Vietnamese Communist Oppressive Policies

Understanding the Foundations of the Vietnamese Communist Oppressive
Policies
Dan Chu Forum's Analytical Summary
drafted in 1993 by Vo`nh Thanh
Vietnamese version . Vie^.t ngu+~

***

The Communist Party of Vietnam strangles the Law
Communist Control of Citizens
Religious Repression
Hanoi's Holocaust: Re-education Camps and Prisons
Economic Proscription
Vietnamese Children and the Communist Indoctrination
The CPV's Institutionalized Corruption

The Communist Party of Vietnam strangles the Law

The Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) is positioned at the apex of absolute
power in Socialist Vietnam. It places party members in important posts of
all organizations and enterprises to secure the Marxist domination over all
strategic positions in society. The decorative National Assembly is simply
an instrument for the CPV to legitimize its policies. Although Hanoi's
Constitution provides that `(t)he National Assembly is the highest
representative body of the people, the highest state authority...' and `\...
is the only body vested with constitutional and legislative authority', its
members are `excused from meetings almost all year-round' and leave the
law-making authority in the hands of CPV officials. And, whenever the
representatives convene to consider legislations tabled by the CPV, they
quickly pass those without any question or debate.
Nguyen Cong Hoan, a disillusioned Communist leader, revealed
that, even as an Assemblyman, he was not allowed to express his own view.
His speeches were pre-prepared by `someone else' and he was not permitted to
meet with foreign reporters without his `team leader's prior approval'
(i)\. [i] Besides the National Assembly, other organizations such as Mat
Tran To Quoc (Fatherland Front) and the Association of Patriotic Writers
operate merely to popularize the CPV's policies.
In an article in December 1991, Hanoi's Fatherland Front member
Ho Ngoc Nhuan bitterly denounced the idleness and incredible silence of the
National Assembly members in light of the country's serious problems. Nhuan
naively wondered when the decorative Assembly would take action to resolve
Socialist Vietnam's current economic and political deadlocks (ii)\. [ii]
In response to the growing `controlled criticisms', the CPV
leaders decided to change the Constitution and the National Assembly.
However, their intention was neither to permit a democratic election nor to
grant the Assembly representatives the right to exercise their legislative
authority freely. Rather, their aim was to put a new coat of autonomy on
the decorative National Assembly to fabricate the existence of liberty and
democracy in Socialist Vietnam.
In 1992, Hanoi created and implemented a new Constitution that
reaffirms the Communist Party's political monopoly and socialism as the
`correct and sole direction' for Hanoi's economic plan. Subsequently, a new
election for the National Assembly was duly held. Unlike the results of the
last election which a few non-Communist elements were `elected', the July
1992 election introduced only faithful party members into this decorative
legislature. Many well-known former members of the National Assembly such
as leftists Ngo Ba Thanh and Nguyen Xuan Oanh were dropped by Hanoi.
The National Assembly's 1992 election results demonstrate the
senior party officials' frustration over the chronic economic failures and
their calculated move to consolidate the CPV's grip on power. More than
ever, Hanoi tries to show that the election results represent the Vietnamese
people's views. And, therefore, a complete control of the National Assembly
gives senior party officials the absolute authority to interpret the General
Will as to approve their political monopoly. In a period of uncertainty,
Hanoi cannot afford to face any opposition in the National Assembly,
although this legislature's role is merely window-dressing. The results of
the 1992 election confirm the despair that is seizing the Communist Party of
Vietnam.
With respect to the Marxist legislations concerning civil
liberties, the vacuity of Hanoi's law is factually demonstrated by the harsh
realities of Communist social and political life. The CPV's propaganda
machine constantly praises the people's protected rights to life, liberty
and the pursuit of happiness. In the mirror of actuality, however, the
elegantly-composed legislations and speeches appear to be mere fantasies.
The CPV controls virtually all aspects of life in Socialist Vietnam. Its
absolute and uncontested political monopoly brings a universal retardation
of liberalism in Vietnam.
Hanoi's Constitution entitles the Vietnamese people to many
freedoms and rights including the freedom of speech, the press, assembly,
association, worship, and security of the person (iii)\. [iii]
Nonetheless, the Constitution also elevates the Communist Party to be `the
only force leading the state and society, and the main factor determining
all successes of the Vietnamese revolution (iv)'\. [iv] Therefore, the CPV
is empowered to do whatever necessary to maintain its monopolistic position
and to stay above the people, whom it leads arbitrarily in the name of
socialism.
The Communist Party views itself as the sole `correct' authority
on all matters. Thus, the country's law is drafted to serve the CPV's
political objectives rather than to define the limits of government powers
and protect the citizens' fundamental rights. Furthermore, Hanoi's
implementation of its law collides violently with the legal spirit,
articulated by the elegantly-written statutes; the variance between the
regulations and the actual practice is enormous. The pretentious concepts
of liberty and democracy in Socialist Vietnam's legislations cannot bury the
deep contradiction between the proclaimed statutes and the Communist
authorities' misbehaviour.
The arbitrary power exercised by the CPV's law enforcers to
control the people's everyday life is so extraordinary that the Chief
Justice of Hanoi Municipal Court, Le Sau, has to concede there were
countless instances where the security cadres abuse their authority and
arrest people at will. The accused individuals are handcuffed, tortured and
forced into adopting the alleged crimes. Le Sau complains that `the
(cadres') practice prevails alarmingly' (v)\. [v] Minister of the Interior
Mai Chi Tho acknowledges in the official Communist Journal [1] [1] * that
`some' cases of unlawful arrest, detention and coercion do exist in spite of
legislative prohibitions (vi)\. [vi]
Within Socialist Vietnam's judicial system, the judges are
promoted in accordance with their political status rather than their
competence. In a conference on `legal works' in early 1993, Hanoi's Prime
Minister Vo Van Kiet publicly acknowledged that he `\.. knew that among the
judges, legal specialists, lawyers, prosecutors are many who received little
or no legal training at all'. Recently, Hanoi had set up a law school to
train `legal workers' in response to its economic and political
requirements; however, it was quickly exposed that the school's Dean (Le
Hai Thanh) and various instructors (Tran Hoang Hao, Pham Thi Hong Hoa)
secretly changed marks and even wrote the exams for various students, who
were senior party officials holding powerful government posts.
The role and number of lawyers in Socialist Vietnam are defined
and controlled `from above'. In Ho Chi Minh city, formerly Saigon with a
population of 4.5 million people, there are only 67 attorneys (1 per 67,164
persons) versus 7,000 lawyers for 7.5 million dwellers (1 per 1,071 persons)
in the city of Paris, France. Needless to say, the Communist lawyers
receive directives from the CPV before the commencement of all important
trials. A `people's pleader' does little more than asking the court for a
lenient sentence because the pleader is fully aware that the judgement has
been pre-determined, not by the judge but by the political official in
charge of the case\. Attorney Trieu Quoc Manh, Chairman of Ho Chi Minh
city's Bar, responded to a question on the people pleaders' attitude in
state-initiated trials: `In cases assigned by the Court, the lawyers usually
must act upon request and are not motivated because\... they already know
before hand the outcome of the trials. Therefore, the lawyers are not
interested and are somewhat reluctant...(vii)' [vii]
No trial in Socialist Vietnam lasts more than a few days in
spite of the seriousness of the offenses and the severity of the sentences.
The trial of religious leaders Tue Si and Tri Sieu (sentenced to death) and
that of political activist Doan Viet Hoat (incarcerated for 20 years) were
proceeded and completed within several working days. The incredible speed
of Hanoi's trial proceedings can be attributed to the idleness of defence
lawyers or so-called `people's pleaders', who never put forth the accused
persons' defence, let alone attempting to cross-examine the prosecution
witnesses.
In Socialist Vietnam, the people are entitled to neither liberty
nor democracy. And once they are arrested by the authorities, they receive
no independent legal advice. The detainees have no legal protection despite
that Hanoi's Criminal Code pronounces all accused individuals are `presumed
to be innocent until proven guilty'. The prisoners' fate is decided not by
the court but by the CPV officials, who would ensure that the judicial
system serves the Communists' ideological and personal interests and not the
citizens' rights.



Communist Control of Citizens

The CPV manipulates propaganda to hide its monopoly over the creation and
implementation of legislations to rule the people. Because the CPV
pretentiously possesses `dinh cao tri tue' (the supreme mind), it gives
itself the right to manoeuvre the law to achieve ideological goals and use
propaganda to further malicious objectives. Hanoi's propaganda has a
twofold purpose: (i) to portray Ho Chi Minh and the party as the only
supreme leadership throughout the nation's history and only the CPV can
`correctly' determine the direction for the country to follow, and (ii) to
manufacture and sustain an inherent enemy, be it an actual foe or an
imaginative adversary, on whom the party can place all the blames for its
incompetence.
Artists and writers, perceived to be `engineers of the human
soul' by the Communists, must act as an instrument for political control and
mass influence. Their principal job is to educate and instill in the people
the `correct' ideas which are defined by the party. Every conceivable
communication source - radio, television, publications, lectures, public
ads - is used to deliver news about `socialist victories' on all fronts to
the citizens. Hanoi's efforts are concentrated to invent and preserve the
CPV's invincible position in order to justify its absolute authority.
Hanoi monitors closely the movement and employment of all
citizens for security reasons. To see a friend outside one's residential
locality, the visitor must apply for a travel permit. To stay overnight at
a friend's place, prior approval must be obtained from the cadres who run
that region. Family gatherings must be pre-arranged with the local security
chief, who is more likely to ask for some `tien tra nuoc' (tea money).
One can be dismissed from his or her employment upon the
recommendation of the party's local cell, which spies on everybody.
Following the dismissal for being politically unreliable, one may be
prosecuted and tortured into admitting the fabricated `crime against the
state'. Those, who explicitly oppose the CPV's policies, face worse
consequences because the Communist Penal Code provides for sentences ranging
from 20-year incarceration to death for crimes against the party.
Through the state-managed Ho Khau (Family Food Portion
Certificate) system, Hanoi implements its food rationing policy as well as
controls the movement of all civilians. Without his or her name on a Ho
Khau, a person has no access to food and supply of necessities.
Furthermore, he or she is considered to be an outlaw and will be detained
automatically by the authorities. The Communist government pre-determines
how much food and basic necessities a family would get in accordance with
its political desire and the family's status vis-a-vis the party's scale of
loyalty. The cadres who decide how one's Ho Khau is affected by any new CPV
agenda are the local security commissars and the secret police officers.
Hanoi's security force forms a vital link between the party and
the general public. Through the armed cadres, the CPV effectively retains a
complete control over the entire population. Every citizen is watched and
his or her conduct is ranked regularly by the security commissars using
Hanoi's scales of reliability. One's entry into school or promotion at work
is dependent on his or her family background and whether he or she is a
member of the Youth Communist League or the CPV. Children and relatives of
those considered to be `enemies of the socialist regime' can hardly expect
to go very far in a country, whose government values loyalty to the
Communist party over professional competence.





Religious Repression

The Ho Khau system, mentioned previously, is also being used by Hanoi as an
instrument to oppress pious practitioners and restrict their mobility.
Monks and priests are monitored and their teachings are scrutinized. The
majority of faithful followers are banished from temples and churches. Many
well-known religious leaders such as Buddhist Monks Tue Si and Tri Sieu,
Catholic Priest Tran Dinh Thu are detained and enslaved in so-called
re-education camps, which over the years have held Novelist Doan Quoc Si,
Poet Nguyen Chi Thien, Writer Nguyen Manh Con, [2] * Dr\. Nguyen Dan Que,
[3] * and a large number of officials of the former Government of Republic
of Vietnam.
The Communist hostility towards religions is motivated by (i)
the belief in Marxism, a philosophy based on materialism that views the
spirituality of religions as an obstacle for the achievement of Communism,
and (ii) the institutional resistance to political demands nourished by
religious organizations, which represents an on-going concern for the
Communists.
Hanoi imposes a total control over all sources of religious
proselytization. Restrictions are placed on the publication and
distribution of religious literature, the training of monks and priests, the
construction of churches and pagodas, etc. Monks and priests are forced to
preach the official line and those, who refuse to provide `service to the
state', are directly or indirectly punished. Charges against religious
leaders have never been clarified, and the accused detainees are prevented
from having defence lawyers to act on their behalf.
Following the fall of South Vietnam in 1975, the Unified
Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV) was dissolved and Venerable Thich Huyen
Quang and Thich Quang Do, President and General Secretary of the UBCV
Institute for the Propagation of Buddhism respectively, were detained
indefinitely without trial\. [viii] Buddhist Monks and Scholars Tue Si and
Tri Sieu were sentenced to death for rejecting Communism as the only path
for human progress. Catholic Priests Tran Dinh Thu, Dinh Hoang Nang, Hoang
Si Quy, Tran Van Khuyen, Pham Tuc Tri, Do Minh Tam and many others had been
incarcerated for refusing to adopt the CPV's political view. Numerous
Hoa-Hao and Cao-Dai leaders were arrested and held captive for years without
any just cause.
Despite its oppressive measures towards religious followers,
Hanoi has failed to eliminate the people's belief in God. The more
restrictive the rules against pious practitioners are, the more people
become committed to their faith. The harsh methods undertaken by the
Communists to tyrannize religious leaders and followers could not, cannot
and will not abolish the populace's religious conviction.








Hanoi's Holocaust: Re-education Camps and Prisons

Re-education camps, in addition to the Communist prison system, have been
set up since 1954\. [ix] The raison d'etre of these camps is to provide
the CPV with a free labour force to develop the wilderness. The detainees
are worked to death in the harshest weather and labouring conditions that
one can imagine. While serving their indefinite sentences, the prisoners
cultivate undeveloped land during day time and face self-criticism and
indoctrination sessions at night. Their small individual food portion
consists of mostly manioc and some rice to help one barely survive the
never-ending starvation.
The writer's father, a former AFRV officer, tells many horrible
stories which he had witnessed during his lengthy experience in Hanoi's
re-education camps. Once in North Vietnam, several detainees were severely
punished for attempting to dig up and eat a dead animal. In another
instance, a hungry prisoner was brutally beaten by the Communist cadres for
swallowing sweat-potato leaves. Frogs, snakes and all other moving reptiles
around the camps disappeared rapidly as the demand for additional food by
the starving and dehumanized captives rose\. [4] *
Solitary confinement with meal reduction serves as a surest
death sentence for anyone, who disobeys the prison rules or steals raw
supplies to satisfy his or her desperate hunger. Other measures against
non-conformists and those, who fail in their attempted escape, include the
Number 8 handcuff, by which one's arms are twisted backward to the limits of
endurance and then handcuffed to a tree. The recaptured escapees might also
be ordered to re-act their plan in front of other prisoners, and the guards
would shoot to wound but carefully avoid killing them. Some seriously
injured detainees are tied to a pole in the camp's central field and left to
die without medicine or any kind of care. Others have the wounded parts on
their body amputated and are allowed to remain alive as terrifying examples
for the rest of the prisoners.
The narratives about the brutality of Hanoi's detention system
are beyond one's wildest imagination. Those responsible for such
dehumanizing condition and violent treatments are not the low-ranking prison
cadres but are members of the CPV Central Committee, who formulate and
implement Hanoi's ruthless policy concerning re-education camps and prisons.
How many people are being held in Hanoi's concentration camps?
The numbers range from a few thousands according to Hanoi's claim to 60,000
by Amnesty International's estimate to as high as 500,000 by the documented
calculation of Paris-based Vietnam Committee For Human Rights\. [x]
However, these figures do not expose the maltreatment experienced by
Vietnamese detainees everyday. The numbers only satisfy one's statistical
curiosity, but tell nothing about the cruelty that characterizes the CPV's
incarceration policy.
It is a common knowledge that many of those confined to
re-education camps are officials of the former Government of Republic of
Vietnam (GRV). A less familiar fact is that among those GRV men are
religious leaders, writers, poets, human rights and political activists,
leftist intellectuals, who returned to help building `the Revolution' but
became disorientated by the party's arbitrary practice, and Hanoi's former
soldiers.
Members of the Communist People's Army (PAV), who were captured
and then released by Saigon following the 1973 Paris `Peace' Agreement, had
been held captive by Hanoi in various concentration camps until at least
1975. The CPV suspected that its incarcerated infantrymen might have been
either influenced by the GRV's propaganda or exposed to the better life of
ordinary South Vietnamese. Thus, if they were set free to inform others
about their experience, they could endanger the Stalinist reign of terror in
the North. Consequently, upon their return from South Vietnam, the PAV
deportees were required to `serve socialism' in numerous isolated camps.
It should be noted also that, during the 1957-1975 war, Hanoi
maintained a secret policy to terminate its wounded regulars in order to
eliminate one of the many costly burdens for North Vietnam's economy. PAV
Colonel Cao Vinh Khanh [5] * and Commando Colonel Can told fellow companions
that the PAV's hospitals along the Ho Chi Minh trail were mined and those in
Dong Hoi, Vinh and Ha Tinh were decorated as military stations to attract
bombardment in order to liquidate the injured soldiers.
Imprisoned PAV Ship Commander Le Qui Bao, who passed away in a
concentration camp in Ha Giang, disclosed to other detainees that he
received a confidential directive to dump the wounded `coward' troops into
the high seas on his way back to North Vietnam after a shipment of arms to
the South. Bao was discharged and sent to jail for his failure to carry out
the order properly because he tried to save his cousin, who happened to be
among the injured `coward' regulars. Ironically, unaware of the CPV's
deceitful tactics and evil ploys, anti-war activists unconsciously praised
Hanoi's Marxist leaders as gentle champions of liberty and justice.







Economic Proscription

One of the CPV's first official polices dealt with land reform. As soon as
HCM and his comrades received sufficient support from Maoist China, they
started an agrarian redistribution campaign that lasted from 1952 to 1956
and resulted in mass persecutions and executions. The strategic objective
of Hanoi's land reform program was to achieve political monopoly for the
CPV, instead of economic betterment; and, its ultimate goal was not to
equalize land ownership to advance public welfare but to pauperize the
masses, forcing them to join state-run agricultural cooperatives or
kolkhozes. The dire consequence of this campaign was the perpetual food
shortage in North Vietnam.
After World War II, approximately 90 percent of North Vietnamese
farmers cultivated their own ranch and nearly all the northern tilled land
was owned by small holders. Even Moscow's estimates admitted that, in 1956,
there were almost 4.8 million acres of land divided among the 2.29 million
farmers in North Vietnam\. [xi] Furthermore, the departure of 900,000
people for the South to escape Communist terror in 1954 made available at
least 1 million privately-owned acres, which could be redistributed to the
landless minority to minimize the scarcity problem faced by a relatively
small number of peasants. Therefore, Hanoi's land reform campaign was only
a political move to help the party gain its absolute control of North
Vietnam. By becoming members of state-run kolkhozes, the masses placed
themselves under the CPV's direct rule.
Hanoi's political aim in the agrarian redistribution project was
twofold: (i) to destroy those who occupied the higher positions in society,
be they poor intellectuals or prosperous farmers, in order to prevent all
potential outbreaks under their leadership in the future and to bend the
people's resistance will into submission, and (ii) to force all farmers to
join the CPV-managed agricultural cooperatives in which private
landownership would be terminated and, therefore, the party would become the
sole landlord. In the aftermath, the Communists would dominate virtually
all aspects of life in North Vietnam.
The CPV's land revision program was first tested and refined in
several isolated areas in northern Vietnam from 1952 to 1953\. [xii] The
brutal methods used against landowners in those initial sub-projects
terrified many farmers, who later fled to South Vietnam with their
nightmarish tales. The full implementation plan was prepared during 1955
and executed in 1956 under the leadership of Truong Chinh, the CPV's General
Secretary at the time. Self-appointed President Ho Chi Minh signed the Land
Reform Act on June 14, 1955 with the following highlights:

(i) Expropriating without compensation all properties and farming
equipments of `progressive' individuals and landowners in spite of their
past contribution to the resistance [against the French] (Chapter II, Part
II, Section 4), and all properties and farming equipments belonging to
religious groups such as the Buddhists and Catholics (Chapter II, Part IV,
Sections 9 and 10).

(ii) The classification of landowners for expropriation purposes was to be
determined arbitrarily by the People's Courts in spite of the (victims')
actual wealth (Chapter IV, Part III, Sections 35 and 36). The Kangaroo
courts could sentence to death even without any real evidence to
substantiate the allegations against the accused, whose right to the service
of a defence lawyer and a fair trial was denied.

The land reform cadres, instructed by Peking-trained Ho Viet
Thang, treated the accused landowners and their family members ruthlessly.
These Communist agents encouraged and pressured the landless minority to
invent unfounded crimes against the targeted landowners, who would be
arrested and tortured into admitting the alleged offenses. The victims'
relatives were socially isolated and confined to their houses where many
died of starvation.
The People's Courts, run by the land reform cadres, would try
to find every possible way to hand down the most severe punishments. Those
victims, who were condemned to death, could be shot, drowned, buried alive,
or left in the hot sun to dehydrate to death without food or water. To Huu,
the CPV's most prominent poet, praised the senseless murders in his `The
October Song' poem as follows: [xiii]



`... Still promise with the darling Red soldier
- Kill, kill more, the hand would not be let to rest
For the farm, good rice, quick collection of taxes,
For the party's long life,
together (we) match with the same heart
Worship Chairman Mao, worship Stalin long live...'

[Italic added]

Displaced CPV Politburo member Hoang Van Hoan revealed that, during the land
reform period and thereafter, prisons mushroomed everywhere to hold
landowners and so-called anti-revolutionaries\. [xiv] While Ho Chi Minh
acknowledged that approximately 10,000 people were wrongly executed, a
classified report in the Prime Minister Office in Hanoi put the number at
15,000\. [xv]
Confidential information provided by CPV's high-ranking
officials, who took part in the bloody campaign, divulged that the death
toll was as high as 160,000\. [xvi] Professor Nguyen Van Canh interviewed
many Hanoi's regulars and political commissars, who defected to South
Vietnam, and estimated that at least 160,000 civilians were killed along
with 40,000 cadres, who were considered by the CPV to be politically
unreliable\. [xvii]
To counteract Hanoi's violent land reform measures, ordinary
farmers rebelled in many areas. One of several well-documented revolts was
the famed uprising in Nghe An, Ho Chi Minh's birthplace. The farmers in
Nghe An forcibly detained the local security cadres and assembled to storm
the provincial capital of Vinh. In response, the CPV deployed the People
Army's 325th Division to suppress the rebellion. Hanoi's regulars brutally
executed almost six thousand men, women and children in that single event\.
[xviii]
To contain the resistance movement and prevent further clashes
between the people and Communist officials, in November 1956, Ho Chi Minh
publicly apologized to the North Vietnamese for the `mistakes committed by
the cadres'. Although the CPV leaders and `Uncle Ho' were responsible for
formulating and implementing the land reform program, they were sinless.
All the crimes, which arose from the CPV bosses' malicious schemes, were
dumped on the lowest-ranking cadres. Earlier on July 1, 1956, in a letter
asking party members to evaluate their performance, HCM praised the bloody
campaign overwhelmingly: `\... due to the correct policy of the party and
the government, due to the farmers' active participation, the land reform
campaign achieved a great success: the landowner class was overthrown, the
Party's local cells were purified, etc., and the cadres themselves were
tested, trained...' [xix] [Bold added]
The so-called `mistakes' of the land revision program were
linked tenuously to CPV General-Secretary Truong Chinh and his assistants.
However, none of the accused officials was ever prosecuted for the senseless
killings. Truong Chinh resigned from his post but remained as member of the
Politburo. In 1986, he was reinstated by the party to his previous
General-Secretary position. Ho Viet Thang, the cruel land reform cadres'
mentor, was promoted to become Deputy Minister of Agriculture and later
retired as member of the CPV Central Committee. In the aftermath, there
were only victims of the appalling land redistribution campaign but no
perpetrators. And, overall, the Communist Party got what it initially set
out to achieve from the land reform program - a complete control of all
aspects of life in North Vietnam.
As a result of their agrarian redistribution project, the
Marxists were able to consolidate their totalitarian power in the North.
Such political absolutism permitted Hanoi to manoeuvre all resources of
North Vietnam to attack the South in 1957. Once the CPV took over Vietnam's
last non-Marxist territory in 1975, a similar land reform policy was
implemented. Direct pressure was placed on the South Vietnamese landowners
to forfeit their private farms, while all properties belonging to the
alleged `enemies of the state' were expropriated and transferred into the
hands of party officials. In addition, thousands of checkpoints were set up
to restrict the commercial flow of food and goods in the country as well as
to stop anti-Communist news in one area from spreading to other regions.
The dire consequence of Hanoi's agrarian policy, as
aforementioned, is the constant food shortage. Despite the shocking
realities of insufficiency in staple food grains, the CPV continues to seize
rice for export to earn hard currency. Within the month of May 1988, while
CPV members celebrated their success in selling rice overseas, the official
newspaper Nhan Dan (People's Daily) and Radio Hanoi described the food
shortage situation in Vietnam as `extremely serious'. Many families in Bac
Thai, Binh Tri Thien, Ha Nam Ninh, Thanh Hoa, etc., lived on little or no
food at all.
Even in Nghe Tinh, birthplace of Ho Chi Minh and the 1930 cruel
Soviet movement, the people had suffered from starvation. AFP reported on
May 13, 1988 that the citizens of Thanh Hoa had to flee to other cities to
beg for their daily meals. Some provinces in North Vietnam were without
sufficient grains to feed the local people, and as many as 20 million
children under the age of five experienced illnesses resulted from eating
sub-standard food\. [xx] In July 1988, a study by UNICEF concluded that
nearly 30 million Vietnamese children under the age of 15 would become
victims of malnutrition - the direct consequence of Hanoi's economic
proscription\. [xxi]
Other politically-motivated economic measures taken by the CPV
include the creation of New Economic Zones (NEZs) and the food rationing
system, also known as the Ho Khau system. The NEZs are located in
undeveloped regions, where the new arrivers must try to cultivate the land
with virtually no assistance from the Communist government. Who are those
pioneers? Most of them have been city dwellers, who are detrimentally
misled by Hanoi's false assurance of a better life in rural areas.
The living conditions in the isolated NEZs are unbearable.
Without the necessary equipments which are promised but never delivered by
the authorities, the new comers could not clear the land of trees in order
to farm. Life becomes worse after a few months when the official food
supply is reduced and the new arrivers are required to survive on their own.
Since the NEZs were first set up, many pioneers had died from
malnutrition, disease and other dangers of the wilderness. A large number
of people returned to the cities, only to find out that their homes had been
occupied by party officials. Eventually, most former NEZ families ended up
living on city sidewalks and doing odd and disgraceful jobs.
Before the 1957-75 war, South Vietnam produced, on an average,
470 kg of rice per capita versus the Marxist North's harvest of about 180 kg
per capita. Just after the Communist takeover of the South, the entire
country's per capita production of paddy approximated 350 kg. A decade
later in 1985, the country's rice production per capita dropped to 304 kg
and, in 1987, this figure fell again to 280 kg\. [xxii] At the present
economic climate, there is no sight of recovery yet.
As rice and other necessities grew more scarce, speculation
became more serious and fuelled the fires of inflation. In early 1987, the
annual inflation rate rose to 300% and, by the end of the following year,
the rate was in the 700%-1000% range. Inflation has come down recently but
still remains in the double-digit range.
In addition to the rampant inflation, the economic picture of
Socialist Vietnam is worsened by the climbing unemployment figure. Only 26
million people of the country's 32-million workforce have full-time jobs\.
[xxiii] With the current collapse of many state-run companies, the
unemployment rate has moved well above the 18.75% mark.
In the West, democratically-elected governments can be brought
down by dissatisfied voters, who experience economic chaos with an upward
consumer price index. In Socialist Vietnam, at gunpoint, the people must
accept and endure the sky-high cost of living and, at the same time, are
obligated to publicly praise the CPV's leadership. Any complainer shall be
branded as `counter-revolutionary' or `enemy of the state' and forcibly
re-educated in Hanoi's penitentiary.
The economic fiascos of Socialist Vietnam are not the result of
the U.S\. embargo, as Hanoi and its apologists try to portray. Socialist
Vietnam's universal poverty is created by the CPV's ideological path and
incompetent leadership\. [6] * The country's economic objectives are
defined by senior party officials, who draw up plans to reflect their own
political ambition. The Communists, guided by their own power-oriented
concept of economic planning, seek to retain a total control over economic
resources and means of production. `Unauthorized' private enterprises are
monitored closely and can be shut down quickly.
Due to the CPV's short-term vision and unstable policies, the
people have no confidence in the socialist economic system. The masses
refocus their attention from production to pretention, and their most
efficient time is spent on arranging private deals behind the CPV officials'
backs. Consequentially, the national economy declines and reaches the verge
of collapse. The economy also deteriorates as a result of the people's
discontent with the Communist system of government. The populace's
opposition to the CPV's political monopoly, taking the form of
non-cooperation, will continue to demolish the already retarded economic
foundation.





Vietnamese Children and the Communist Indoctrination

Schools provide a vital environment for the CPV to select and train its
future cadres. Therefore, the education system is centrally planned,
centrally directed and centrally controlled. In Socialist Vietnam, children
are taught to reject traditional family values and to adopt Marxist ideals.
They are `cultivated' to devote to Communism, to portray an implacable
attitude towards the party-defined enemies, and to report and eliminate
potential counter-revolutionaries. The party seeks ways to deprive
individual families of all authority and cohesion and to implant in the
youth the seeds of ideological hatred.
Every child is obligated to take political science courses in
which Communism is decorated with myths of grand successes and capitalism is
painted with chronic failures. Vietnamese youngsters are instructed to
praise Hanoi's initiatives, regardless how inhuman the tactics are, and to
denounce all non-socialist alternatives. The official history of Vietnam is
full of ideological lies, while all non-Marxist achievements are buried or
discussed lightly as unimportant.
Students in Socialist Vietnam are classified in accordance with
their `family political status'. The children of party members and
prospects receive special merit points on their application to school or job
openings. Management positions in all companies are reserved for graduates
belonging to the exclusive club of party loyalists. Those children, whose
parents or relatives are considered to be bourgeois or anti-Communist, are
subject to sanction in every field.
Furthermore, Hanoi's economic fiascos have led to the universal
poverty that prevents many children from going to school and removes the
stigma from stealing, prostitution, and other illicit activities. The
Communist path dehumanizes Vietnamese youth and attacks all traditional
values. The roots of morality decay gradually as a result of Hanoi's
repressive manoeuvres in education.
The CPV's education policy turns out undereducated children who
show no respect for their parents and teachers. In a public commentary
published in Ho Chi Minh city in December 1991, author Ly Chanh Trung
conceded: `Today, \... words like "thank (you)", "(I) apologize" almost
disappear from everyday usage, the children's welcome expressions and
respect for guests cease to exist in a number of regions: these are signs of
worry for our culture...' Trung concluded: `the (present) culture declines
because education is degraded. And education is degraded not only because
while we teach students many things, (we) forget to teach them (good)
manners, but also because teachers in our society are not respected...'
[xxiv]
The Communists' destruction of morality and family bond along
with their discriminatory policies on education and employment will have
many negative effects on Vietnam's future. While children of neighbouring
states are learning technical and managerial skills, Hanoi's ideological
practice takes away from Vietnamese youth the opportunity to develop
necessary abilities to compete in the coming years. The immediate adverse
product of the Communist approach to education is a lost generation equipped
with political fantasies, but without valuable knowledge to build the
nation. The future of Vietnam looks extremely bleak unless the existing
system of government is transformed fundamentally - and quickly.




The CPV's Institutionalized Corruption

Before the fall of South Vietnam in 1975, anti-war idealist Frances
FitzGerald wrote in her book Fire in the Lake that `\... the movement has
arrived for the narrow flame of revolution to cleanse the lake of Vietnamese
society from the corruption and disorder of the American war...' The
current realities of Socialist Vietnam expose the naivete of this alien
view. Hanoi's grand-scale corruption defeats the leftist prediction that an
utopian society would be created by the Communists after the war.
The CPV's faithful members have only one collective
objective -to crush all opposition forces which challenge the party's
absolute authority. Beside this common objective, however, different party
members possess different self-enrichment goals. Former CPV
half-perestroika General-Secretary Nguyen Van Linh blames the corrupt cadres
for Hanoi's chronic failures. He angrily condemns low-ranking party
members, but not the CPV leaders, for `betraying' Marxist ideals and for:
[xxv]
`... alienating from the masses, disassociating themselves from
realities, adopting haughty attitude towards the people, and boastfully
displaying revolutionary optimism. (These cadres) know only how to spend
the whole day writing one directive after another, burying themselves in
piles of papers, or walking from one conference room to another to issue
orders while separating themselves from realities. They may know only how
to talk rhetorically and boastfully about abstract theories on revolution or
about Communist ideals without being able to handle any real, specific
issues.'
Linh deliberately avoids to acknowledge that the cadres only act
on the orders from the Politburo, which is run by Linh and other
high-ranking officials. He should realize that to be blamed are the
backward policies, the institutionalized corruption, and the socialist
system of government created by his predecessors, but not the ignorant
cadres who know only to follow the Politburo's directives.
Even Hanoi's faithful supporters have to admit that many of the
critical problems have deep roots in the Communist system and are beyond the
CPV's control\. [xxvi] However, they blindly accuse the `new generation'
cadres for all the economic and political chaos resulting from Hanoi's
systematic corruption. These `progressive' leftists forget that senior
party officials like Ho Chi Minh, Pham Van Dong, Le Duan, Nguyen Van Linh
and many others also maintain lavish life styles with beautiful houses,
personal yachts, chauffeured limousines, etc.
The Vietnamese Marxists possess no cleaner hands than those of
their ideological comrades elsewhere. East German Politburo members enjoyed
luxurious villas in Wandlitz. While Prime Minister Willi Stoph kept a
personalized tropical garden, General-Secretary Honecker owned seven racing
cars along with his Jaguars and Mercedes. The building at 37 Mlade Gardy
street in Prague was a distribution centre supplying at nominal prices vast
amounts of valuable goods, mostly imported items including expensive fur
coats and jewellery, to the Czechoslovakian Marxists.
In Poland, hundreds of thousands of dollars had been removed
quietly from the National Treasury by 171 former Communist bosses. In
socialist Hungary, Defence Minister Czinege took cash and men from the army
to build a villa and a vacation home for his family. Bulgaria's Zhivkov
constructed 33 buildings for his personal enjoyment and inscribed his name
as author on more than 50 books written by someone else. Rumania's Nicolae
Ceaucescu maintained 80 villas, 23 of which were heated all year round, for
his own use. His wife, Elena with a grade 5 education, was praised as one
of the most prominent Chemists and, thus, was installed as head of the
National Council of Science.
Back to Vietnam, CPV founder Ho Chi Minh was `re-created' to be
the greatest poet in Vietnam's history and the only great leader of the
people. HCM lived in a guarded home surrounded by a beautifully designed
garden and a man-made lake. Similar to Bulgaria's Zhivkov, HCM placed his
name on the stolen collection of poems `Gulag Diary' and jealously praised
himself in at least two books\. [xxvii]
Long-time comrades of HCM, deceased General-Secretary Le Duan
owned a huge yacht, while Prime Minister Pham Van Dong kept a group of
servants to care for his tropical garden and a bunch of rare dogs. Other
CPV leaders such as Nguyen Huu Tho, Nguyen Van Linh, new hard-line
General-Secretary Do Muoi and their family members maintain bottomless
spending accounts and have access to privileged stores reserved for
high-ranking party officials and selected foreigners. Recently, in
recognition of the Communist worldwide collapse, Nguyen Huu Tho's family and
others are reportedly beginning to transfer their assets abroad. Strangely,
they prefer the capitalist city of lights (Paris) over the former Marxist
heavenly capital (Moscow).
While the CPV's top leaders secretly remove large amounts of
money from the country's treasury, lower-raking party members nakedly rob
the already pauperized masses by using a network of sophisticated methods,
which consisted of tax regulations, key money, paper work charge, special
service fee, protection levy for private businesses, and the so-called
project `freedom for sale', etc. The list of CPV members' illegal and
immoral activities is endless. To fully understand the depth of the CPV's
institutionalized corruption, one needs to spend countless hours to review
all available documents and eyewitnesses' reports. The following paragraphs
will describe only some of the most obvious cases, which were acknowledged
by Radio Hanoi and various state-run newspapers.
Key money and `extra fees' constitute a blatant fact of life in
Socialist Vietnam. Without paying the undeclared levies to open the
invisible bureaucratic doors, one's request can be buried forever in
stockpile of applications awaiting to be sent to storage rooms. Recently,
high-ranking CPV members have also jumped into this area of corrupt
activities in a big way. They have set up private consultation offices
under different names right beside various government departments to provide
`speedy services', naturally, at a stiff price. Within the Communist
system, money helps one get to places.
For licensed private businesses, the government tax collectors
possess the most fearsome weapon - their discretion to set the levy. The
monthly tax rate always moves upward. One does not know how the past
calculations were made or how to compute the following month's levy. It
appears that the local tax officials derive the collection objective in
accordance with their superiors' personal goals and their own needs, rather
than any pre-set standard.
Two major systematic approaches to extracting money from the
general public are the project `freedom for sale' and the smuggling network.
The former approach, sponsored by the CPV Politburo, is applied differently
in various regions throughout the country. To flee Socialist Vietnam, the
people themselves can organize illegal exits. However, the escapees would
face severe punishment if they are captured by the security cadres.
A large number of expatriates feel safer to leave the country
via Hanoi's official or semi-official routes. The price to use these
protected routes ranges from $1,700 (U.S.) to $5,000 (U.S.) per person\.
[xxviii] Hanoi's Ministry of the Interior and Ministry of Finance directly
monitor the execution of this scheme, which is dubbed as project `freedom
for sale'. During the initial phase of the plan, it is estimated that the
CPV leaders had obtained roughly $115 million (U.S.) in 1978 alone. In that
year, this amount is equivalent to 2.5% of Socialist Vietnam's Gross
National Product\. [xxix]
Regarding the second means to earn `extra enrichment', a
sophisticated smuggling network has been developed by the Communist army and
navy commanders in several military zones. Tuan Tin Tuc (Weekly News),
published in Ho Chi Minh city, described that many smugglers were escorted
by armed soldiers driving trucks and motorcycles\. [xxx] Within the first
six months of 1990, $16 million (U.S.) worth of contraband goods were flown
to the southwest provinces under military protection. In the same period,
250 major smuggling activities under the supervision of high-ranking party
members valued at hundreds of thousands of U.S\. dollars took place in
Hanoi. In 1992, it is estimated that nearly 4,000 incidence involving
contraband goods occurred in Ho Chi Minh city. This number represents a 46%
jump in comparison to the statistics for 1991\. [xxxi]
In the past few years, many CPV officials have also entered the
private business arena by sponsoring giant companies such as Thanh Huong
Perfume Co., Dai Thanh Co., Imexco, Andaco, Cidec, Saho, Xacogiva, Covina,
or development banks such as Gia Dinh Savings Centre, Thanh Cong Savings or
Hoa Cuong Trust. These well-connected operations borrowed millions of
dollars from the state and accepted large deposits from the populace in
return for unsubstantiated promises of high returns.
After several years in business, these companies and banks would
declare heavy losses to write off capital and, in worse cases, they could
become defunct in order to avoid repaying their monetary liabilities. While
the list of those who lost their life savings is extensive, there is
virtually no official investigation or report as to how the funds
disappeared or which government department should be held accountable.
Again, there are only victims but no perpetrators.
In August 1991, the City Security Cadres News disclosed that
`... to March 1991, there were 2,597 serious cases of corruption involving
4,593 individuals and including 1,668 party officials, public servants, 4
Bureau Chiefs and Vice-Chiefs, 49 high-ranking Chair persons, Vice-Chair
persons, 28 Directors, General Managers, 261 Managers, and 202 Chief
Accountants of state-run companies and departments...' [xxxii]
Hanoi's institutionalized corruption is deeply rooted in the
Communist system and involves very powerful party officials. Noticeable are
Tran Trung Hieu, Deputy Minister of Forestry, who caused a loss of $185,000
(U.S.) in a country where a medical doctor earns less than $1,000\. (U.S.)
annually; Tran Kim Anh, Head of the National Reserve Bureau, who traded
56,000 tons of rice `irregularly'; Hoang Van Van, Director General of To
Lich Company owned by the Fatherland Front, who defrauded seven Savings
Funds in Hanoi and stole $220,000 (U.S.); Nguyen Tai Tuan, Vice-Director of
Ha Son Binh province's Bank of State Commerce (Ngan hang cong thuong), who
received more than $150,000 (U.S.) in kickback for illegal activities; Dinh
Chi Tien, Director of the Incorporated Bank (Ngan hang co phan) of Thai Binh
province, who received $40,000 (U.S.) through back door and, in return,
authorized the write-offs of more than $300,000 (U.S.) in the bank's assets.
These are just some of the many obvious cases which cannot be hidden from
the general public. Therefore, the CPV decides to broadcast them to prove
that it is trying to deal with its own depravity.
Hanoi's widespread corruption also helps to fuel the black
market. With party officials' protection, contraband goods exist everywhere
and consist of small items such as foreign cigarettes to major merchandise
such as colour televisions and automobiles. At a conference on illegal
goods held on December 2, 1991 in Ho Chi Minh city, the delegates complained
that many security cadres were `turned' into eyes and ears for the dealers
and then became smugglers themselves.
It was revealed that the traffickers knew `people' in high
places and were too powerful for the local administrations to cope with. A
representative from Qui Nhon city told others that, recently, his men
arrested a commercial ship selling contraband merchandise in his region.
But before the detained smugglers could be brought to trial, his office
received a directive `from above' ordering their release without any
condition. Not too long after that incidence, the Qui Nhon authorities
captured another ship trading illegal goods valued at $100,000 (U.S.).
Again, there was another directive `from above' requesting the local
administration to let the smugglers walk free. Overall, it was assessed
that only 10% of the contraband deals were caught. Among that 10%, only 1%
of the cases were `resolved'\. [xxxiii]
For those who are tenuously connected to the party, stealing
from work is the only viable alternative to smuggling in order to adequately
provide for their dependents. Hanoi's journalists continue to wonder why
state-run factories have turned out only poor products, despite countless
reports of `great' successes. In searching for the cause, these
government-paid `media workers' fail to `look at the truth in the face' as
their former half-perestroika General-Secretary Nguyen Van Linh recommends.
If the Marxist journalists `look at the truth in the face', they
can figure out easily that both factory managers and workers collude for
their own benefits. Products of good quality rarely get to state
distribution centres but are plentiful on the black market at hefty prices.
Equipments and machines do not break down as often as reported, the parts
are simply removed for sale elsewhere to other government employees, who
search for replacement components.
Moreover, the recycled parts bought on the black market cost
much lower than the prices quoted on the bills submitted for reimbursement.
There is little that the CPV leaders, who are themselves corrupt, can do to
rectify the problem. To remove those who steal from work is to paralyse
state-run companies and, consequently, the already retarded economy.
As mentioned earlier, the above examples are only a few of many
stories about Hanoi's systematic corruption. A complete study of this
serious topic requires dedicated efforts and is beyond the scope of this
book. An effective solution to end the existing institutionalized
corruption involves the democratization of Vietnam's system of government
and the liberalization of its economy.


Notes 1

[1] * Tap Chi Cong San .
[2] * Tortured to death in prison.
[3] * Dr\. Nguyen Dan Que is currently serving 20 years in Hanoi's
penitentiary for demanding democratic reforms in Socialist Vietnam.
[4] * Hanoi's cruelty furthers the people's compassion for the
detainees. In 1979, at an in-transit stop at the Central Train Station in
Ho Chi Minh city, the writer's father and his imprisoned friends were
surrounded by hundreds of patrons and merchants. The people gave the
prisoners free food and cigarettes. When the security cadres blocked their
contact, the merchants continued to throw breads and drinks over the head of
the Communist cadres to the detainees. A few pedicab drivers asked various
prisoners, including the writer's father, for their residential addresses,
then they voluntarily drove around the city to inform the detainees' family
members that the captive men were still alive in Hanoi's jail.
[5] * Brother-in-law of the PAV's Division General Le Quang Hoa.
[6] * 80 percent of the Communist Politburo members did not finish
high school, and only 5 percent of them had done some post-secondary
studies.



Notes 2

[i] \. i\. Nguyen Van Canh with Earle Cooper, Vietnam Under Communism
1975-1982, Hoover Institution Press, Stanford University, Stanford, 1983,
p.150\. [Hereinafter referred to as Nguyen Van Canh]
[ii] \. ii. Ho Ngoc Nhuan, Some Suggestions to the National Assembly, Tuoi
Tre Chu Nhat, December 8, 1991.
[iii] iii\. iii\. Socialist Republic of Vietnam's 1980 Constitution,
Articles 67, 68, 69 and 70.
[iv] \. iv. Ibid., Article 4.
[v] \. v. Nhan Dan (People's Daily), February 26, 1987.
[vi] . vi. Tap Chi Cong San (Communist Journal), December 1988 Volume.
[vii] \. vii. Tuoi Tre Chu Nhat, No.36, September 15, 1991.
[viii] \. viii. Many religious protests have been recorded in details by
witnesses at the scene. For instance, on November 2, 1975, twelve Buddhist
monks doused their clothes with gasoline and set themselves on fire at Duoc
Duc Pagoda in Can Tho to call world attention to Hanoi's inhuman practices.
However, their death did not make the front page of any newspaper.
[ix] \. ix\. Tran Nhu, survivor of Hanoi's dehumanizing prison system,
provides an excellent insight into the complex network of concentration
camps and the hardship experienced by the detainees in The Prison System in
North Vietnam, Vietnam Committee For Human Rights, Paris 1985.
[x] . x. Vietnam Today, Vietnam Committee For Human Rights, Paris 1985.
[xi] \. xi. V.P\. Karamiychev, Zemledeliye, Moscow, October 1957.
[xii] \. xii. Ho Chi Minh, Supra, Lam Thanh Liem, Chinh Sach Cai Cach
Ruong Dat cua Ho Chi Minh: Sai Lam hay Toi Ac? (Ho Chi Minh's Land Reform
Policy: Mistake or Crime?), p.182.
[xiii] \. xiii. Excerpt from To Huu's poem `The October Song':
`... Con hen voi anh Hong Quan yeu quy
- Giet, giet nua, ban tay khong phut nghi
Cho ruong dong, lua tot, thue mau xong,
Cho dang ben lau, cung rap buoc chung long
Tho Mao chu tich, tho Xit ta lin bat diet...'
[xiv] \. xiv\. Hoang Van Hoan, Supra, pp.359-367.
[xv] \. xv\. Vietnamese leftist intellectual Vo Nhan Tri, living in France,
came upon the report while doing research on the book Croissance economique
de la Republique democratique du Vietnam upon Hanoi's request.
[xvi] \. xvi\. Ho Chi Minh, Supra, Lam Thanh Liem, p.208.
[xvii] \. xvii. Nguyen Van Canh, Nong Dan Bac Viet nhung nam 1945-1970,
Northern Vietnamese Farmers from 1945 to 1970, ACSAV, Centre for Vietnamese
Studies 1987\. [Hereinafter referred to as Nguyen Van Canh]
[xviii] \. xviii Bernard Fall provides a good cover of this sorrowful
clash in The Two Vietnam, Frederick A\. Praeger 1967.
[xix] \. xix. Ho Chi Minh Toan Tap [1954-1957] (Ho Chi Minh Collection
[1954-1957]), Hanoi 1987, pp.460-461.
[xx] . xx. Radio Hanoi, May 15 and 16, 1988. On May 15, 1988, Radio
Hanoi read an article entitled May in Uncle Ho's Birthplace from the
People's Daily (Nhan Dan) describing the grave situation of the people
living in Nghe Tinh, birthplace of Ho Chi Minh, in the year that the CPV was
preparing to celebrate its founder's centennial birthday.
Foreign sources indicated that the situation was worse than
what was disclosed by Hanoi. For examples, AFP reported on May 13, 1988
that citizens of Thanh Hoa had to flee to the cities to beg for food.
Beijing's radio broadcast reported that people in some northern provinces
were without sufficient food for months (May 13 and 24, 1988).
[xxi] \. xxi\. U.N.I.C.E.F., July 20, 1988.
[xxii] \. xxii. Report to the Council of Ministers by Hanoi's Premier Vo
Van Kiet, Nhan Dan (People's Daily), June 28, 1988.
[xxiii] . xxiii. Nhan Dan (People's Daily), July 5, 1988.
[xxiv] \. xxiv. Ly Chanh Trung, An Abnormal Phenomenon, Tuoi Tre Chu Nhat,
No.48, December 8, 1991.
[xxv] \. xxv. Nguyen Van Linh, Speech at the CPV Central Committee Fifth
Plenum.
[xxvi] \. xxvi. See Huynh Kim Khanh, Revolution at an Impasse, Vietnam:
Facing the 1990s, University of Toronto - York University Joint Centre for
Asia Pacific Studies 1989.
[xxvii] \. xxvii. Le Huu Muc, Ho Chi Minh Khong Phai La Tac Gia Cua
Nguc-Trung-Ky (Ho Chi Minh Is Not the Author of the Gulag Diary), Lang Van,
Toronto 1991.
In this valuable study, Scholar Le Huu Muc provides an
anatomy of the obvious contradictions between the timing of the poems and
HCM's reported jail terms as well as the elegant Chinese writing techniques
used in the poems and HCM's poor knowledge of Chinese literature.
[xxviii] \. xxviii. 4.84 oz (or 4 taels) to 14.52 oz (or 12 taels) of pure
gold at U.S.$350 per ounce.
[xxix] \. xxix. Nguyen Van Canh, Supra, p.128.
[xxx] \. xxx. Bao Tuan Tin Tuc (Weekly News), No.43, October 27, 1990.
[xxxi] \. xxxi. Sai Gon Giai Phong (Liberated Saigon News), December 23,
1992.
[xxxii] \. xxxii. Bao Cong An Thanh Pho (City Security Cadres News),
August 10, 1991.
[xxxiii] \. xxxiii. Tuoi Tre Chu Nhat, No.48, December 8, 1991.