The country’s fierce lèse-majesté laws, officially designed to protect the much-loved Bhumibol and his family from defamation, have kept the prince’s stranger exploits out of the Thai media, but the cover-up is only cosmetic.
Stories about Vajiralongkorn are a gossip mainstay nationwide, and he is loathed by many of his future subjects, including the elite circles expected to crown him and then help him rule.
“The lèse-majesté law criminalises publication of the prince’s exploits, but despite this, or indeed because of this, Thais have voracious interest in informal royal information and gossip, which they share privately with those they trust,” said Andrew McGregor Marshall, a British journalist who has written extensively on the monarchy.
“Almost all Thais know about the exploits of the crown prince, who has been a hated figure in Thailand since the 1970s.”