Đối Thoại Website: Doi-Thoai.com Email: toasoandoithoai@yahoo.com
|
Ðằng Vân: Is PM Nguyen Tan Dung Really a Lawyer? |
Point of View
Week Ending 29 October 2006
In the aftermath of the 10th Congress of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) from 18-25 April this year when the CPV effectively chose, on behalf of the people the entire top leadership of the nation, news were leaked out that the new PM Nguyen Tan Dung was, if not a trained lawyer, then at least academically qualified in law.
Given the fact that political leaders in advanced democratic nations the like of Australia and America have a tendency to be lawyers (such as current Australian PM John Howard or former US President Bill Clinton), such news were greeted with some hope in certain quarters of the Vietnamese population, both inside Vietnam and overseas. The hope was that, perhaps as a lawyer, the new PM would be more educated, more observant of the rule of law and would move the nation forward to consolidate the rule of law as understood by the rest of human kind.
Certainly there were many people in the population who had more experience with the CPV, its system of education and its concept of a socialist version of the rule of law. These people warned that any optimism might be premature because they had question-marks relative to Nguyen Tan Dung’s legal qualifications. How can the PM study law while fighting guerilla warfare in South Vietnam? Which university did he attend? Isn’t it the convention among top CPV cadres to be granted “university degrees” regardless of their academic deficiencies?
These people also warned that PM Nguyen Tan Dung is foremost a policeman, not in the normal sense of the word like an Australian or US policeman whose duty is to uphold the law, but in the sense that he is a secret police boss whose real duty is to suppress all dissent and consolidate the dictatorship of the CPV.
Despite these dire warnings, some people continued to be hopeful until recently, when the new PM displayed his true colors by ordering a series of harassments, arrests and detentions of dissidents both local and overseas.
Doi- Thoai Online is awash with such typical news and cries for help from dissidents.
Despite his alleged legal qualifications, PM Nguyen Tan Dung appears to be completely oblivious to the very clear provisions of the current constitution of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam itself.
The following rights and freedoms have been clearly enshrined in the constitution and violated by PM Nguyen Tan Dung:
While article 68 of the said constitution provides that:
”The citizen shall enjoy freedom of movement and of residence within the
country; he can freely travel abroad and return home from abroad in accordance
with the provisions of the law.”
Under the stewardship of PM Nguyen Tan Dung, on 25 October, Lawyer Nguyen Van Dai and Mr. Luong Duy Phuong were refused permission to exit from Vietnam to attend a Christian Lawyers Conference in India for “national security reasons”. No further explanations were given by the police.
In addition, the fact that the Rafto International Human Rights Award has been granted to the Most Venerable Thich Quang Do, General Secretary of the United Vietnam Buddhist Congregation on 21 September 2006, is an occasion for joy for the whole Vietnamese people both inside Vietnam and overseas. Yet, the flat refusal by the CPV regime under PM Nguyen Tan Dung, to guarantee the Most Venerable’s safe return to Vietnam, once he was overseas to receive the award, effectively prevented him from attending the award ceremony in Norway.
Furthermore on 25 October 2006 Amnesty international have completed a report on suppression of freedom of expression by the Vietnamese CPV through restricting access to the internet via harassment, arrest and detention of peaceful internet dissidents.
Aren’t the above actions of Nguyen Tan Dung’s government direct violations of article 68 of the constitution? Or is the PM not a real lawyer and could not understand the literal wording of such constitution?
While article 69 clearly provides that:
”The citizen shall enjoy freedom of
opinion and speech, freedom of the press, the right to be informed, and the
right to assemble, form associations and hold demonstrations in accordance with
the provisions of the law.”
Vietnamese citizens inside Vietnam are forbidden to freely assemble or to form associations or independent trade unions to protect their labor rights. They have to ask the help of their brothers and sisters overseas to assist them in voicing their lack of freedom and the need to form independent trade unions to fight for their rights.
Indeed the “WARSZAWA CONFERENCE held on October 28-30, 2006 at the Polish Ministry of Economy in Warsaw where Representatives of labor circle can openly analyze labor laws and the situation of workers’ rights in Viet Nam Concerned over the lack of labor rights and its current disastrous impact on the life of millions of Vietnamese workers” is a crucial case in point.
Mr. PM Lawyer Nguyen Tan Dung? Where is our people’s freedom of association?
On 26 October 2006 The Committee for the Protection of Journalists warned that the CPV has intensified pressure on certain newspapers inside Vietnam such as Cong Ly (Justice), Thoi Dai (The Epoch), despite the fact they are all government-owned, on the allegations that they have breached media laws, are clear indications that the new PM intends to move Vietnam even closer to a Stalinist police state.
Mr. PM Lawyer Nguyen Tan Dung? Where is Vietnam’s free press?
While article 70 provides that:
“The citizen shall enjoy freedom of belief and of religion; he can follow any religion or follow none. All religions are equal before the law.
The places of worship of all faiths and religions are protected by the law.
No one can violate freedom of belief and of religion; nor can anyone misuse beliefs and religions to contravene the law and State policies.”
PM Nguyen Tan Dung’s police force has been busy arresting, torturing, and harassing members of the clergy of the Vietnam United Buddhist Congregation. Most senior members of the congregation have been for years under house arrest. The Most Venerable Thich Quang Do mentioned above has been effectively prevented from going to Norway to receive his Rafto Human Rights Award.
Pastor Nguyen Cong Chinh has been stripped naked and humiliated by the secret police. Only state-owned and puppet churches are allowed to practice religions.
What sort of religious freedom is this? Mr. PM Lawyer Nguyen Tan Dung?
While article 71 states that:
”The citizen shall enjoy
inviolability of the person and the protection of the law with regard to his
life, health, honor and dignity.
No one can be arrested in the absence of a ruling by the People's Court, a ruling or sanction of the People's Office of Supervision and Control except in case of flagrant offences. Taking a person into, or holding him in, custody must be done with full observance of the law.
It is strictly forbidden to use all forms of harassment and coercion, torture, violation of his honor and dignity, against a citizen.”
Mr. Do Thanh Cong, a USA citizen was arbitrarily arrested on false allegations of terrorism. When these allegations could no longer be sustained and under pressure from a super power the like of the USA, you were forced to release him back to the USA. But you still keep under arrest his colleagues Dr. Le Nguyen Sang, Journalist Huynh Nguyen Dao and other members of the People’s Democratic Party. Why are these people still under arrest without a ruling by the people’s court? Even when such people’s courts are nothing but kangaroo courts under your thumb?
Mr. PM Lawyer Nguyen Tan Dung, can’t a person trained in law like you read the wording of the constitution?
While article 72 provides that:
”No one shall be regarded as guilty and be subjected to punishment before the
sentence of the Court has acquired full legal effect.
Any person who has been arrested, held in custody, prosecuted, brought to trial in violation of the law shall be entitled to damages for any material harm suffered and his reputation shall be rehabilitated. Anybody who contravenes the law in arresting, holding in custody, prosecuting, bringing to trial another person thereby causing him damage shall be dealt with severely.”
On 27 October 2006, Lawyer Mrs. Le Thi Cong Nhan, at the airport, on her way to Paris, with a view to attending the conference in Europe for the creation of independent Trade Unions in Vietnam, was unlawfully kidnapped by your secret police, in violation of the laws and the constitution. Will you order your government to pay her damages? Have you ever heard of a CPV government paying damages to the poor victims of Vietnam?
Mr. PM Lawyer Nguyen Tan Dung, until you can read clearly the constitution you should not be PM nor parade yourself as a lawyer.
While article 73 provides that:
”The citizen is entitled to the inviolability of his domicile.
No one can enter the domicile of another person without his consent, except in cases authorized by the law.
Safety and secrecy are guaranteed to the citizen correspondence, telephone conversations and telegrams.
Domiciliary searches and the opening, control, and confiscation of a citizen's correspondence and telegrams can only be done by a competent authority in accordance with the provisions of the law.”
There is convincing evidence that all dissidents from Professor Hoang Minh Chinh, to Tran Anh Kim, Phuong Nam Do Nam Hai, Lawyer Nguyen Van Dai, Nguyen Thanh Giang and others have been subjected to home invasion, confiscation of property (especially computer equipments), threat to their safety, threat that the state would withdraw police protection from them in case they are attacked by the “angry public”. This term should be understood as elements of the underworld but hired by the police to wreck terror on dissidents. The police then would simply sit around and watch these outlaws terrorize their victims.
What kind of PM Lawyer are you PM Nguyen Tan Dung?
Unless the people receives a satisfactory answer from you, they are entitled to give credit to the allegations against you, made by Hoang Tung ( himself your colleague and apparently a high ranking member of the CPV) in an article widely distributed in the international electronic media on 9 October 2006 (also published on Doi-Thoai).
I quote:
“I have a number of documents on the record of the bureau relative to Nguyen Tan Dung but could not find any thing about these allegations (that Dung was the illegitimate son of General Nguyen Chi Thanh). But looking at the history and record of work by Ba Dung, there are clearly mysteries. He is only an average cadre, no professional training (he was trained to be a military nurse), with low level of education, with not basic mainstream training, no special achievements, but with spectacular promotions.”
Mr. PM Lawyer Nguyen Tan Dung, until you provide us with an answer, the people are entitled to believe that you are now PM up there merely because you are the illegitimate son of a party boss with powerful connections but with no proper education or legal training whatsoever?
31 October 2006