I'm neither Thai nor Malay, but I'll provide some information, as I understand it.
Southern Thailand is ethnically Malay; the Malay sultanate of Pattani was annexed by Thailand as part of the Anglo-Saimese Treaty of 1909. The Thai provinces of Yala and Narathiwat were originally part of Pattani, but were made separate provinces by the Thai government. The semi-independent Malay states of Satun and Songkhla were also annexed. This has repurcussions to this day, as there is much civil unrest in Southern Thailand.
As David has noted, some of the keris in the thread are from other parts of the Malay archipelago. However, keris tajong and keris coteng were prominently featured; tajong are considered to have originated in Pattani, and coteng from Songkhla. In particular, the sheer number of coteng in the first thread is impressive. I noticed that a number of the keris in the thread are from members of this site (and presumably originally posted on this site).
I've included a map of southern Thailand, along with representative examples of a tajong (with apologies to Kai Wee, although I did 'borrow' the .jpeg from the Thai thread) and a coteng.
I don't know anything about the policeman, but I wonder if he's not ethnically Malay? Nakhon Si Thammarat is in the south, less than 100 miles from Songkhla. To the best of my knowledge, ethnic Thais do not have a keris culture. Ethnic Malays living in Thailand, however, do very much have a keris culture.
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