Matthew McDaniel

Matthew McDaniel is an American indigenous rights activist, formerly a carpenter, working to improve human rights for the Akha people of Thailand and Laos. He is the founder of the Akha Heritage Foundation. He lived in Thailand from 1991 to 2004.

On April 18, 2004, he was arrested at Thailand's border with Burma by Thai immigration authorities, jailed for nine days, and then deported. In July 2005 he moved from the USA back to Laos. His Thai Akha wife and children left Thailand and went to Laos to be with him. After his wife and children received visas, the family relocated to the United States in May 2006. A December 22, 2005 Keizer Times article reported on the difficulty in getting the visas.

McDaniel is opposed to what he claims are missionary efforts to rewrite Akha history and eradicate their culture. This includes a language and oral history, which he says are critical components to their unique identity. He opposes coercive missionary conversion tactics, and the removal of Akha children from their families and villages. He has frequently questioned why charities such as Rotary International support certain missionary groups. McDaniel has asserted that Rotary International has since pulled their web pages supporting the funding of the Children of the Golden Triangle Mission. McDaniel also asserted that UNESCO was working with US missionaries who were "destroying Akha culture".

A May 15, 2004 Asia Times article reported:

McDaniel estimates that more than 100 organizations are proselytizing. "There's way too many missionaries coming. It's become a free-for-all. They come in with money from their home churches, with four-wheel drives, living like kings, like they never would back home," said McDaniel, whose forthright campaign upset many people, spurring whispers about his motives. McDaniel was reportedly deported by Thai authorities after being interviewed for this article; the reasons for the deportation are unclear.

A January 2003 Village Voice article described him as "the evangelicals' fiercest critic in Chiang Rai."

Since moving to Thailand 15 years ago, McDaniel has started a small nongovernmental organization called the Akha Heritage Foundation. With an annual budget of $6000, the group provides services that range from the establishing of fish farms and publishing books in the Akha language to documenting human rights violations.

Half Moon Bay Review reported in a May 2009 article:

Bruno, a San Francisco resident, teamed up with McDaniel on what she calls “guerilla aid style” missions to usher medical supplies across the Thai-Burmese border to Akha people. Both were fighting a common enemy – exploitation and oppression – one with a knapsack full of medicine, the other with a video camera. She remembers watching McDaniel motorbike across the border alongside black market traders and sex traffickers, wearing a leather cowboy hat and shouldering a knapsack packed with bandages and ointments for homeless Akha.