More French, please, we're francophones

More French, please, we're francophones
By: ACHARA ASHAYAGACHAT
Published: 10/02/2009 at 12:00 AM
Newspaper section: Outlook
Parlez plus en francais, s'il vous plait! That's a plea made by a regional director of the International Organisation of the Francophonie (OIF) during his recent visit to Bangkok.

Chinese is all the rage in Thailand at the moment, but the French are saying that we should practise this European language because French remains the most used internationally, second only to English!

"You should not count the size of the population speaking a language, because that will always put Chinese on top! French is a United Nations official language alongside English. After all, Thailand is now an observer of the French-speaking society - the OIF," said Hanoi-based regional director Patrice Burel.

Burel's job is to promote a wider use of the French language in Thailand, targeting mainly high schools, diplomatic and legal bodies, following Thailand's admission as an observer of the 39-year-old organisation at the Francophone Summit in Quebec last October.

Thailand's observer status, he said, would help boost the importance of the Asian pillar in the 56-member organisation as there are currently only three Asian members - Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam - and Thailand is the sole observer from this continent out of the total of 14 observers.

"Here, there is a different traditional link to the francophone community. Thais have been using French for four centuries, and the country is generally accepted as being more developed economically [than the three Asian members of the society]," said Burel.

The OIF is aiming to enhance the status of the French language in three main areas in Thailand: Schools, diplomacy, and legal studies. The state-funded organisation would also like to see Thailand adopt a progressive policy on Francophones by ratifying the 2005 Convention on Cultural Diversity, said Burel.

Presently, there are some 600,000 French-speaking Thais, including some 50 diplomats and about a dozen members of the Council of State.

The size of the French-speaking populace here, according to Burel, is more the same as that in Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam, and the OIF would like to work toward a strengthening of the status of French as an important second foreign language.

With a conservative amount of 80 million (3.57 billion baht) annually to look after three members and one observer in Asia as well as to generate more interest in, and give greater importance to, the language, the OIF has its work cut out.

"We could provide expertise to Thai French language high-school teachers and encourage Thai experts to find means and ways to create a French curriculum. We would also like to see more Thai universities like Chulalongkorn and Thammasat universities join the Agence Universitaire de la Francophonie (AUF), which provides research networks and scholarships to members," said the regional director.

Only four Thai universities are members of this French university networking structure, he noted.

While the OIF needs to change perceptions among students that the French language has a bright future in the marketplace as it is not exclusively spoken by the elite, the organisation needs to emphasise the opposite to Thai diplomats.

"The concept of 'francophonie' comes with democratic values and traditions, and the idea of solidarity, behind the language. French is the international working language along with English in many international organisations, and Thai diplomats should be proud to be able to speak the language eloquently as Thailand is now an active participant in French-speaking society," he said.

Thai diplomats will be considered inner members of the forums where the majority speaks French, he declared. OIF members fully backed Cambodia's bid to list the 11th-century Preah Vihear temple as a World Heritage site last year, while Thailand contested the Cambodian quest to no avail.

"On the matter of the border dispute between Thailand and Cambodia," Burel said, "OIF members should have a good relationship with each other. In fact, during the process of considering granting Thailand observer status, Vietnam and Laos were strongly in favour. Cambodia did not raise any objections, and merely informed the summit of the then on-going dispute over the temple."