tuk-tuks and motorcycles for hire at each end of the street to be controlled. “At this time, they can park anywhere they want,” he said.
“Another thing that is becoming popular in Soi Bangla is marijuana that is open for sale in many shops,” Mr Weerawti continued.
“We would like this to be organised so it is sold and smoked under formal rules, and not allowed to be taken out and smoked in the street, which has a wide variety of tourists… Some people like it, some people don’t,” he said.
An official report of the meeting, without naming any persons responsible for the decisions, said that vendors selling food from motorbikes with sidecars will be banned from entering the street, but will be found appropriate sites to sell their food elsewhere.
The sale of alcoholic beverages openly from foam boxes along the street will be banned entirely, simply because “it is illegal”.
Ladyboys and touts will have to be registered in order to ply their trade on the street, and touts will have to register which businesses they work for, said the report.
Regarding marijuana and cars parked at the end of the street, the report marked only that “the responsible agencies must strictly follow the rules of the law”.