In a telephone interview granted to Viet Long of RFA’s Vietnamese service on January 10, Uyen acknowledged that he is author of the three essays. He wrote them, he said, in the hope of helping to remove Vietnam from its current rut. 

In his essays, Pham Ngoc Uyen responds to the Party’s invitation to comment on the draft political platform being considered by the Central Committee.

In the first one, he says that the draft is much too long and too vague on several crucial issues. For instance, in assessing the present, the platform stops at the 1960 Conference of 81 Communist Parties, ignoring the fall of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union as well as such universal trends as globalization and the knowledge economy. 

The platform also eulogizes socialism without describing what it is that it is praising. And when it mentions the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, it says that it is only “a temporary crisis” without further comment. Uyen also says that despite praising the Doimoi (“Renovation”) policy-adopted by Vietnam in 1986-the Platform fails to emphasize the policy ’s essential features, which amounts to a rejection of the classical Marxist-Leninist model long followed by Vietnam. 

In his second essay, Uyen says that all ideologies, including Marxism-Leninism, are only the means to an end. The end for Vietnam must be happiness, progress, democracy and justice for all -- including the overseas Vietnamese. He then proceeds to give a scientific demonstration of how Marx went wrong because he could not have foreseen the future, including such things as the transformation of capitalism in the twentieth century and the information age. 

The history of ideas, the author continues, shows that to take root in a new land all ancient religions or ideologies have to adapt themselves to the characteristics of the new territory. So it was with Marxism-Leninism when it came to Vietnam: it was Ho Chi Minh who grafted it onto the tradition of anti-foreigner resistance of Vietnam. Now that that phase is over, the author suggests, we should say: “Marxism-Leninism is dead, long live Marxism-Leninism!” and let it die a natural death. 

In the third essay, Uyen tries to outline Vietnam’s future. While it is always risky to peer into the future, he says, Vietnam must become a civil society with people having “the right to think differently.” 

The future Vietnam must also be a society governed by the rule of law. To refuse the rule of law is merely to perpetuate high-level corruption and undeserved privileges. Objections raised by the Communist Party that given too much democracy and freedom, the country would end in chaos, are in fact antiquated. Like “water, fire, robbery and war,” something may be dangerous but one can always tame them. One cannot say that because fire burns one should not use it. 

As for democracy, “hundreds of ‘burning spots’ all over the country, from the capital to the farthest reaches of the land, in the past as well as at the present time, all are pointing to the fact that democracy is a crying need of the entire population. There can be no political stability without real democratization of every facet of the country’s life.”

Radio Free Asia 
Vietnam Update #33  
January 10, 2001

The content of the letter reads as follows:

"My name is Nguyen Vu Binh, reporter of Tapchi Congsan ("Journal of Communism"), and I reside at Number 26, Cell 67b, Vinh Tuy Neighborhood, Hai Ba Trung Ward, Hanoi.

"After having studied and researched the situation of our country for quite some time, I realize that Vietnam is facing a comprehensive crisis covering the economy, politics and the society.…In my understanding, the time is not far when we will be witnessing a huge transformation in our nation's history, and it will be nothing less than a transformation of our societal regime. It, therefore, becomes an urgent necessity for our society to have an opposition as represented by a political party so as to minimize the suffering that our people must bear in the process of transformation.

It is on the basis of such an understanding that I make myself bold to send in this application. I propose and respectfully hope that you, in the name of our country and for the interest of our nation, would allow me to form a party called the Liberal Democratic Party."

Radio Free Asia Vietnam Update #35 Wednesday, February 28, 2001

ETHNIC MINORITY ATTACK ON VIETNAMESE SETTLERS IN CENTRAL HIGHLANDS  

Washington, DC-- Sources from inside Vietnam told Radio Free Asia (RFA) of a surprise attack on a Vietnamese settlement by some 15% members of the Ede ethnic minority who have lived in the central highlands for centuries. 

The Ede are one of the many minorities who have seen their ancestral habitats encroached upon by ethnic Vietnamese moved in by the Hanoi government. 

According to RFA sources, the attack at 9:30 a.m. on August 8 came out of nowhere. A government cadre of about 15 men were coming from the district of Ea H’leo to visit Hamlet 8 of Ea Hiao Village in Buonmathuot Province. Upon their arrival, they found themselves surrounded and attacked by about 15% Ede. The attackers were armed with rifles, grenades and an assortment of primitive weapons including crossbows, machetes and sticks. The Ede seriously wounded the chief police officers from Ea H’leo District and from Ea Hiao Village in addition to two others.

 Following the attack of the cadre, the Ede then set fire to the houses of the hamlet and deputy hamlet chiefs and burned down eight other houses. The rest of the hamlet population, mostly Vietnamese settlers from North Vietnam, had to flee into the fields and neighboring villages. 

According to a report in Lao Dong ("Labor") newspaper, the attackers came from Sech, a location 120 kilometers away where they had been resettled by the Hanoi government, in Dlei Yang village. This is report has been questioned since it would have taken the attackers several days to reach Hamlet 8. 

Two task forces have reportedly been sent to Sech and Hamlet 8 to look into the incident and calm the distraught settlers. The government claims that the Vietnamese settlers came of their own free will -- the so-called "free migration" movement from the Red River delta into the Central Highlands. At the same time the government concedes, according to the Lao Dong article,  that "the building of ‘free migration’ projects" leaves much to be desired and needs to be solved "on an extremely urgent basis in Daclac Province at the present time." Ever since the communist takeover of South Vietnam in April 1975, the government in Hanoi has encouraged the majority population of Vietnamese to resettle in the Central Highlands in what was called "New Economic Zones" (NEZs). This push has encroached into the territory that the many ethnic minorities considered the traditional habitat of their ancestors. 

The Ede practice slash-and-burn agriculture and hold their land communally. This encroachment has caused extensive damage to the forest cover of Vietnam which has been reduced from 75% in 1975 down to about 30% at the present time-causing many ravaging floods in recent years. 

The encroachment has also reduced the natural habitat of elephants, reducing them from a herd of some 1,500-2,000 in the early 1990’s to what is estimated to be no more than 100-15%. In the last year, the normally peaceful elephants have run amok and killed seven people in several villages.