Authorities' calls for help in uprooting illegal landowners from Nakhon Ratchasima's Khao Yai Thiang forest preserve have been rebuffed by locals.
Surayud was forced to return his land to the department recently and is now moving his possessions out of the vacation home built on the land.
The department's investigation found that Surayud was not qualified to hold the land, which was reserved for only poor, landless farmers under a 1975 Cabinet resolution.
However, the resolution recognised the right of people to settle there who were already on the land before it was declared a forest preserve.
Chonlatid has chaired a fact-finding panel investigating landholdings in the national park that includes Khao Yai Thiang.
Chonlatid said forestry officials would try to assure locals that not all would be evicted.
"If their properties are inside three designated villages, they can of course stay on," he said.
Without the locals' cooperation, forestry officials could only survey the lots but could not determine who were actually occupying them now.
"The information from locals is crucial for planning solutions," he said.
Local administration officials at the district and provincial levels would be asked to help seek the involvement of the locals, he added.
Interior Ministry permanent secretary Manit Wattanasen insisted that he had not yet been appointed to resolve the Alpine Golf and Alpine Estate land title controversy.
The site for the golf course and homes was in fact meant to serve a temple.
A wealthy woman donated the land to a temple before she passed away. However, it soon changed hands under suspicious circumstances to be developed into the golf club and estate.
Manit said the Alpine case was very complicated.
Even if the assignment was given to him, he was not sure whether he could finish it before he reached mandatory retirement, he said.
