A Koh Pha Ngan childcare centre was raided on May 1 after officials found it was allegedly operating outside the scope of its licence with unregistered foreign teachers and 163 children enrolled.
Surat Thani Immigration police, Koh Pha Ngan police, district officials, and Internal Security Operations Command Region 4 officers inspected the property.
The centre was licensed as a childcare facility operated by a juristic person for children aged two to six, with a limit of 18 children.
However, the site was found operating as a non-formal school, with four classroom levels, teaching children from nursery age up to 12 years old.
The school reportedly ran three terms per year and charged tuition of 32,000 baht per child per term. Officials found that the centre issued certificates to children who completed its courses, but staff could not show a licence to operate a non-formal school.
A total of 163 children were found enrolled at the site. Thairath reported that the group included 89 foreign children aged two to 12, most of them Israeli nationals.
Police arrested nine people, including three listed as owners or employers and six foreign teachers.
The owners and employers were one Thai woman and two Iranian nationals. They were charged with employing foreigners without work permits, failing to report foreign workers within 15 days, breaching childcare centre rules, and operating a private non-formal school without permission.
The six teachers were from the United States, South Africa, and France. They were charged with working without permits and failing to report their employer, workplace, and job duties within 15 days of starting work.
All nine suspects were handed to Koh Pha Ngan police for legal proceedings.
Surat Thani police also ordered an investigation into the company’s shareholder structure. Investigators found that the company had four Thai shareholders and three foreign shareholders from Iran and Estonia.
The structure raised suspicion that Thai shareholders may have been used as nominees to conceal foreign-run business activity in the tourist area.
In a similar case, a special operations unit conducted a raid on Koh Pha Ngan, apprehending a group of foreigners from Russia, Ukraine, and Myanmar involved in operating an illegal childcare centre.
The story Koh Pha Ngan raid exposes illegal school, unregistered foreign teachers as seen on Thaiger News.
