The Cavalier daily :: Thursday, May 6, 1971 :: University of Virginia Library

SAIGON (DSNI) — South Vietnam's
Lower House of the National
Assembly, the foundation of the
"constitutional system" here, has
suffered a blow to its already weak
prestige in the discovery of at least
three deputies involved in
smuggling gold and heroin.

The Lower House has been
guarded by Vietnamese soldiers for
more than a week, after rumors
began circulating that war veterans
might try to invade it to show their
outrage against corrupt deputies.
One opposition deputy recently
said that if this were to happen,
"Justice would be on the side of
the soldiers."

The smuggling cases climaxed
three years of steady loss of public
respect for the Lower House, which
has been controlled by the Thieu
regime at every important point.
Even before the smuggling cases
became public, Lower House
deputies had earned a reputation as
being less concerned with legislating
than with making money.

An American official noted that
the prestige of the Lower House has
fallen so low that "everyone
considers it a joke." It has
"absolutely no influence, he said,
"since it can be bought off so
easily."

The most recent vote on which
vote-buying played an important
role was the Thieu regime's
economic-financial program, passed
last summer. Vietnamese
newspapers reported that deputies
were paid from 200 thousand to
300 thousand plasters (between
500 and 700 U.S. dollars) to vote
for the bill. There were no denials
from those who voted for the bill.

Even strong opposition deputies,
lacking the power to bloc Thieu's
bills, sometimes take advantage of
the bribery system. One pro-An
Huang Buddhist deputy told friends
last year that he decided he might
as well vote for Thieu's measure
and use the money to fund
Buddhist social and political
activities, since the opposition
could not muster enough votes to
defeat it.

Even more lucrative than selling
votes, has been the opportunity
which the deputies' position gives
them to travel abroad free of
taxation and, at least up to now,
free of customs inspection when
they pass in and out of Tansonhut
airport.

Significantly, Deputy Phan Chi
Thien, caught smuggling heroin in
his luggage, did not bother to hide
it, thinking that his suitcases would
not be carefully checked by
customs agents. A customs official
admitted last week that Thien
probably thought he was immune
from customs control. "Usually we
haven't made a systematic check on
parliamentary deputies," he said.
"if they have five bags, perhaps one
of them would be checked."

The Vietnamese public long ago
began to link extensive travel
abroad with smuggling, and the
Lower House deputies have done
more than their share of traveling.
Some of the travel is financed in
part by foreign countries, some by
the Lower House budget itself, and
some by the individual deputies.

The Secretary-General of the
Lower House, deputy Nguyen van
Nhue, told Dispatch last week that
only last December, Lower House
rules were changed to permit
deputies to travel outside the
country twice during each vacation.
There are two vacations each year,
one at the beginning of the year
and one at the end. The decision to
allow more travel was made by the
"office of the Lower House,"
deputy Nhue said, "at the
suggestion of a number of
deputies."

Deputy Nhue refused to say
how many trips deputies had made
abroad last year, saying, "I wish to
remain silent on that question."
The U.S. State Department
revealed, however, that 42 deputies,
or nearly one-third of the entire
Lower House had visited the United
States in 1968 and 1969.

Since travel to other Asian
countries is much less expensive, it
is assumed here that the vast
majority of the deputies made at
least one trip abroad last year, and
that many of them made more than
one.

The smuggling of heroin, which
is believed to have involved deputies
only within the past year, offers
tremendous profits. The four kilos
of heroin which deputy Pham Chi
Thien tried to smuggle into Viet
Nam last month was estimated to
be worth about 800 thousand
dollars.