March 5, 2010
Hanoi – Around 100 people, including many former soldiers, staged a protest against a Vietnamese regional military headquarters they said had cheated them out of overseas jobs, protestors said Friday. The crowd gathered Thursday in front of the headquarters of Military Zone 4 in the city of Vinh in central Vietnam, accusing senior military officers of taking downpayments from soldiers in return for the promise of overseas employment that never materialized.
Photos distributed on the internet showed protestors holding banners reading, “Division 324 cheated us,” and “Wronged people call for help.”
No violence or arrests took place, and police and army officers allowed the protest to continue, protestors said. The demonstration broke up peacefully after a senior officer invited protestors to meet with leaders of Military Zone 4 and promised to resolve the case quickly.
The protestors alleged that Lieutenant Colonel Dang Dinh Tien, deputy commander of the military zone’s Division 324, promised 99 soldiers jobs in South Korea through an export labour recruitment agency after they finished their tours of duty in 2008 and 2009.
Tien allegedly introduced the 99 soldiers to Nguyen Thi Kim Hoa, the recruitment agency’s director, and required them to pay deposits up front. When the jobs failed to materialize, protestors say, Tien and Hoa kept their deposits, totaling 5.4 billion dong (290,000 dollars).
Hoang Van Thien, the father of a soldier and among those protesting Thursday, said each family had paid Tien and Hoa 120 million dong.
Another protestor, Cao Thanh Binh, said an earlier protest took place last year in front of Division 324’s headquarters in the district of Do Luong. After receiving no response, the families decided to bring their protest to the senior command at Military Zone 4 headquarters in Vinh.
“We have also sent a petition for help to the president of Vietnam and the Ministry of Defence, but nothing has been resolved yet,” Binh said.
In a letter sent November 26 to soldiers’ families, Colonel Vu Van Viet, commander of Division 324, said Lieutenant Colonel Tien had been acting in a private capacity and bore sole responsibility.
However, Binh said a number of soldiers in the division had attended training courses for work in South Korea while still on active military duty. He said such training violated regulations.
“Mr Tien couldn’t have done it alone,” Binh said. “He did it with the cooperation of other leaders of the division.”
The headquarters of Military Zone 4 and Division 324 and the inspectorate of the Ministry of Defense did not answer repeated telephone calls Friday.
