The swelling number of state-provided cars in Vietnam is a luxury that the country’s struggling economy cannot afford, experts say

A state-provided car (C) in Ho Chi Minh City. The increasing number of state-provided cars in Vietnam is a luxury that the country’s struggling economy can ill afford, experts say.

Bureaucrats all over the world are famous for their penchant for showering themselves with largesse at the tax payers’ expense, and a recent report from the Public Asset Management Department shows Vietnam is no exception.

The department estimates that as of June 24, 2010, Vietnam had around 26,000 cars valued at about VND13 trillion (US$680 million) meant for official use. Ho Chi Minh City led the pack with around 1,000 state-provided autos, followed by Hanoi with 800 cars, the report said.

In July 2006, when around 19,300 state-provided cars were recorded nationwide, Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung applied the brake on further purchases, but released it in July 2009.

The report points out that many provinces and cities have spent more money than they were allowed to on buying official vehicles. Provinces are only authorized to purchase cars that cost less than VND700 million each; many have ignored the regulation, the report said.

“The increasing number of illegitimate state-provided cars has done nothing but confirm the egregious squandering of the state budget,” said Dr. Le Dang Doanh, an economist with the Hanoi Economic College.

“This is a huge paradox compared with the size of Vietnam’s economy,” Doanh said.

Around 70 percent of all Vietnamese citizens still depend on agriculture for their livelihood. Per capita income is about $1,000 and the minimum government salary is VND730,000 ($38) per month.

The World Bank has also said that Vietnam’s budget deficit was “very high” at 8.4 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2009. “I think this is not just a question of money. People would need a clear and transparent explanation for the use of state-provided cars bought with their tax money,” Doanh said.

Unhealthy privilege

Recent media reports have highlighted how state-provided cars have been used for different unofficial purposes.

A bunch of official cars, distinguished from others by their green license plates, were found parked in front of many schools in Hanoi and HCMC last month when the national college entrance exams took place.

In February this year, state-provided cars thronged the site of a major lunar festival in the Mekong Delta province of An Giang. The cars were spotted littering closed streets and halting traffic throughout the city.

“Ordinary people can easily spot a green-plate car parked at a restaurant or a wedding party,” Doanh said.

Those traveling in official cars are apparently immune from punishment for any traffic law violation, Doanh said.

“This is a very unhealthy privilege which should be stripped,” he added.

‘The government knows all’

“26,000 cars and VND13 trillion are indeed startling figures,” said Nguyen Minh Thuyet, a prominent parliamentarian.

Both Thuyet and Doanh urged a comprehensive probe of all state-provided cars to ensure they have been used properly.

But they remained doubtful that drastic and serious measures would be taken against the misuse of state-provided cars.

“Punitive measures will only work when they are enforced frequently and seriously. Otherwise they will turn out to be just lip service,” Thuyet said.

“I think the government knows all about the squandering of money [in buying state-provided cars] because it is nothing new,” he added.

Thuyet recalled a plenary session of the National Assembly in 2005 when the then Finance Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung took the floor to address the issue of wasting money in buying state-provided car.

Hung, now the deputy prime minister, was then quoted by the media as saying that officials who waste state money on buying cars should not get any promotion or nomination for awards.

“But I have not seen anyone punished until now,” Thuyet said.

About ten Vietnamese children continue to drown every day; concerned agencies scramble to address the crisis

A group of children play by the Hoan Kiem Lake in Hanoi. Concerned agencies are seeking to reduce drowning rates among children in Vietnam as about ten children die of drowning every single day of the year on an average.

Two children drowned on July 11 while picking snails with their grandmother on a riverbank in the south-central Khanh Hoa Province.

Nguyen Thi Trang Nha, 14, and her younger sister, Nguyen Thi Anh Huyen, 10, fell into a deep underwater hole along the bank of the Tac River in Nha Trang’s Phuoc Dong Commune.

Neither child could swim.

The sisters’ horrible end is just a piece in a larger tragedy: about ten Vietnamese children die from drowning every single day. It is the leading cause of injury-related deaths in children and adolescents in Vietnam. Official statistics found that over 3,500 children and adolescents, aged 0-19, died from drowning nationwide in 2008.

“[Drowning] accounts for about 50 percent of injury-related mortalities among children and adolescents,” said Jean Dupraz, UNICEF Acting Representative in Vietnam, told a conference in Hanoi on July 16. The conference was aimed at building a communications campaign to battle the epidemic.

“They die close to their homes and close to their playgrounds, often left alone without adult supervision and care,” Dupraz said. “Compared to other countries in the region, Vietnam has the highest fatal drowning rate. This reflects the extent of the problem in Vietnam, which requires urgent and strong action from all of us.”

“Evidence has shown that creating a safe environment for children can help to save them from drowning,” he said.

Seeking solutions

At the conference, the leaders of 15 provinces where the problem is most acute signed a commitment to reducing child drowning cases.

The leaders pledged to raise community awareness about the urgent demand to prevent drowning deaths and call for the urgent action from families, community and local leaders to address the issue. In the meantime, representatives from the central government pledged their full support.

“The Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs will cooperate with other ministries and mass organizations to guide and monitor the implementation of child drowning prevention activities in the 15 provinces with the highest rate of child drowning” said Dam Huu Dac, Deputy Minister of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs.

“It’s important that all children and adolescents live in safe and secure environments”, he added.

Dupraz said UNICEF would continue to aid Vietnam in the prevention of child drowning.

“We will continue to work closely with the government in its efforts to protect children from injury in general and from drowning in particular”, he said.

Over the last couple of years UNICEF has continued to play its part by supporting the government of Vietnam in its efforts. Recently, they helped fund programs to teach children how to swim and perform first-aid.

The Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs reported that other countries have succeeded in reducing drowning casualties by building fences, covering water jars, and stressing child supervision.

Positive examples are found in cities and provinces such as Da Nang, An Giang, Dong Thap, where due to leadership commitment, regular swimming classes are offered to children in addition to other prevention activities. The measures have helped to dramatically reduce the number of child drowning deaths in those provinces in recent years, the ministry said.

 Tran Thi Hoan stands in front of the US Supreme Court in 2008. Hoan is a victim of Agent Orange, the herbicide laced with dioxin-tainted defoliant that was sprayed across huge swaths of Vietnam between in the 1960s and early 1970s, and she fears that she could pass on the poison that saw her born without legs and with a withered hand to her children.

At 23, Tran Thi Hoan dreams the dreams of a typical young woman: find a good job, start a family and, as a native of a country long ravaged by war, live in peace.

But Hoan is a victim of Agent Orange, the herbicide laced with dioxin-tainted defoliant that was sprayed across huge swaths of Vietnam between in the 1960s and early 1970s, and she fears that she could pass on the poison that saw her born without legs and with a withered hand to her children.

So she’s let go of part of her dream.

“Maybe my children will be disabled like me. So I don’t believe I can get married,” Hoan told AFP after she became the first Vietnamese victim of Agent Orange to testify before the US Congress.

“I’m worried,” she added quietly.

“I’m scared.”

Hoan had just read a three-page testimony in English to US lawmakers in a packed hearing room.

“I am not unique, but am one of hundreds of thousands of people whose lives have been marked by our parents’ or grandparents’ exposure to Agent Orange,” she said.

“I was born as you see me: without legs and missing a hand.”

But in spite of her handicap, and in spite of her fears that nobody would want her as a wife, Hoan told the packed hearing called by Congressman Eni Faleomavaega, a veteran of Vietnam, to try to determine how to meet the needs of Vietnam’s victims of Agent Orange, that she was “one of the lucky ones.”

“I’m missing limbs, but my mental functioning is fine,” she said.

Some Agent Orange victims do nothing but sleep, she said. Others fall ill with a slight temperature change. Still others die young, at age 10.

“Many babies, children and young people live lives of quiet agony. They are trapped in bodies that do not work. Their brains remain in infancy even as their bodies grow.

A ribbon supporting Agent Orange victims. Today, Agent Orange and dioxin, which is known to increase the risk of cancer, immune deficiency disease, and reproductive and developmental disorders, still contaminates the land and water of Vietnam.

The American Public Health Panel estimates that some 77 million liters of herbicides, including 49.3 million liters of Agent Orange containing dioxin-contaminated defoliants, were sprayed over 5.5 million acres (2.23 million hectares) in what was then South Vietnam by the United States military.

The aim was to destroy the densely wooded hiding places of the Vietnamese liberation forces.

Today, Agent Orange and dioxin, which is known to increase the risk of cancer, immune deficiency disease, and reproductive and developmental disorders, still contaminates the land and water of Vietnam.

Vietnamese medical doctor Nguyen Thi Ngoc Phuong told the hearing that studies she has conducted have found that up to 4.1 million Vietnamese were directly exposed to Agent Orange during the war and more than three million have suffered its effects.

Babies are exposed through their mother’s breast milk. Others have been exposed by living in or near contaminated areas called “hotspots,” such as Da Nang, where the United States had a base during the war.

The United States, which reestablished diplomatic ties with Vietnam 15 years ago, is funding a program to “remediate” dioxin at Da Nang, or burn it at ultra-high temperatures of 350 degrees Celsius (662 Fahrenheit), which causes it to vaporize.

Not doing anything would mean dioxin, which has a half-life of 100 years – meaning it will take 100 years for it to fall to half its initial strength – would still be tainting the land and people’s lives next century.

“My gosh,” said Faleomavaega, “We’ll all be dead and it’ll still be there.”

Though Hoan’s life has been marked by an event that happened decades before her birth, she insisted Agent Orange victims have to look to the future.

“We can look at the past and see the consequences of war, but we don’t want to stay in the past. We have to look to the future and see what we can do,” she told AFP.

And she added another wish to her wish-list.

“We want those responsible for the terrible consequences of Agent Orange to hear our pain and respond to us as humans,” she said, speaking not only for Vietnamese victims but for “the children and grandchildren of Americans who were exposed to Agent Orange and who are suffering like us.”

In the audience, a veteran of the Iraq war cried. Another applauded quietly.

One of the chemical companies that made Agent Orange, Dow, says on its website that manufacturers were compelled by the government to produce the herbicide.

In 2007, Dow said there was no evidence to link Agent Orange to Vietnam veterans’ illnesses.

And last year, a US embassy spokeswoman in Hanoi said there has been no internationally-accepted scientific study establishing a link between Agent Orange and Vietnam’s disabled and deformed.

Members of the French Vietnam-Dioxine Collective gather in Paris on June 18 to show their support on the same day the US Court of Appeals held a hearing in New York related to a lawsuit filed by Vietnamese victims of the chemical Agent Orange against several US chemical companies that manufactured the toxic material. Agent Orange, a dioxin-containing defoliant used during the Vietnam War, caused disfiguring birth defects, cancer, and many other health problems to those exposed.

Vietnam has just begun to enter the thriving Asian semi-conductor boom.

Some say that if Vietnam plays its cards right, the nation could compete with tech powerhouses like South Korea in the next ten years.

In the interim, Professor Hiroshi Ochi from the Kyushu Institute of Technology (Japan) has advised Vietnam to invest in its highly talented students.

Thanh Nien Weekly: How is the semiconductor industry going at this moment?

Hiroshi Ochi: The semiconductor market is growing worldwide thanks to smartphones, Ipods and all these electronics devices which are very popular. Today, even in developing countries, everyone has a computer. The market size is getting bigger and semiconductor manufacturing is changing: yesterday’s leading producers (like Japan and the US) are lagging. China, Taiwan’s and Korea’s are on the rise. So they compensate each other.

Those Asian economies are becoming very strong. So, as a result, we can say that semiconductor production is increasing. In the future, Vietnam and Indonesia could be the third generation of semiconductor producers. You could be the next generation.

Why do you say that?

If the government goes in the right direction Vietnam can become like Korea. You are growing. You organize high-tech conferences. The Vietnam National University (VNU) is a great university, and you have ICDREC (IC Design Research and Education Center), the design center. So there are a lot of possibilities to bring the semiconductor industry to Vietnam.

What do you predict for the IC industry over the next ten years?

China is a good example. At the beginning of their economic development, they earned a lot of money from low tech production – mass production. Then, as the next step, they invested all this money in the semiconductor segment and the automobile industry. They opened their market to the world. That’s why a lot of foreign companies decided to invest in China.

So this big investment of money stimulated the economy and education. They still don’t have big electronic companies, they just have companies for mass production, and appliances. They don’t produce high-tech semiconductors or applications like the iPod or the iPhone. Still, they have been successful. Because the government wanted to invest in this field.

So China is a success story even if they don’t have high-tech companies: the secret is the government control. If the administration decides to invest in a certain field, like semiconductors, you don’t need big companies, you have the government that can help local companies to develop. The same thing can be applicable to Vietnam. Your government is strong and, if it has the money, it can invest in this field.

So how much do we need in order to have substantial production in Vietnam for this industry

I’ll reply with another example: Taiwan. In Taiwan, the target was semiconductor fabrication plants. The company TSMC needed huge investments. At the beginning they didn’t build any plants. They waited for the foreign money. So this can be a model for you: if your government doesn’t have the money right now to invest in the semiconductor industry, wait. And while you are waiting you can educate your students and engineers.

But even if your government has the money, it should think very carefully about the right way to spend it. In Taiwan, they invested in semiconductor fabrication plants. They became successful but I don’t think you should follow Taiwan’s lead. TSMC is already a strong company, you can’t compete with them, you should avoid investing in costly plants.

Are you suggesting that Vietnam should only concentrate on design?

Exactly. And when you design something, you can ask Taiwan to make it.

What do you think of Vietnamese students?

Vietnamese students are top quality. My direct experience can better show what I’m talking about. I’m the director of the LSI (Large Scale Integrated) Design Contest. We hold it annually and we invite universities from many Asian countries. Usually Kyoto or Osaka wins first prize.

But recently things have changed. In Indonesia there is the Bandung Institute of Technology, and it is one of the top technological universities. They won three times. But the achievements of the Vietnamese students are far better than the Indonesian or Japanese students. Last time your students won. That proves that your education system and the caliber of your students are very good.

Growth of Vietnam’s IT sector depends on its ability to combat piracy, Rebecca Ho, IP program strategist with Microsoft, tells Thanh Nien Weekly.

Thanh Nien Weekly: Where does Vietnam stand now, in terms of IT development and copyright protection?

Rebecca Ho: The IT sector and software industry are growing rapidly in Vietnam, while the piracy rate has steadily gone down since 2005. Inevitably, as we have seen in many countries around the world, there are those who will seek to exploit this thirst for technology by producing and selling inferior counterfeit products to consumers and businesses across the region.

In 2009, despite the financial crisis and consequently the general expectation that piracy will worsen, Vietnam was able to contain its piracy rate to 85 percent (according to the Seventh Annual BSA and IDC Global Software Piracy Study, 2010). This is higher than the regional average piracy rate, and it will need to be further reduced in order not to impede the growth of the IT sector.

No country is immune to the impact of software piracy – it is a global issue that needs to be addressed in every market and Microsoft is working in partnership with local ecosystems, including local governments, educational and industry bodies to ensure we are focusing our efforts in a way that will make the most positive impact and increase growth opportunities for local economies.

Which products of yours are most vulnerable to piracy?

In part, today’s high rates of piracy reflect the surge in demand for software in emerging markets as the benefits of technology are realized. Usually the more popular the products, the more widely they are pirated, such as Windows, Office and Windows Server.

These high rates of piracy represent a need for continued education on the value of genuine software to individuals, business and the economy, and the risks inherent in using counterfeit software.

We are committed to supporting governments as they boost their economies by educating their communities on the value of intellectual property and the opportunity it represents.

In Vietnam, the Business Software Alliance (BSA), of which Microsoft is a member, formed a partnership with VINASA, and the Copyright Office and Inspectorate of the Ministry of Culture, Sports & Tourism, to protect intellectual property rights.

How does copyright infringement in Vietnam affect your company?

Counterfeit software has an enormous impact on the software industry. Microsoft invests a tremendous amount of human and monetary effort in its software development and distribution, which is impacted greatly by the effects of piracy.

Microsoft is determined to protect its customer, reseller, and partner ecosystem from the threats and losses associated with piracy, and to prevent counterfeiters from taking advantage of innocent victims and gaining an unfair advantage over our honest partners.

More importantly, copyright infringement impedes the growth of local IT industry. The government of Vietnam has a clear goal to turn Vietnam into an IT power by 2020, aspiring to export software and digital content services to the world.

To realize that goal, we believe that innovation needs to be fostered. Innovators, however, will not have sufficient incentive to innovate if their intellectual property will not be protected. Emerging economies which have strong intellectual property laws can also benefit from technology and knowledge transfer and strategic alliances with multinational companies such as Microsoft which in turn will help enhance the competitiveness and innovative capacity of the local IT industry.

Has your company sued any individuals or organizations in the country for piracy?

No, we have not. At Microsoft, we believe in first educating (the public) about the benefits of using genuine software, and working with law enforcement agencies as well as our industry association, Business Software Alliance. We believe in taking legal action as a last resort to show that there are serious consequences to the crime.

What measures do you take to minimize piracy?

We focus our activities and investments on combating software counterfeiting and other forms of piracy into a single coordinated effort, the Genuine Software Initiative (GSI). The initiative focuses on increasing investments across three strategic areas: education, engineering and enforcement.

Vietnam finds it difficult to balance the reduction of software use and respect for copyright, while prices of legitimate software are too high compared with people"s income. Does your company have any pricing strategies for the Vietnamese market?

Pricing is only one component of why people choose to pirate software, and not purchase it. Microsoft has many options for delivering value and cost savings for customers. The best pricing usually comes through either the pre-installation from original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) or from our home and student packages for Office, for example.

Just lowering pricing does not result in less piracy; there is more to it than that. As an example, Lac Viet, another BSA member, whose Dictionary software is priced at US$2.5, probably the same cost of a KFC meal in Vietnam, is also widely pirated. This is clear proof that pricing is not a main factor for piracy.

Many firms find it hard to implement the intellectual property law due to limited financial capacity or awareness. What would you say to them?

Intellectual property protection is an essential part of maintaining a healthy cycle of innovation in the IT industry and it is important that intellectual property rights are respected across borders.

Intellectual property rights protect legitimate businesses by making it possible for companies to focus on the areas which differentiate themselves and their products from the competition, improve product features, and speed up delivery to the market. This spurs growth and job creation that benefits consumers, industry and the economy.

South Korean authorities have pledged to make Korean men looking to marry foreign women undergo a cultural education program after a Vietnamese woman was allegedly killed by her husband in Busan.

“Those with a history of mental illness or a violent crime record and those who have married and divorced foreign brides three times or more will face restrictions on applying for visas for their would-be brides,” Moon Soo-Yong, a ministry deputy director, told AFP.

The move came after 20-year-old Thach Thi Hoang Ngoc was stabbed to death by her South Korean husband, Jang Do Hyo, who had a history of mental problems, on July 8, just eight days after arriving in South Korea to live with her new husband, according to the Korea Times, which cited reports from the Busan Saha Police Station.

Ngoc was beaten and stabbed to death in her house in Busan after quarreling with her 47- year-old husband, the Korea Times said, adding that the husband told police that he had been instructed by a ghost to kill her during a fight the couple was having.

Make me a match

Statistics from the South Korean Consulate General in HCMC show that around 27,500 Vietnamese women had been granted marriage visas by 2008 and around 8,000 such visas were granted in 2009 alone. This means around 35,500 Vietnamese women had migrated to South Korea for marriage by the end of 2009.

Many of these marriages were arranged by illegal brokers, who put women up on show at human supermarkets.

In a famous case, Ho Chi Minh City police arrested a man caught displaying 65 Vietnamese girls to two prospective South Korean grooms in an allegedly illegal marriage brokerage scam in 2007.

Following many such cases, the International Organization for Migration (IMO) and the South Korean government collaborated to set up a website, www.vovietchonghan.org, on Vietnamese and Korean customs laws and how they affect cross-cultural marriages.

Police requested an arrest warrant for Jang on murder charges July 9, the paper said, adding that investigators were now questioning the husband about the brutal beating and stabbing.

Ngoc married Jang without knowing he had undergone psychiatric treatment for depression and mental illness 57 times since 2005, South Korean media reported.

Ngoc’s parents, Thach Sang and his wife Truong Thi Ut, were informed of the death on July 9.

Ut told Thanh Nien Ngoc had met Jang, her husband, on February 7 via a brokerage firm, whose name has not been released. She said the wedding was held ten days later in Ho Chi Minh City.

Before the wedding, Jang’s family gave Ngoc’s family VND3.8 million (US$199) and rented a car to bring her family to HCMC.

Broken dreams

Ngoc’s family comes from Thoi Hoa B Hamlet in the Mekong Delta city of Can Tho’s Co Do District, where they live with 300 other ethnic Khmer families. Most of them are poor and many in the Mekong Delta area have seen their daughters marry husbands from Taiwan and South Korea in recent years.

But several cases of Delta women marrying foreign men through brokerage services have ended in tragedy.

In 2008, Tran Thanh Lan, 22, of Hau Giang Province reportedly committed suicide in Kyongsan City just 25 days after she went to South Korea with her husband Ha Jang Su, whom she had been married to for six months.

Vietnamese media reports said she had become depressed after failing to integrate into the new society. The reports also said there were suspicious circumstances surrounding her death, pointing out that she had requested to get divorced a week earlier and that her husband had already bought her a ticket home.

In 2007, Le Thi Kim Dong of Can Tho died while allegedly attempting to escape from her husband’s house in Daegu Town, some 400 kilometers from Seoul. The pregnant woman had allegedly suffered maltreatment at the hands of her husband’s family, Vietnamese media reports said.

Emotional arbiter

In upholding the 12-year murder conviction of Huynh Mai’s husband – known only as Jang – chief justice at the Daejeon City trial Kim Sang-jun said he hoped the incident would not give Vietnamese people a poor image of South Korea, according to the local Hankyoreh newspaper.

The paper quoted him as saying: “We [the South Korean people] should cordially and sadly confess the brutality hidden in our hearts.”

“No one told Jang who his bride would be nor what her expectations would be and Jang himself did not make any effort to find out... We cannot blame Jang alone. This is something that was caused by the immaturity in our society, by which foreign women are regarded as objects that can be imported.”

“We wanted to seek forgiveness from the victim’s family for the brutality in our society. It is regrettable that we’ve had to make the ruling without informing her family.”

Progress is paving its way through Vietnam’s ancient cities and no one knows what to save and what to toss.

After several debates regarding preservation efforts in Hanoi, the nation still lacks an agency capable of evaluating the historical significance of a given site. What’s more, Vietnam needs technicians who know how to preserve the relics it wants to keep.

Olivier Tessier, researcher from the French School of Asian Studies (École Française d’Extrême-Orient, EFEO), sat down with Thanh Nien Weekly to discuss what Vietnam can do to hold on to its cultural heritage.

Thanh Nien Weekly: How do you assess the historical value of a place like the Thang Long Imperial Citadel?

Olivier Tessier: The imperial citadel has great historical and cultural value. It was the capital of the Ly, Tran and Le dynasties as well as a major center for cultural and economic exchange between Vietnam, China, Champa and other countries in Southeast Asia.

A section of Hoang Hoa Tham Street, thought to be part of the citadel, was recently excavated during the construction of an overpass. What are your thoughts on that?

- Cities run into this problem all over the world – Rome, Paris, Athena, etc. We want to preserve our heritage as well as develop our cities. Meanwhile, cities can’t develop if everything is preserved. Hanoi is a city with a long history. When you build roads, you’re going to run into relics of the past – as was the case in Hoang Hoa Tham Street.

So, what can Vietnam do in this case? If you ban all construction, you’ll stymie socioeconomic development. Every year in France, some 700 square kilometers of land are set aside for the construction of roads, railways and private and public buildings. Underground relics are definitely destroyed during the construction. Inevitably this leads to disputes among politicians, scientists, residents and economic sectors. So, in 2002, the French National Institute for Preventive Archaeological Research (INRAP), was established to research the protection of archaeological relics.

While researching 20 percent of the 700 square kilometers, INRAP combs the project sites, work out their maps, and photograph them, before a decision on the use of the site is issued. Construction projects are seldom stopped. INRAP doesn’t make the decision, politicians do, but only after considering our findings regarding the site’s historial and cultural value. They weigh those findings against issues such as land planning, and the development demand of the surrounding community.

Such an agency can’t make everyone happy, but it can cool down disputes by establishing a legal procedure for potential construction projects. Such an agency could help Vietnamese authorities make decisions in cases like Hoang Hoa Tham Street. Once again, however, you can’t please everyone.

But, we should strive to maintain our cultural heritage for posterity...

- Right, you are right. Everyone agrees with you. But, you can’t save everything. Hanoi might not have become the capital of Vietnam if construction had been banned, a thousand years ago, to maintain historical integrity.

There are a number of ways you can approach the preservation of a given site. You can preserve relics on-site. You can study relics and then remove them to museums. Additionally, you can bury them so that future generations, with more advanced technology, can study them further.

There are different methods (for preservation) but the goal is to maintain something that scientists can continue to study and preserve evidence of the past for future generations

What should we do about the Thang Long Imperial Citadel?

- The discovery of archaeological relics at the imperial citadel is of great significance to Vietnam’s history. The relic site has two unique features. The first is that the site sits on top of five meters of sediment filled with objects that span 13 centuries (from the 8th-19th). The second is that the space above ground continues to be used.

There are older and better heritage sites in the country, but Thang Long is especially interesting because it contains a long-term history. It is here, in the space of a few hectares, that Vietnam’s political center has been established over the course of a thousand years.

This historical gem sits in the middle of Hanoi, an expensive city that’s rapidly modernizing. Moreover, it is in the center of Ba Dinh political area, adjacent to the National Assembly’s building. For that reason, its development has been widely debated in recent years.

So, what’s the best option in this case?

- Now, we must determine how to best preserve the site and develop a working plan for the project. Foreign and local experts agree that there’s no single best recipe for handling this scenario. It’s not like baking a cake.

Research proposals from the Institute of Archaeology (of Vietnam) have proposed that part of the site be left open for sightseeing, while the rest be covered with land and soil to protect it from the elements. This should be urgently implemented. In fact, the relic has been affected by rain, sunshine, and moisture since it was unearthed eight years ago.

Is there anything else Vietnam can do to preserve its cultural relics?

- I think Vietnam should train more experts in the technical aspects of preserving archaeological relics in particular, and cultural relics in general. Archaeologists cannot succeed without this technical understanding and capacity. This is a subject that is taught at many universities, especially in Europe.

A young barber from Kim Lien Village cuts a customer’s hair in an open air barber shop

The next time you need a haircut in Hanoi, eschew the high-end, luxurious salons.

Instead, make your way to Kim Lien Village (Phuong Lien Ward, Dong Da District) just a twenty minute amble from Lenin Park.

If you’re lucky you’ll find a barber from the century-long birthplace of the nation’s barbers. If you’re not in the mood to wander, take my Uncle Minh’s advice and go see Pham Duy Hao. “He’s not only a good barber,” Minh told me. “He’s a cute, funny, little guy.”

Nestled behind the cluttered clothing clothes stalls in Kim Lien’s second-hand market, Duy Hao Hairdressing Shop doesn’t bear any outward signs of belonging to a local master. But once Hoa’s scissors are out and snipping, Hoa will unfold Kim Lien Village’s great legacy like a hot towel.

“I am the third generation in my family doing this work,” Hao said, as he worked. “My grandfather Pham Duy Hien was among the first barbers in Kim Lien Village; he opened the first barber shop in Hanoi nearly a century ago when he was just 19-year-old.”

Hao swelled through the tiny shop as he recalled his ancestral past. “My grandfather’s skill brought him the great honor of an invitation from King Bao Dai to come to his citadel in Hue and work as the private barber for the royal family,” he said. “The king was so pleased with his skill that he took my grandfather with him on all his trips, even abroad. Thanks to the king, my grandfather earned enough to buy a big house and provide a rich life for his family in Hanoi.”

After some political upheavals, Hao’s grandfather left the palace and opened a chain of lucrative barber shops on Hang Quat and Hang Dao streets. He soon became the man to see about a haircut.

Hao can recall his grandfather belonging to a dapper circle of barbers who dressed like silent film heartthrobs. They wore felt hats, smoked wooden pipes, and maintained meticulous bi-bop hairdos in the style of King Bao Dai – imagine a sort of slicked-back mini-pompadour sans height.

While Hanoi’s famous barber class enjoys numerous stars, no one knows precisely who pioneered it all.

“According to Tu Hinh, who used to be a famous barber and now is tending the village’s pagoda, no one knows who the ancestor of our hairdressing trade is,” Hao said.

Hao introduced Thanh Nien Weekly to a pair of veteran barbers. These old-timers said that in feudal times, when Vietnamese men twisted long, luxurious hair into chignons, Kim Lien Village became the place to come for a shave.

Most of this work was done out of the home, Mau and Hien agreed. In their eyes, the trade took off with the arrival of the French at the end of the 19th century.

“The French guys brought scissors or clippers,” 84-year-old Nguyen Van Mau remembered. “They heard about us and came to instruct us on the use of these new tools. Some of our Vietnamese customers were gradually influenced by their style.”

Sixty-nine-year-old Nguyen Duc Hien is one of the few veteran barbers still working now. He clearly recalls the heyday of Kim Lien’s barbers. “When the French came, we started to open a lot of shops in Cot Co Street to serve them,” Hien recalled. “These foreign clients were very finicky. Before working on their hair, we had to clean every tool with boiling water and alcohol. They wanted their ears covered with cotton and asked to have scented water sprayed on their hair. When finished, they demanded that not a trace of hair be left on their clothes.”

Because most of their customers were French and aristocratic Vietnamese, Kim Lien barbers at that time all learned to speak some French. “Thanks to the high standard of these foreign customers, we always strove to become perfect barbers with professional manners. These demands made Kim Lien barbers famous throughout the country,” Mau added.

Beyond all the pomp, Hien says it was their sense of humor that really hooked the city’s elite. “Besides learning hair design, we had to figure out how to make our customers feel at ease. We told jokes and funny stories while we cut their hair,” he said. “Our customers came from different cultures and varied economic and social positions; we had to learn how to be able to talk to all of them.”

From the early 1950s to the late 1960s, Kim Lien’s hairdressing trade hit its peak. The town’s barbers enjoyed so much renown, they were able to leave Hanoi and establish businesses based on their hometown’s reputation. In the capital, barbers grouped themselves into a collective managed by Hao’s father.

“I started helping my father at his barber-shop when I was just a kid,” Hao remembered. “Anyone who wanted to work there had to pass an entrance exam and attend a course. I aced the first course, but I had to pass a few advanced placement exams to become a first-class barber – the highest-paid honor.”

Hao looks much younger than his fifty-plus years. His short hair is streaked with ruby-red highlights and quick, delicate hands. He carries a fanciful, stylish air about himself. Hoa says he needs just an instant to determine what haircut you need. Today, Hao is free to improvise with hair and take his time experimenting. He remembers a time when he served around 30 customers per eight-hour shift. “At that time everyone wanted the same haircut,” Hao said. “If we were inspired by a beautiful face and added a few flourishes, they docked our pay.”

As the capital continues to open up to the global economy, Kim Lien’s youth has its sights set on white-collar work. Many of them have turned away from their ancestors’ trade.

“In the 1970s and 1980s, 80 percent of our village was still doing the job,” Hao said. “Now that figure has shrunk to around 10 percent (about 200 people).”

The remaining barbers have had to equip their shops with modern tools and techniques to meet evolving customer demands. Yesterday’s barbers are now known as hair designers. Gone are the men who would arrive at your door carrying their wooden toolboxes offering a simple shave.

Now they are confined to open sidewalk stalls struggling to continue their line.

This spring, Kim Lien’s remaining barbers went head-tohead in an exciting hair design competition. The event was held to honor their traditional trade and encourage young people to follow in their ancestors’ footsteps.

A hairdressers club was also introduced on this occasion.

The chairman of Phuong Lien Ward’s People’s Committee, Bui Minh Hoang, has expressed a desire to preserve the barbers in Kim Lien. Hoang personally called on villagers to organize the competition. When we asked what he would do next, the young chairman said that he wanted to have a small street here dedicated to the preservation of the town trade.

Veteran barber Pham Duy Hao says he’s willing to open a class to teach the traditional job to the next generation.

The history of Vietnam-US relations is still crazy (after all these years)

Former US President Bill Clinton is greeted on the street in Hanoi, Vietnam on Wednesday, December 2006

In the days following the liberation of Saigon, Nayan Chanda, the young Saigon correspondent for the Far East Economic Review, thought he had a scoop.

He went to the man he hoped would be his source: the editor in chief of the Vietnamese Communist Party’s Nhan Dan (The People) newspaper, Hoang Tung.

“I said I know that a lot of official US documents were left behind in Saigon, which your government now has in its possession. Would you help me get access to these documents?” Chanda told Thanh Nien Weekly via phone.

Tung’s answer was no.

“I was surprised,” said Chanda. “He [Tung] said: ‘Look, the war is over, there is no reason to throw salt in the American wounds.”

According to Chanda’s history of postwar Indochina Brother Enemy: The War after the War, American banks and oil companies were invited to Hanoi as early as 1976 to explore possibilities of trade and financial relations. “They [the Vietnamese government] wanted to seek everyone’s help. It was this [US-imposed] embargo that prevented western countries from helping Vietnam,” he said in the interview.

This July 11 marks 15 years since the US decided to open its doors and lift the embargo.

Warren Christopher, US Deputy Secretary of State 1977-1981 and Secretary of State 1993-1997 (during normalization) wrote to Thanh Nien Weekly via email:

“In 1995, with the war almost two decades behind us, I believed that the time had come to establish a working relationship with Vietnam, to recast the word in the American consciousness as a place rather than a war.”

What took so long?

After the fall of Saigon, Vietnam was invaded by the Khmer Rouge several times. Vietnamese-led forces then crossed into Cambodia and ousted Pol Pot in 1978, ending a genocide that had killed two million Cambodians.

The US was not pleased. In 1981, US Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig Jr. said the US would not recognize Vietnam because of its actions against Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge.

Edwin A Martini, author of Invisible Enemies: The American War on Vietnam, 1975-2000 and Associate Professor of History at Western Michigan University, told Thanh Nien Weekly what the US was up to in Cambodia at the time:

“The US was providing all these supplies and materials to what they called the ‘non-communist resistance’ when everybody knew full well that most of those supplies and most of those materials were going to the Khmer Rouge.”

This relationship made normalization seem virtually impossible for the Vietnamese.

“After the war, the US led a coalition of nations to establish a political blockade and economic embargo on Vietnam, preventing Vietnam’s development of regional and international relations,” recalled vice chair of the National Assembly’s Foreign Affairs Committee Ngo Quang Xuan, who served as Vietnamese ambassador to the United Nations during the normalization process.

Martini added that even ostensibly non-political organization like the IMF and World Bank, whom Vietnam had invited into the country post-1975, were under the influence of the US and couldn’t work here under the embargo.

But now, with Vietnam a World Trade Organization member and major trading partner with the US, Xuan considers the large economic gap between the two nations to be their greatest challenge.

However, even given the richness of the friendship, Xuan still felt relations were not yet “comprehensive.”

“I believe that US-Vietnam relations will only be comprehensive once the Agent Orange matter has been resolved.”

Flying high

In a press conference on June 29, US ambassador Michael Michalak announced the winner of the anniversary logo contest: a soaring kite, made up of the two nation’s flags.

Michalak went on to describe the various millions of dollars the US government has invested in Vietnam since the end of the embargo: including $46 million that had been donated since 1989 to help the disabled.

“I feel very strongly that relations between the US and Vietnam have never been stronger,” he said in his closing remarks.

‘Propaganda’ no more

Seated at her District 1 office in confident repose, Madame Ton Nu Thi Ninh, retired diplomat and former vice chair of the National Assembly’s Foreign Affairs Committee, seems comfortable in the light of Vietnam’s bright future. She plans to open a major new private university and is always happy to speak with the press.

Though she holds no grudges, Ninh remembers the harshness of the embargo with great clarity.

The stateswoman told Thanh Nien Weekly that a high-ranking UNICEF official had explained to her that even for a multilateral body, normal relations with the US were an important prerequisite for serious cooperation.

She considers Agent Orange the only problem between the two nations. “But AO will never capsize the boat,” she said.

To illustrate how far the two nations had come, Ninh recalled that years ago, a former US ambassador had dismissed Vietnam’s Agent Orange toll as “propaganda.”

“No US ambassador will use that word anymore,” she said.

Encouragement

Nguyen Duc is perhaps Agent Orange’s most famous victim.

He was joined at the leg, from birth, to his brother Viet – who remained bedridden following their 14-hour separation surgery.

Viet never fully recovered following the operation. He died in 2007.

Now, Duc walks with one leg.

He is married and living in a home made possible by international donations and the salary he earns as a computer technician.

He was just a child when relations normalized. “Over the past 15 years, I have seen remarkable progress in the relations between the two countries,” he said over the phone. He was encouraged by the recent arrival of four US Senators willing to discuss dioxin cleanup and hopes that the Vietnamese government will continue to lean on the US for a resolution to the Agent Orange problem.

“If I had a chance to speak with the US leaders, I would tell them to stop all other wars waged elsewhere in the world,” he said.

Freedom fighter

Nguyen Kim Phuong, 80, fought in the guerilla resistance movement against both the French and Americans. His father was killed by the French and his father-in-law was confined at Con Dao prison, notorious for its infamous “tiger cages.”

Like most Vietnamese, Phuong is forgiving about the war and is happy to see US-Vietnam relations moving forward.

“Since normalization, the lives of our people and our economy have both improved. Our relations are mutually beneficial. The Vietnamese people are grateful to the generous support from the US,” Phuong said.

“But... history cannot be forgotten.”

Vietnamese authorities prepare to crack down on online gaming

A young boy plays online games at an Internet shop on Tran Quang Khai Street in Ho Chi Minh City’s District 1. Vietnamese authorities are poised to issue a stringent clampdown on the online gaming industry, a move decried as unfeasible and unwise by critics.

Vietnamese authorities are poised to issue a stringent crackdown on the online gaming industry.

Authorities claim that the move is aimed at protecting the nation’s youth from perceived social ills. Critics of the measures have decried them as unfeasible and unwise.

On July 16, the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee, the municipal administration, submitted a proposal to Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung asking that he tighten the screws on online gaming.

In the request, the city government noted that the number of licensed online games has increased from only two in 2006 to more than 65 today. The city hall claimed that 43 of the currently licensed games are violent in nature.

The city government proposed a halt on the importation of new online games and an end to their advertisement “in any form.” It further proposed that all new games be screened for violent, gambling or pornographic content. All existing licenses should be re-evaluated; those that fail to meet the new content standards should be revoked, the city officials recommended.

At the same time, deputies at a meeting of the Hanoi People’s Council, the municipal legislature, called for laws that would force Internet providers to pull the plug on Internet cafés from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m.

The snowballing municipal ire has worked; the central government is honoring many of their requests.

Starting September 1st Internet access at public cafés will cease from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. While the central government will not enact all of the proposals put forth by the Hanoi and HCMC administrations, it looks as though Vietnam’s cyber-junkies will be getting a lot more sleep this coming fall.

“How could they do that?” asked the owner of an Internet shop on Bui Vien Street in HCMC’s backpacker area. She said her business mainly depended on tourists who visit the shop after spending the day sightseeing.

Two other shop owners in the same neighborhood said they wouldn’t mind the move.

“It won’t hurt us much,” said Hung an employee at the Hoang Hao Internet shop on Do Quang Dau Street. “There aren’t many customers at night.”

Unfeasible

HCMC’S PROPOSALS ON ONLINE GAME MANAGEMENT

- All existing licenses must be reevaluated – those that fail to meet the new content standards should be revoked.

- A halt on the importation of new games

- No advertisement of online games “in any form”

- All new games must be screened for their violent, gambling or pornographic content

- Applications for the approval of new games must include a “social impact assessment” that would quantify the game’s potential for harmful social effects.

- Local online game providers must shut down online gaming servers from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. [Current regulations require Internet shops to comply with local cyber curfews, though such laws are seldom enforced.]

- Provisions for suppliers to limit each gamer to three hours of game play per day [Current law requires game providers to create virtual deterrents for players who exceed three hours of game play. Players are able to dodge these penalties by signing into different virtual profiles –they can create as many as they like.]

- The government will now encourage the development of locally-made games that educate players about Vietnamese history and culture.

Many officials, experts and gamers consider the new regulations unfeasible and unreasonable.

Luu Vu Hai, head of the Broadcasting and Electronic Information Bureau under the Ministry of Information and Communications said that even if a domestic ban on online games were to be instituted, gamers could still play games on foreign servers.

“We cannot ban the games completely,” Hai said. “We plan to come up with a solution that will maximize the benefits of online games and reduce their harmful impacts.”

He said the Ministry of Information and Communications is trying to create an initiative to encourage local firms to produce “positive and healthy” games.

According to the Vietnam Software Association (VINASA), Vietnam is the biggest online game market in Southeast Asia; 22 domestic game suppliers generated $130 million worth of revenue in 2008 alone.

Generally speaking, these companies purchase the rights to games and invest in large computer servers to run them on. Most of the games run by Vietnamese providers are produced abroad. Most of the games have their own currency. Players can enter the virtual worlds for free but, in order to advance, they purchase virtual items and powers for real-world currency.

Many of the games are designed in China and South Korea. They are streamed through Vietnamese servers that translate the language. However, Vietnamese gamers are able to download software that enables them to play foreign games on foreign servers.

Pham Tan Cong, VINASA General Secretary, said online games, like all forms of entertainment, have their good and their bad sides.

“People have vilified online game companies without considering their potential for good,” Cong said. He believes that the government should encourage domestic game developers to work on games that educate players about Vietnamese history and affirm its cultural identity.

“The concept of limiting game play time flies in the face of the borderless nature of Internet,” he said. “We can only manage games that are being run off servers inside the country,” he said.

Management failure

Khuat Thu Hong, head of the Institution for Social Development Studies, said cutting off Internet access at game shops will prove ineffective and signify a failure of the concerned management agencies.

“Online games are not guilty,” Hong said. “They are an advanced technological product. We can’t deny their entertainment value or their capacity to develop players’ reaction time and problem solving skills. Of course, any form of abuse will have negative consequences,” she said.

“We have to educate our kids about avoiding addiction to online games and select suitable games to play” Hong said, adding that many of the supporters of the new measures are parents who have ultimately failed to educate and supervise their children.

Worried companies

Domestic game providers have claimed that the proposed crackdown will prove unfeasible, impede the lawful adult enjoyment of a legal product, and damage a fledgling online gaming industry.

Hoang Trong Hieu, deputy director of VTC Games, an online game subsidiary of Vietnam Cable Television, said banning online games will not affect youth violence.

“When I was at school, there were no online games but fights still broke out. [Violence] is a big picture problem that starts with family, school and the whole society,” he said.

Nguyen Dac Viet Dung, deputy director of FPT Online, an online game supplier, said it would be difficult to issue an account for each gamer and manage their maximum game play per day. Putting online game servers on hiatus [from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. every night] will badly hurt providers, he said, as they will be forced to backup databases and fix errors caused by regular shut downs.

Dung added that the proposed regulations will not affect Vietnamese gamers who play online games on foreign servers, but local providers will lose foreign customers who wish to play during the new cyber curfew hours.

Gamers divided

Thanh Nien Weekly spoke to several gamers who seemed concerned about hostile behavior exhibited by the youngsters who frequently crowd Internet cafes. Beyond such concerns, however, is a large community that appears frustrated with the government plans.

Dinh Hoang Minh, 28, said he often plays online games to relax after a long day at work. “A ban on online gaming at night would deny adults [who hardly qualify as ‘addicts’] a valuable entertainment outlet,” the HCMC gamer said. “They should find another way of preventing vulnerable children from becoming addicts.”

Minh added that his friends often play games supplied by companies abroad at home and the new regulations would not have any affect on their activities.

Nguyen Thanh Luan, a 21-yearold Vietnamese student in Paris expressed his concern that he would no longer be able to play online games out of his native country – due to the time difference. “Didn’t they take Vietnamese gamers living abroad into account?”

MINISTRY HALTS THE LICENSING OF ONLINE GAMES

The Ministry of Information and Communications is about to put the hurt on the officially reviled online gaming industry.

On July 27, the central governing body held a closed government meeting discussing a draft of new restrictions on the burgeoning industry, according to Luu Vu Hai, head of the Department of Broadcasting and Electronic Information under the Ministry of Information and Communications.

Subsequent to the meeting, Hai said no new licenses will be issued to companies that operate online game servers inside Vietnam.

Furthermore, the ministry will instruct Internet service providers to cut service to online gaming shops in accordance with local cyber curfew laws.

“Actually, a 2008 decree requires all Internet shops to close after 11 p.m.,” Hai said. “The new measure will make its enforcement more effective.”

He added that the regulations have been in place for a long time. Due to the abundance of Internet cafes and shops, he said, the laws have been impossible to enforce until now. He believes the new measure will make enforcement more effective.

Hai told the Tien Phong newspaper that regulations on cutting Internet access for Internet shops after 11 p.m. will take effect September 1.

He said that the Ministry of Information and Communications and the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism are drafting regulations that will add provisions for the management of off line video games. A task force is currently in the making designed to assess the content of currently licensed online games and new games.

Workers build a ship for delivery later this year at a Vinashin shipyard in the central province of Quang Ngai. The government has decided to restructure the state-owned shipbuilder, whose debts totaled more than US$4 billion.

Loss-making shipbuilding giant Vinashin has admitted its massive expansion efforts over the past few years had been overconfident and had led to the “necessary” restructuring it is now undergoing.

“We want to apologize to the Party, the government, the public and everyone who put their faith in Vinashin,” CEO Tran Quang Vu said in a series of reports published by Tien Phong newspaper last weekend. “We have failed to live up to expectations.”

As shipbuilding is a comprehensive industry, comprising many other sectors like steel, machinery and paint, Vinashin had created “an ambitious plan” to build a well-rounded business in order to control quality and cut production costs, said Vu, who took the CEO position at the state-owned company on July 1.

“However, we have to admit that we became overindulgent. Besides shipbuilding, which is our core business, we also invested in stocks, real estate and insurance markets.

“Since our business was based on loans, Vinashin faced difficulties when the economic crisis hit the global market, severing the company from its financial plans.”

Vu said the company regretted being “too confident” about raising funds that never materialized.

“If we could have forecast accurately and took aggressive preemptive measures, we would not be in this situation today.”

Overhaul

The situation that Vinashin finds itself in now is indeed dire. The government said last week that the shipbuilder’s debts totaled more than VND80 trillion (US$4.2 billion).

As a result, it has to be restructured so that it can focus only on its core business, the government said. Projects that are not necessary to the company’s development will be transferred to other state-owned enterprises, like Vietnam Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam) and Vietnam National Shipping Lines (Vinalines).

“When we are no longer capable, it’s better to transfer our subsidiaries to other companies that still want to make investments,” Vu said.

“This is a reasonable decision and will benefit the whole economy; much better than us just holding onto them.”

But not everyone thinks that the restructuring plan is a good one. Economist Pham Chi Lan, a former advisor to the government, called it “problematic.”

“Passing parts of the debt on to other companies doesn’t make the debt go away,” she said in an interview published on Nguoi Lao Dong newspaper on Monday. “Moreover, it’s not rational for the government to continue offering loans to Vinashin while the company hasn’t made any change yet to prove their competence. The new capital flows can become new debts in the future.”

“The government has chosen the easiest rescue plan for Vinashin by passing the debt burden to the economy, other businesses and, in the end, tax payers,” she said.

‘Too lenient’

MARKET IMPACTS

Le Trong Nhi, independent financial analyst, talks with Thanh Nien Weekly about how Vinashin’s loss has impacted Vietnam’s bond and equity markets.

“Vinashin’s VND80 trillion, or US$4 billion, in losses has affected Vietnam’s bond and equity markets. State-owned Vinashin issued US$750 million with guarantees by the government. The big loss has downgraded bonds issued by state-owned businesses and the government on the international market. It will also affect bonds to be issued by the sector and other private corporations in the coming time. PetroVietnam, or National Oil and Gas Group, plans to issue bonds on the international market this year. The group was assigned to share the loss with Vinashin as the latter’s affiliates were ordered by the government to merge into the group. The affiliates have also undergone some losses. The group’s bonds will be cited as more “expensive” after the Vinashin “scandal.”

From what I know, some local banks and financial funds invested in projects introduced by Vinashin, or indirectly in those financed by Vinashin. The loss has shaken financial investors such as the banks and funds which hold listed shares in Vietnam. Some international financial funds which operate in Vietnam have faced pressure from shareholders to divest from the market. This combination will create more pressure on the stock market in the country.”

Vinashin was established in 1996 with a charter capital of VND100 billion, according to a government report. The company has made great strides over the years, turning Vietnam into one of the strongest shipbuilders in the world.

But due to the economic downturn, Vinashin faced numerous financial difficulties. Many customers canceled shipbuilding contracts or delayed payments, the government said.

Analysts have said that Vinashin’s failures created a storm of outrage among a public that had been kept almost entirely in the dark about the company’s operations.

People knew almost nothing about the state-owned company, except that it was “a major shipbuilder,” until they found out it was on the verge of bankruptcy and needs a serious overhaul. Many in fact assumed the company was strong.

Analysts said the public had the right to know about the operations of a state-owned company that uses state funds.

Like many state-owned enterprises, the shipbuilder barely disclosed its financial figures, leaving the public oblivious to what was going on, even when it incurred huge losses of billions of dollars.

The issue of ineffective business at Vinashin and other state-owned enterprises has been raised many times but concerned agencies did not pay enough attention to it, Lan said.

“I think both Vinashin and government agencies have to take responsibility. Specific individuals and agencies have to be held accountable because public funds are not charity funds,” she said.

“Censure would be too lenient a penalty for Vinashin. Legal actions should be taken against those accountable for the losses and debts at the company.”

Favor?

“The government should have let inspectors and auditors find out what Vinashin had been doing over the years, particularly as pertains to its debts, losses and excessive investments,” Lan said, noting that the state-owned company had taken advantage of preferential treatment from the government.

Inspections of several large companies, including Vinashin, were delayed last year when the government decided to give the firms more time to recover from the global economic downturn.

Lan said the lack of oversight had allowed Vinashin to always demand large land areas for its projects, which she called “a waste”.

In what other experts have called preferential treatment, the government raised $750 million by selling bonds in 2005 and then lent the proceeds to Vinashin. The company late last year won government approval to sell as much as $600 million of bonds overseas to fund construction of new ships.

The government has already rejected speculations that it showed a preference for Vinashin.

Pham Viet Muon, deputy head of the Government Office, told a press briefing last week that the government has supported the shipbuilding sector as it is one of the key industries for the country’s development.

“However, the government has not favored Vinashin. The company, like any other business, has to operate in accordance with the laws.”

Muon said while Vinashin’s business was affected by the global economic crisis, the company had its own weaknesses in financial management.

“The decision to restructure Vinashin aims at four goals: to maintain and develop the shipbuilding industry; to use resources and infrastructure effectively; to prevent negative impacts on credit institutions; and to ensure jobs for workers,” he said.

“The lesson learned is that the government has to monitor the operations of businesses closely even after they are given autonomy,” he said.

Restructuring a company or an economy is a normal task, Muon said, noting that after Vinashin, other companies will undergo reforms to improve their operations.

BAD REPORT CARD

The authorities have censured Vinashin Chairman Phan Thanh Binh for irresponsibly using state funds and pushing the company towards bankruptcy. According to the Inspection Commission of the Party’s Central Committee, Binh also appointed his family members to key positions in the company against state regulations.

These violations have caused serious consequences, inspectors said, noting that Binh may have acted out of his own self-interest.

The Inspection Commission also said Vinashin was dishonest in financial reporting and had invested aggressively beyond its major business of shipbuilding, causing losses to the government’s budget. According to a report in Tuoi Tre newspaper Wednesday, Binh was appointed CEO of Vinashin in 1996 and two years later he also took the post of the company chairman. Holding the highest authority in the company, Binh made many investment decisions which other managers and board members said they did not know of, the report said.

For instance, Binh decided on his own to buy a ship worth VND1.39 trillion (US$72.8 million) in 2007 and the purchase had not been reported to concerned ministries beforehand, the report said. Binh also appointed his son Pham Binh Minh, 30, to multiple key positions, including chairman of Vinashin Design Company and deputy general director of Vinashin’s Dung Quoc Shipyard, expected to become the largest shipyard in South East Asia.

Proposed increase in prices of medical services can be too much or too little, depending on who’s paying, but affordable healthcare remains out of reach for Vietnam’s impoverished

Two patients at Nguyen Trai Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City’s District 5. Many poor patients are concerned by a government plan to increase hospital fees.

Nguyen Thi Ha is slightly apprehensive as she enters the cashier’s booth, bill in hand, at the Hospital of Lung Diseases and Pneumonia in Hanoi.

The bill, for more than VND5 million (US$260), has been incurred for the treatment of her husband Nguyen Van Thong, who is suffering from tuberculosis. This does not include other daily expenses incurred staying away from home in Hanoi’s Thuong Tin District.

For a poor farming family from Thuong Tin District, this is an astronomical sum, and this is true for millions of other families in a country with a per capita income of about $1,000 and where the minimum government salary is VND730,000 ($38) per month.

A simple question about the bill has tears flowing down from Ha’s swollen eyelids. “It is really difficult for us to pay for the treatment,” she says.

Ha and her 40-year-old husband earn less than VND5 million per each rice season [three-four months] as farmers.

It is not uncommon in Vietnam’s rural areas for a family member’s illness [and subsequent death, in many instances] to plunge the household so deep in debt that they have to sell the only source of livelihood they have – their land.

Later, they subsist on hiring out their labor in surrounding areas or neighboring cities, forcing children to give up their education or parents to leave their children behind with relatives to work in cities to pay off their debt.

In fact, several NGO reports have noted that illness, accompanied by the lack of affordable healthcare, is one of the most common reasons for people to fall into poverty.

This dismal state of affairs could get worse for Thong and other patients nationwide who would have to spend a lot more on hospital fees if and when a draft document on the issue jointly prepared by the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Finance takes effect.

The document proposes increases in hospital fees that are up to ten times more than current rates, but policymakers argue that these increases are nominal, adjusted for inflation.

Nguyen Thi Xuyen, deputy minister of Health, said the 1995 document on hospital fees that is in use now was unsuitable because it stipulates examining fees of between VND3,000 and VND5,000 and hospital beds at just VND10,000 a day.

She said the proposed fees were between VND10,000 and VND30,000 for examinations and between VND50,000 and VND100,000 per day for a hospital bed.

Such an increase would not affect many patients because up to 62 percent of Vietnamese citizens have health insurance, Xuyen said. The poor are supported with health insurance fees while others will be able to pay all their fees, she added.

The family of Ha and Thong do not qualify for any health insurance assistance.

About 49.5 million people, or 56.6 percent of the total population had health insurance by the end of last year, according to the Vietnam Social Insurance – the central agency in charge of managing social and health insurance.

Groundless factors

Pham Luong Son, head of Vietnam Health Insurance’s policy division, was not convinced about the rationale for the increase.

“There should be a clear and reasonable foundation for the increase in hospital fees. I think the draft was not based on enough technical data for such an increase,” Son was cited by the Tuoi Tre newspaper as saying on July 18.

According to Son, drafters had proposed medical examination fees of VND30,000 per person because they estimated that there are about 20 patients being examined a day and the daily cost for an examining room is VND600,000.

This is not the situation in Vietnam’s hospitals, where around 50 patients are being examined in each examining room every day, he said.

Son also said the proposed hospital bed price of between VND100,000 and VND180,000 per day was also not feasible. Most hospitals would not be able to supply such services that require actual hospital beds and facilities like televisions, while hospitals at present have simple beds that are sometimes shared by two or three patients because of overcrowding.

Better service?

A recent editorial in the Tuoi Tre newspaper said the draft document on hospital fees should have included a plan to improve medical facilities and services that are overloaded and fail to meet demand.

“The number of patients sharing beds remains high, even three or four patients sharing a bed in some cases and the current solution is shortening the treatment period for inpatients,” the paper said.

“Following an increase in hospital fees, patients should be supplied with minimum services like giving each patient a bed of her/his own and each doctor examining a maximum of 30 patients a day. But with the current demand, such simple requirements cannot be satisfied,” it added.

Local media have many times reported constant overloading at many hospitals where each doctor has to examine some 100 patients a day and doesn’t have enough time to conduct thorough examinations and offer detailed consulting services to the patients.

According to a report by the Ministry of Health about state-run hospitals, only 38 percent have nutritional departments and 51 percent have their own kitchens while 16 percent lack conditions to provide round-the-clock care for seriously ill patients.

Insurance fees follow suit

Facing a hike in reimbursement of hospital fees for patients with health insurance, the central insurance agency is looking to significantly increase insurance premiums.

Nguyen Minh Thao, deputy director of Vietnam Social Insurance, said they would increase health insurance fees by 40 percent once the draft regulations on hospital fees are approved. The current health insurance fee is VND450,000 per year.

However, Thao also said that Vietnam Social Insurance would suggest that the government supports policyholders with the surplus amount that can be taken from current subsidies granted to public hospitals.

Life and death

According to Vietnam Social Insurance, the 62 percent of patients having health insurance are mostly civil servants, workers and retired workers. People who don’t have health insurance are those who don’t have stable incomes, like households living near the poverty line, daily-wage laborers and farmers.

In April, the Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs had said the number of poor families in Vietnam will increase to between 17 to 22 percent if the new poverty lines are approved and take effect from next year. The ministry has submitted a proposal to the government to define poverty at a monthly average income of VND300,000 ($13.2) per person in rural areas and VND600,000 ($31.6) in urban areas. Another option is to set the threshold at VND480,000 ($25.3) and VND700,000 ($36.9), respectively.

While it is clear that an increase in hospital fees would affect those without health insurance, policyholders would also suffer.

Under the Health Insurance Law taking effect in July 2009, poor patients have to pay five percent of hospital fees, and the rest is reimbursed by the health insurance agency. Having to pay five percent will also hit many families hard, and can mean the difference between life and death.

Truong Thi Ngoc of An Giang Province in the Mekong Delta says the health insurance agency used to pay in full the hospital fees for the treatment of her six-year-old son at the HCMC Tumor Hospital. Her son suffers from leukemia, or blood cancer. With the new policy, they have to pay a portion of the costs. Ngoc and her husband have had to leave their rice fields in the Mekong Delta to work for daily wages as construction workers in HCMC to take care of their child.

“We have to borrow more money to pay for each of his treatment periods. But we can’t afford it if the hospital fees increase. Maybe we will have to take him back home to An Giang then.”

Farmers, lawyers baffled by provincial farmers’ association reluctance to take river polluter to task

A portion of the Thi Vai River in 2008, much of which was polluted by the illegal wastewater discharge of Taiwanese MSG manufacturer Vedan Vietnam.

Nguyen Lam Son was angry, puzzled and relieved.

His lawyer had just told him that he is likely to win a lawsuit against Vedan, the company that had destroyed his livelihood by dumping untreated wastewater into the Thi Vai River in the southern Dong Nai Province for 14 years.

“The prospects are bright. This is totally different from what I was told a week ago,” Son said.

At a meeting between some 100 representatives of 5,000 farmers from Long Thanh and Nhon Trach districts in Dong Nai on July 7, the provincial farmers’ association reiterated its stance that members stood little chance of winning a lawsuit against Vedan.

Despite the fact that province was hardest hit by the pollution caused by the Taiwanese MSG maker, the association asked affected farmers to drop the case, and continued to “negotiate” the compensation with the company.

“I was shattered by that. It seemed that we have no choice but to accept something that has already been set up,” Son told Thanh Nien Weekly.

At the July 7 meeting, all the farmers accepted that they would drop the case.

Except Son

Shrimp farmer Nguyen Lam Son of Dong Nai Province’s Nhon Trach District said he would sue Vedan on his own, despite warnings from the local farmers’ association.

“I was frustrated as the association just clung to the lack of evidence claim to talk the farmers out of pursuing the lawsuit. They kept saying that we had to present all the invoices and documents certifying that our business had suffered heavy losses due to Vedan,” Son said.

“But I would dare anyone who can find such documents as evidence. Most of the farmers in my commune are illiterate and their business transactions are based solely on mutual trust and word of mouth.”

Son, a shrimp farmer, said he decided not to drop the case because he has had enough of putting up with the “crime” Vedan has committed.

“Vedan’s crime happened right in front of me for years. Now I will never ever let them do it again,” said Son, who had been breeding shrimp by pumping water directly from the Thi Vai River since 1996.

Devious ploy

In September 2008, government inspectors found Vedan Vietnam dumping untreated wastewater into the Thi Vai River in the southern province of Dong Nai. The company had avoided detection by hiding pipes under ground and in the river, and had been discharging toxic liquids through them for 14 years, massively polluting the surroundings.

A study authorized by the Institute of Environment and Natural Resources found in December 2009 that Vedan was responsible for 77 percent of the pollution then plaguing the Thi Vai River.

The report said Vedan should compensate farmers in Dong Nai Province, Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province and Ho Chi Minh City with a total of VND1.7 trillion (US$89.2 million) for the damages it has caused, including the destruction of marine farms and damage to land crops on the banks of the river.

But the company rejected the figures about the extent of damage as “groundless”. Vedan claimed it had inspected and assessed the damage by itself and offered far less compensation than the government-sponsored study said the farmers are entitled to.

Earlier this year, farmers’ societies from HCMC, Ba Ria-Vung Tau, and Dong Nai, agreed that they would take the company to court and demand fair compensation.

Lawyer Nguyen Van Hau, who will defend HCMC farmers in the upcoming lawsuit, said he could see what Vedan was up to in trying to delay the bargaining process.

“After September 15, two years after the company was caught red-handed, if no lawsuit takes place, demanding even a penny from the company would be a tough task,” Hau said, referring to a statute of limitations.

But the Dong Nai farmers’ association made a u-turn early last month, saying it would persuade the farmers to drop the case due to lack of evidence.

The association also agreed in principle to accept “financial assistance” worth VND15 billion from Vedan without consulting the farmers.

Lawyer Hau said he found the decision of the association incomprehensible.

“I’m baffled. Dong Nai farmers are the hardest-hit and they should receive the largest support [from the association]. I just don’t understand.”

Hau said he did not think suing the Taiwanese company would be that tough.

Son’s lawyer, who wished to remain anonymous, said he has found the way out not only for Son but for other farmers hit hard by Vedan. However, he declined to spell out specific measures, saying, “Let’s just wait until we get to the court.”

The farmer’s willingness to go against the stated odds has impressed 47-year-old Hoang The Dung, another shrimp farmer in Dong Nai’s Nhon Trach District.

Dung said he would also follow Son in taking legal action against Vedan.

Dung said he was not consulted when the Dong Nai farmers’ association held a meeting on what action they should take against Vedan. “That just made me livid,” Dung said.

“I don’t trust the association anymore. I will go on my own.”

‘Certain to win’

Nguyen Van Phung, chairman of the HCMC’s farmers’ association, said he was not in a position to judge the decision of his Dong Nai counterparts.

“But I just don’t agree with them.”

Phung said he was glad that the two farmers in Dong Nai have shown their determination to take the case all the way.

“The court officials have told me that they all know about the ploy by Vedan to buy time. They urged us to expedite the process so that the court hearing could take place in time,” Phung said.

“We are certain to win.”

The Tuoi Tre newspaper quoted Nguyen Quoc Cuong, chairman of the Vietnam Farmers’ Association as saying that they would strongly support the farmers.

“Any farmers’ association should be protecting the right interests and benefits of the farmers,’ Cuong was quoted by Tuoi Tre as saying.

“Perhaps because Vedan is located in Dong Nai Province, the farmers’ association there need to take their relations with the company into consideration,” he surmised, referring to the reluctance of the local farmers’ association to pursue the case against the company.

Inquiry follows wave of Agent Orange interest in wake of Senators’ visit

Tran Thi Hoan, 23, with her friends at Peace Village in Ho Chi Minh City’s Tu Du Maternity Hospital, a home for Agent Orange victims. Hoan, who was born without two legs and a hand due to her mother’s dioxin exposure, is testifying about the plight of Vietnamese Agent Orange victims at the US House of Representatives this week.

The United States House of Representatives is set to hear the testimony of the first Vietnamese Agent Orange victim to ever speak on capital hill this week.

Tran Thi Hoan, a 23-year-old 2nd generation victim told Thanh Nien Weekly her testimony on July 15th would focus on the agonies she and her peers have suffered, “and the aspirations of Vietnamese Agent Orange victims to be fully redressed by the US government and chemical companies.”

Hoan’s testimony coincides with a rising tide of US interest in Vietnam and its estimated 3 million Agent Orange victims. Hoan was born without a hand and both legs, which doctors have attributed to her mother’s exposure to Agent Orange.

According to an article written by Charles Bailey, Director of the Ford Foundation’s Special initiative on Dioxin/Agent Orange: “Between 1961 and 1971, the US sprayed close to 20 million gallons of Agent Orange and other herbicides over 10 percent of what was then South Vietnam.” Bailey added that the chemicals contained Dioxin, defined as a “persistent organic pollutant that even in tiny amounts (parts per trillion) can seriously harm the health of anyone exposed and potentially their offspring and future generations.”

Nearly 50 years later, members of the US government are stepping forward and taking ownership of the act.

“We as a country and a government formulated this policy of using this chemical toxic substance to supposedly fight the war in Vietnam only to find out that the consequences were just unbelievable,” Congressman Eni Faleomavaega (D -Am. Samoa) chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Sub-Committee on Asia, the Pacific and the Global Environment told Thanh Nien Weekly.

Faleomavaega used the words “chemical warfare” to describe the US spraying campaign.

The Congressman was stationed with the US Army in Nha Trang from 1967-68. He summoned the first congressional hearing on Agent Orange that included the US-Vietnam dialogue group in 2008. He called another in 2009. In this third hearing, members of the House will come face to face with the consequences of the spraying.

“When I see these children in the hospital there in Vietnam who are deformed, it’s almost like being exposed to nuclear radiation in a way,” he said.

Rep. Faleomavaega is the second US official in two weeks to acknowledge a direct moral obligation on behalf of the US government to increase aid to Vietnamese Agent Orange victims.

The Samoan Congressman was unaware that a group of three US Senators had visited Vietnam last week and toured Agent Orange treatment centers in and around Da Nang.

During the delegation’s visit, the Tuoi Tre newspaper reported that Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Ia.) expressed a desire to raise the current allotment of $3 million to $20-30 million.

“[What] I want to do is to get the money for the compensation for the same illnesses here as we are doing in the US,” he was quoted as saying.

In an e-mail, Sen. Harkin’s staff said they could not commit to a specific number. “Sen. Harkin is working hard to increase funding,” a spokesperson said.

Senators Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and AL Franken (D-Minn.), who accompanied Harkin to Vietnam last week, declined repeated requests for comment on the nature of their trip and plans for future action.

During the fiscal year of 2007, Congress approved $3 million for Vietnamese Agent Orange victims. The amount was approved again in 2009 and 2010.

“This 3 million is just pittance,” Rep. Faleomavaega said. “I really hope that we’re gonna see what we can do to increase our efforts.”

Both Harkin and Faleomavaega independently praised the work of the Ford Foundation, a charitable organization that has worked to develop a $300 million clean-up plan with the US – Vietnam Dialogue Group on Agent Orange/Dioxin. The plan requires funding largely by the US government –money that has yet to arrive.

“I don’t know where this is going to end up,” said Rep. Faleomavaega. “I’m just doing the best I can. Hopefully there will be members who will see the rightness of the issue and say we just need to correct it that’s all.”

Dr. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Phuong, who will testify alongside Hoan and was the first Vietnamese citizen to speak on the issue before congress in 2008, said the money that comes into Vietnam for Agent Orange assistance needs to be used properly.

“The money should be directed to Vietnamese NGOs for better distribution. As far as I understand, the already meager assistance has been trimmed by US NGOs tasked with bringing the money to Vietnam,” said the former president of HCMC-based Tu Du Maternity Hospital and current vice chair of the Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin (VAVA). Phuong has conducted extensive research on the impact of Agent Orange on breast milk in Vietnam.

“Imagine how much Vietnamese Agent Orange victims would receive given the fact that such [US] NGOs often come to Vietnam in large delegations and stay in five-star hotels.”

SHOW ME THE MONEY

Congressman Faleomavaega was the first to hold a hearing on Agent Orange that included the Vietnamese government. He served in the US Army from 1967-8 and was the first Asian-American in the history to chair a sub-committee on Asia and the Pacific.

In 1989 he was elected to Congress by the people of American Samoa. They have been re-electing him ever since.

During an extensive interview with Thanh Nien Weekly, Congressman Faleomavaega spoke on a range of issues, excerpted below.

We’re gonna spend another $100 billion on the 100,000 soldiers we’ve got on the ground in Afghanistan. And we’re right in the middle of saying, are we justified, does this smell of Vietnam again?

... Every time I read about the billions and billions of dollars that have been wasted on the war on Iraq and out of Afghanistan... that really burns me up, you know?

... We can’t account for billions and billions and we can’t spend a few million to alleviate [Agent Orange]? Billions and billions we can’t even account for? Give me a break. That’s not right.

In my review of the situation, this started under the Kennedy Administration, these major chemical companies like Monsanto... They pointed the finger at the Department of Defense. They are both responsible for what happened.

... What makes it worse is that this didn’t go on for a few months, it went on for close to 10 years!

... I have to put the ball squarely on the pentagon and those officials who conducted the war effort are responsible for what happened.

From South Africa to Laos, authorities are cracking down on traders in endangered flesh

Environmental police seize two frozen tigers and one frozen panther from a house in the north-central Nghe An Province’s Dien Chau District on June 22. Conservationists have called for more efforts to stop the trade of endangered species.

Experts are lauding the recent seizure of two frozen tigers and a frozen panther in the north-central province of Nghe An. Still, they say more must be done to stop Vietnamese traffickers plundering the world’s precious fauna.

In an extensive response sent to Thanh Nien Weekly, Douglas Hendrie, technical advisor for Education for Nature-Vietnam (ENV), the country"s first local nongovernmental organization (NGO) to focus on conservation of nature and the environment, said that a more holistic approach is needed to staunch the loss of wildlife.

Vietnamese authorities must collaborate across borders to take down the international networks responsible for the trade, he said. At home, they must make sure local markets are free of the illicit products.

“We are focused too much on the act and too little on the enterprise,” Hendrie said.

Thomas Osborn, coordinator of the wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC’s Greater Mekong Program, said that the environmental police have demonstrated once again their dedication to halting the illegal trade in protected species such as tigers.

“If we hope to save the country’s remaining tigers and other threatened species, it will take ever increasing vigilance from authorities and a strong commitment by the government to support and promote existing wildlife laws.”

As few as 30 wild tigers are estimated to survive in Vietnam.

Despite their protection under Vietnamese and international law, tigers and panthers continue to be illegally hunted and traded across Vietnam and Southeast Asia. On the black market, tiger parts are sold as food, souvenirs and the components of medicine. According to a TRAFFIC statement released on July 2, tiger bone wine remains in high demand throughout the region.

Tiger farming

On June 22, environmental police entered the farm of 53- year-old Le Xuan Thoan in Dien Chau District in the north-central province of Nghe An. VietNamNet news website cited reports from the local Forest Protection Agency that Thoan’s farm housed two rhinoceroses and a host of other wild animals.

Inside his house, they discovered a menagerie of a different kind.

In addition to the trio of frozen feline carcasses, police seized the skeleton of a wild animal believed to be a lion and around five kilograms of wildlife bones.

Senior Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Viet Nhi of the provincial environmental police said this was the biggest case of frozen wildlife ever to rock the region. He said police will continue to investigate the matter.

RECENT WILDLIFE
SMUGGLING CASES

From April 14 to May 19 in 2010: Seven young bears were seized in three separate cases in Dien Bien, Ha Tinh and Nghe An provinces. All three cases involved smuggling from Laos to Vietnam.

From April 29 to May 28 in 2010: Hai Phong City customs officials busted four smuggling cases. They confiscated around 4.7 tons of elephant tusks in total.

March 2010: Lao Bao Border Guards in the north-central Ha Tinh Province seized the body of a 95-kilogram tiger and a 27- kilogram black panther being transported across the border to be sold in Vietnam.

October 2009: Vietnam Environmental Police seized two frozen tiger carcasses weighing a total of 130kg and arrested five suspects in Hanoi.

(Source: Education for Nature – Vietnam)

Several conservationists have said that Thoan is not the first “wildlife farmer” to be caught in the illegal trade.

ENV has taken aim at the tiger farming.

The NGO recently issued a study that found three out of seven tiger farms across Vietnam are involved in illegal tiger smuggling. Some farm owners opt not to report the number of newborn and dead tigers so they may trade them on the black market, it said.

“Tiger farming in Vietnam should be banned. Only licensed zoos and qualified and strategically planned tiger conservation facilities should be permitted to keep tigers,” ENV’s Douglas Hendrie told Thanh Nien Weekly.

“Most tiger farmers in Vietnam would be better named ‘tiger businessmen’ because they are hardly farmers like the public thinks, but rich businessmen, most of which have purchased their tigers illegally, and nearly all of which are suspected or confirmed to be illegally selling tigers out the back door of their farms, while crying to the public that they are only trying to help save tigers by breeding them for conservation,” he said.

Rhino smuggling

Though tiger numbers in Vietnam are dwindling, rhinos have been forced to the brink of extinction. This April, the carcass of a Javan rhino was found hornless and bullet-ridden in the forest in the Central Highlands Lam Dong Province.

Biologists are still trying to determine whether the corpse represents the last of its kind in Vietnam.

Meanwhile, the thirst for rhino horns prevails.

On March 29, South African authorities seized a Vietnamese national named Xuan Hoang at O.R. Tambo International Airport. Of the seven rhino horns found in Hoang’s possession, several matched the DNA of a rhino that had been poached just a few days earlier.

The horns weighed 16 kilograms, and were valued at approximately US$117,000 according to a press release issued by South Africa-based NGO Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT).

The South Africans hit the Vietnamese trader hard.

According to the EWT’s press release, Hoang pleaded for mercy and tried to convince the court to levy a fine for his crimes. Magistrate Prince Manyathi responded by saying that fines would no longer suffice as a measure of discouraging future such crimes.

On June 30, the magistrate sentenced Hong to ten years in prison for possessing the horns. “A message needs to be sent to Vietnam,” he said.

Last week, three Vietnamese citizens applied for bail in South Africa. The trio were arrested on the opening night of World Cup 2010 on June 11 with a total of 25 rhino horns, EWT told Thanh Nien Weekly via email. Their court case is due later in July.

“[Hoang’s] sentence will be setting a norm in the courts for future sentencing of similar cases and will hopefully be a deterring factor to the poaching. It is very significant that such a large number of horns get smuggled out of South Africa into Vietnam undetected and it is our aim to see that better detection of such horns becomes the thing of the future,” said Faan Coetzee, Executant of EWT’s Rhino Security Project.

Festivals should be interactive and engage their communities in their planning, ambassador to Vietnam, Mitsuo Sakaba, told Thanh Nien Weekly as he spoke about the festivities being held to mark the 1000th anniversary of Thang Long on October 10.

Thanh Nien Weekly: Vietnam will celebrate the 1,000th anniversary of Thang Long-Hanoi in October. How should Hanoi organize the event?

Mitsuo Sakaba: A street march with the participation of 1,000 people in the costumes of the Ly Dynasty, 1,000 years ago, would be a good idea. The march led by a famous actor and actress portraying King Ly Thai To and his queen may be interesting.

To lure many visitors, the event must be big.

The organization board should coordinate with travel agents to promote the event. It is scheduled to start in October, but the detailed agenda has not yet been announced. Vietnam should announce the schedule soon, so that there is time to promote the event abroad.

To attract the participation of local youth, the event should have a history contest. Students from all high schools nationwide could participate in the Thang Long history contest. The two best teams will compete in the final round of the contest on the anniversary day. The contest will make high school students more interested in the event and the history of Thang Long. Vietnamese youths are now not so interested in Vietnam’s history.

The organizing board must coordinate with media agencies to promote the event

What’s the difference between festivals in Vietnam and Japan?

In Vietnam, people’s committees of localities often preside over festivals. Meanwhile, in Japan, people’s organizations, with the assistance of the government, hold festivals. In Japan, festival expenditures are funded only partially by local people’s committees while they are also financed by firms and individuals.

In Vietnam, if people’s committees of localities are in charge of holding festivals, people don’t have to care about expenses, about sponsors. But there are problems that could arise in holding Japanese-style festivals, and people have to solve many issues.

If people do not volunteer to plan, organize and participate in the festival, it will be difficult to hold it.

In Vietnam, residents often watch festivals, they do not directly partake in them. What should Hanoi do so that people can participate in the upcoming 1,000th anniversary of Thang Long in an active manner?

Vietnam should hold festival programs that residents can participate in. In Japan, groups of local people, not the government, hold festivals. The events are organized around participatory activities. Local residents can register to participate in the programs. Festivals in Japan often have street marches, in which people can perform traditional dances, or martial arts.

Festivals in Japan are cheerful, but they are time-consuming and difficult to prepare. It is simpler to organize festivals in the Vietnamese style, and the preparation time is also shorter.

In Vietnam, historical events are often re-enacted by actors and actresses on the stage. Is the situation in Japan the same?

Japan has two kinds of festivals, annual festivals and great festivals. There are three great festivals which lure 1-2 million of visitors each. One great festival will be held this year to celebrate the 1,300th anniversary of Nara, the ancient capital of Japan.

During some festivals in Japan, residents wear costumes of the historical period, and stage recreations of famous events in history. There is almost no usage of stages, actors and actresses, and stage directors in doing this.

This spring, I visited a festival in Bac Ninh (of Vietnam), in which more than 3,000 young people staged creations of historical events. The participation of volunteers have made the festival is very cheerful and interesting.

However, it takes a lot of time and effort to prepare for a festival with the participation of many people. In Japan, volunteers prepare for their festivals for six months. So, the problem is finding enough volunteers to prepare events for such long periods of time.

Many local and foreign visitors will rush to Hanoi during the upcoming festival of the city. So, what should Hanoi do to deal with environmental and transport issues?

When Japan holds street marches during festivals, we have to take measures to limit traffic in streets, such as banning cars and some other vehicles, so that people can comfortably partake in the events. After festivals, a lot of waste needs to be cleaned up. In Japan, the streets are cleaned up after festivals by groups of volunteers.

If Vietnam had such groups, you could deal with the environmental issue. In addition, it is necessary to improve the awareness of local people about environmental hygiene, as many people just litter all the time.

What are Japan’s contributions to the event of Vietnam?

We issued a publication of “Hanoi-Japan, towards a new vision”, and will hold a series of cultural and art events, such as a film festival, music performance and exhibitions of pictures and photos, to welcome the 1,000th anniversary of Thang Long.

Nude photos of a provincial leader were found in the cell phone of a sex worker

Defendants are escorted out of a trial in February of a high school principal having sex with his students in the northern mountainous Ha Giang Province. The Party’s Inspection Commission has proposed dismissal of Ha Giang head while police sources accused that he had involved in the sex scandal.

Communist Party inspectors have recommended the dismissal of a provincial head due to his “unhealthy relations” and “irresponsible way of life.”

The inspectors said Nguyen Truong To, chairman of the northern province of Ha Giang’s People’s Committee, the local government, has committed several violations. Most of these violations pertained to To’s lifestyle.

According to several police sources, To might have had sexual relations with a sex worker in 2005, when he headed a department in the people’s committee. Two other sex workers earlier this year also accused To of having sexual relations with them.

During the 32nd meeting of the Party’s Inspection Committee, inspectors recommended that To be dismissed from his posts as Deputy Secretary of Ha Giang Province Party Unit, Chairman of Ha Giang People’s Committee and Deputy of Ha Giang People’s Council, which acts as the provincial legislature.

In a statement released on July 5, the Party’s Inspection Commission said that To had “seriously violated the conduct [expected] of a [good] Party member” and “negatively impacted the image of a leading official.”

The Party’s Inspection Committee had warned To about his violations but he failed to admit wrongdoing and did not seem receptive to improving his behavior, according to the statement.

The inspectors ordered the provincial Party Unit chief and director of Ha Giang Police Department to file official reports regarding their knowledge of To’s wrongdoing. In their statement, the inspectors also proposed punitive measures against the two officials who had known about To’s dalliances since 2005 but failed to report it to higher ups.

Nude photos

The inspectors did not articulate the specifics of To’s wrongdoings in their official statements, but according to the police sources, To was alleged of having patronized sex workers on two occasions.

According to the police sources, the first instance took place in November 2006 when Ha Giang police busted a prostitution ring. Police found nude photos of To posed “in different positions” saved in the phone of the sex worker, in addition to several text messages sent from his cell phone number.

The case was reported to Nguyen Binh Van, Director of Ha Giang Province Police Department and Hoang Minh Nhat, secretary of the provincial Party Unit and only resulted in internal rebuke.

Fast times at Viet Lam secondary schoo

Nguyen Truong To, deputy secretary of Ha Giang Province Party Unit, Chairman of Ha Giang People’s Committee and deputy of Ha Giang People’s Council

In the second case, a high school student accused To of having sexual relations with her when she was under 18.

Last November, the Ha Giang Court sentenced Sam Duc Xuong – former principal of Viet Lam Secondary School in Vi Xuyen District – to ten and a half years after he was found guilty of statutory rape.

Prosecutors alleged that the principal had abused his position to coerce young women into having sex with him. Two of his students, Nguyen Thi Hang, 19, and Nguyen Thi Thanh Thuy, 18, were sentenced to six and five years respectively for procuring other young girls to have sex with older men.

All three defendants appealed for more lenient sentences. Then, during their February appeals hearing, they changed their pleas. They were not guilty, they announced.

Two years earlier, the young women claimed, they were forced to have sex with local officials.

For the first time, Hang and Thuy named ten men, including To and other senior government officials, whom they claimed had had sex with them when they were underage.

The accusations came to light during the February 1 hearing of the Ha Giang Court of Appeals. The court found that last year"s trial by the Vi Xuyen District Court (as well as the supporting investigations) had "seriously violated" regulations. As a result, they ordered a fresh investigation of the case.

According to an anonymous police source, Hang has told the investigators she had sex with Xuong [the principal] and other Ha Giang officials for money between 2008 and 2009. The source says that she implicated senior officials from the Ha Giang People’s Committee, police and entrepreneurs in the province.

Tran Dinh Trien, Thuy’s defense attorney, told the Tuoi Tre newspaper on July 7 that he was not surprised by the results of the Party’s Inspection Commission.

“In the Sam Duc Xuong case, the defendants produced a black list accusing several Ha Giang officials of having sex with them,” he said. “Nguyen Truong To topped the list.”

Trien also said he heard about To’s nude photos after Xuong’s trial but he couldn’t verify the information as a lawyer. “Now the [Party’s] Central Inspection Commission has clearly concluded the issue,” he added.

Party officials call for Ha Giang leader’s ouster

A senior official has endorsed the a recent proposal by the Communist Party’s Inspection Commission to dismiss the chairman of Ha Giang Province’s People’s Committee for his alleged role in a wide-scale sex scandal.

“I think violating ethical norms is not a minor issue,” Hoang Trung Luyen, head of Ha Giang Party Unit’s Propaganda and Education Commission, told the Tuoi Tre newspaper on July 8. “There should be stricter [measures] if violations of the Penal Code were found,”

Luyen was speaking to the media about the case of Nguyen Truong To. Party inspectors recently called for To’s dismissal from his current posts as Deputy Secretary of Ha Giang Province Party Unit, Chairman of Ha Giang People’s Committee, the local government, and Deputy of Ha Giang People’s Council, the provincial legislature.

Luyen confirmed that police notified Party officials after finding To’s nude photos in a cell phone belonging to a sex worker. Luyen said that the revelation resulted in internal rebuke. He also confirmed with Thanh Nien that To remains on next term’s ballot for key posts in the province.

Nguyen Dinh Huong, former vice head of the Central Party’s Organization Commission, said To deserves to be subjected to stricter measures.

“A Party member who is the head of a locality and has deteriorated should be dismissed from the Party, not just his posts,” he said, adding that there should also be repercussions for officials who knew of To’s actions but failed to report them to higher authorities.

Meanwhile, Le Quang Trieu, head of Ha Giang Party Unit’s Inspection Department said any measures against To would be taken by the Party’s Secretariat.

 Marc Moynot, 66, in his HCMC chocolate lab in Tan Binh District

Marc Moynot, 66, stands in the garden of the French General Consulate during a Bastille Day celebration.

The little old man’s soft, gentle face seems to disappear behind his trove of handmade chocolates. They are white and black, milky and dark. Some have the yielding texture of truffles. Others feature firm shells that burst open to yield tropical bonanzas: passion fruit jam, orange peel marmalade and kumquat liqueur.

Cinnamon and other piquant spices swirl through the buttery softness of these little marvels and a je ne sais quoi that is distinctly Vietnamese.

The following day, I decided to trek out to the small workshop he shares with his Vietnamese partner and her two children out in Ho Chi Minh City’s sprawling Tan Binh District.

The intoxicating aroma of 50 kilos of chocolate almost knocks me out as I step through the door of 27 Nguyen Van Mai Street – Moynot’s home and the headquarters of Astair Chocolates private company. The ground floor of the private home features Moynot’s neat laboratory. Shelf after shelf of pots and trays line the walls. The slight man slinks along a long stainless steel table and goes to work.

Moynot’s production team consists solely of his partner, Nguyen Thi Mai Huong, her two children and a maid. Together, the crew is endlessly experimenting with new fillings based on distinctly Vietnamese flavors - white honey from Da Lat, kumquat, mango, peppercorns.

The nose knows

Laurent Severac has made a living scouring Vietnam for thrilling smells. For the past 16 years, the stout Frenchman has tromped through the nation’s forests in search of seeds, leaves and aromatic woods that delight the senses. He makes his livelihood distilling his finds into essential oils and selling them to Western perfume designers.

For this olfactory epicure, Moynot’s chocolate is sui generis.

Last year, Severac ordered around 200 boxes of kumquat chocolates to give to friends and clients for the Lunar New Year. “Marc’s chocolate surprises me most with its purity and simplicity,” Severac said. “I’ve been in Asia for 22 years. Every time I come home, my father asks me to bring him two things: Tiger Balm and Astair chocolates.”

When Severac tries to slip a French-made truffle to his staff in Hanoi, they turn up their noses.

“I prefer chocolates from your friend in Saigon,” they say.

Moynot has agreed to customize chocolates to suit Severac’s thirst for Vietnamese flavors. In his small lab, he’s whipped up fillings derived from ingredients harvested in the mountains of the north: star anise, wild pepper, and wild ginger – to name just a few. “They are simply the best I’ve eaten in my life,” Severac said.

Moynot B.C. (before chocolate)

The master candy man once made his living as an Apline guide, leading ski trips, forays and search parties into the mountains in Savoir, France. He was busiest during the snow-packed four- month winter season. The rest of the year was slow and Moynot got by on taking tourists hiking and camping.

In 1993, he decided to visit Vietnam on a one-month holiday.

After returning to France, he was determined to change his life. In 1995, he moved to HCMC and took a teaching job. He didn’t care much for the work and toyed with the idea of becoming a water sports instructor in Mui Ne. During the transition, Moynot’s friend, a successful HCMC caterer tried his two standby dessert recipes: chocolate mousse and dark chocolate truffles.

His friend was blown away.

“I had these two recipes when I was in France,” Moynot says. “I learned them from a box of chocolate.”

The apprentice

Moynot’s caterer friend helped him import ingredients and supplies from France. Seeking further guidance, Moynot approached Serge Rigaredin, the former head chef of Sofitel Saigon Hotel, to learn more chocolate recipes. (Rigaredin has since returned to France and could not be reached for this article).

The budding chocolatier felt very lucky at the time. “Serge Rigaredin was a very kind, skillful and devoted teacher,” said Moynot. “He also loaned me several good books.”

In 2001, the standard for chocolate was fairly low in southern Vietnam; Moynot worked hard to change that.

Around the same time, he met his partner in Da Lat. Soon after the meeting, the two began making chocolate together. Huong said that it was difficult to enter the field at the time. Step by step, she added, things became easier.

After a few months their chocolates were being served at some of the finest restaurants and hotels in HCMC.

A tiny, happy empire

After nine years, Moynot’s empire is confined solely to the four walls of his little lab.

He has played a role in every aspect of his operation. He sketched out a design for the heated cauldron he uses to mix the chocolate and built the device he uses to cut wrapping paper.

His major problem has been marketing. “When I started I had very little money for marketing but I am conscious that we need a marketing team for our chocolate,” he said. “Many of the hotels in HCMC make their own chocolate these days.”

Moynot still takes orders from luxury hotels, but he’s on the lookout for new customers across Vietnam. Though he sometimes finds himself pining for the quiet of the Alpine forests, he remains a satisfied man in busy HCMC.

“I have a happy family here and I make something that other people like,” he said.