Vietnamese Farm Owner in Shooting Spree Over Compensation Dispute
RFA – 09/12/2013
A disgruntled farm owner went on a deadly shooting spree at a provincial land
management office in northeastern Vietnam before killing himself, apparently in
protest over inadequate compensation for his property acquired by the
authorities for a development project, according to officials and neighbors.
Dang Ngoc Viet, 42, entered the land resources development center in Thai Binh
City on Wednesday around 2:00 p.m. and opened fire, injuring four officials,
including a senior center official who died later, according to the director of
the local police.
Col. Tran Xuan Tuyet of the Thai Binh city police told reporters that Vu Ngoc
Dung died while receiving medical attention at a nearby hospital.
The other three people injured in the attack remain hospitalized and are
undergoing treatment.
Tuyet said that Viet’s body was discovered Wednesday evening at a pagoda in Tra
Giang village, in Thai Binh province’s Kien Xuong district, and that he appeared
to have committed suicide.
The official Voice of Vietnam radio program quoted an eyewitness to the attack
as saying that Viet had entered the center and asked for its director, Pham Van
Tu.
When Viet was told that Tu was not present, he determined that Dung was the
center’s deputy and began to fire his weapon, the witness said.
Tuyet said that Viet might have resorted to the shooting over a compensation
dispute after he received payment for his property that was taken over for a
development project by officials in Thai Binh city.
A neighbor interviewed by RFA’s Vietnamese Service said Viet had been driven to
the attack out of frustration over the compensation.
“[T]hey did not give him proper compensation,” said the neighbor, speaking on
condition of anonymity.
“In fact [his] family had been living there for four generations … He was not
happy with [the government] compensation and had sent a number of complaints but
got no answer. That was why he took such drastic action.”
Compensation dispute
According to Tuyet, local officials had appropriated Viet’s rice farm as part of
preparations for the construction of the Ky Ba residential project, which is
expected to become a development showpiece in the center of downtown Thai Binh
city.
The project—which will include high rise buildings, villas, schools, parks and a
sports complex—will cover a total area of around 72,000 square meters (775,000
square feet) and require a total investment of 165 billion dong (U.S. $7.8
million). Around 95 percent of the land has already been cleared for
construction.
Tuyet said that authorities in Thai Binh city had offered Viet land elsewhere,
but that he had refused, so they gave him money as compensation instead.
The online newspaper VnExpress quoted Nguyen Hai Truong, head of the
administrative office of the Thai Binh city local people’s committee as saying
that Viet’s family was made to surrender more than 180 square meters (1,940
square feet) from around 220 square meters (2,370 square feet) of their
property.
Truong said that the family had been promised 560 million dong (U.S. $26,600) in
separate payments, but that after receiving around 500 million dong (U.S.
$23,700), Viet had changed his mind and said that he wanted land instead of
money as compensation.
“It is not correct to say that Viet was not happy because of the compensation
amount,” the report quoted him as saying.
“The compensation price frame had been fixed, so there is no such thing as ‘too
much’ or ‘too little.’ Besides, most of the people here had already accepted
that compensation, so I don’t understand why Viet took such action,” he said.
The report also quoted Tu, the director of the Thai Binh land resources
development center, as saying that while Viet had expressed frustration with the
compensation agreement verbally, he had never submitted any official complaint.
Similar case
Land is owned by the state in one-party communist Vietnam and disputes are
common as local officials frequently appropriate land for questionable projects
they say will benefit the public.
Last year, in a high profile case, farmer Doan Van Vuon was hailed as a hero
after he and his family put up an armed resistance against the seizure of his
fish farm in Hai Phong by security forces.
He was sentenced in April this year to five years in jail for attempted murder
after seven policemen were injured in the raid.
Shortly after Vuon was sentenced, a court in Hai Phong ordered a local official
jailed for more than two years for destroying his property and handed out
suspended sentences to four other officials for their roles in the forced
eviction, in a rare admission of a botched government land seizure.
The authorities in Hai Phong have admitted their eviction was unlawful.
Following the shooting incident this week, Vuon’s wife Nguyen Thi Thuong said
Viet’s case involved several similarities to that of her husband’s and blamed
local authorities for driving the two men to desperation.
“It is injustice and unfair practices that push people into a corner and force
them to react in such ways,” she said.
Vu Van Luan, secretary general of the Seafood Cultivation Association of Tien
Lang—the district in which Vuon’s fish farm was located—said that without
properly addressing the issue of property rights in Vietnam, the government was
inviting additional confrontations between local authorities and land owners.
“I think this is a consequence that we all expected, meaning that, because they
didn’t handle Vuon’s case appropriately, things will not stop here,” he said.
“People are very angry over Vuon’s case. It was not dealt with in accordance
with our laws and justice system.”
Reported by Mac Lam and Gia Minh for RFA’s Vietnamese Service. Written in
English by Joshua Lipes.