Why Vietnam Can’t Stop
Risky Migration to Richer Countries
By Ralph Jennings - November
1, 2019
A
Vietnamese woman stands outside her house in Yen Thanh district of Vietnam's
Nghe An province, Oct. 27, 2019.
TAIPEI, TAIWAN - Vietnam’s
prime minister has ordered an investigation into whether 39 people found dead
in a truck in the United Kingdom last month were trafficked out of his country
illegally.
While the order may mollify
outraged Vietnamese citizens, experts fear it masks the government’s
longer-term powerlessness to stop people from being smuggled into wealthier
countries for money.
The discovery by police in
southeastern England quickly cast attention on human trafficking from Vietnam
to Europe where incomes are higher. Several arrests have been made in the
United Kingdom, and one man was charged with conspiracy to traffic people.
But an elaborate
international chain of command to move people out of Vietnam for high-paid work
offshore has grown so mature, dating back to when Vietnam was poorer than it is
today, that government officials will find it hard if not impossible to stop,
experts say.
“This is a never-ending
fight,” said Carl Thayer, Southeast Asia-specialized emeritus professor of
politics at The University of New South Wales in Australia. “The rewards to the
smugglers are too great and the nirvana lifestyle they offer to the people
(who) are desperate.”
Efforts
to stop human trafficking
After
the 39 deaths were discovered, Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc told
his Ministry of Public Security and Ministry of Foreign Affairs to start an
investigation into human smuggling and create “citizen protection measures” if
needed, state-run Viet Nam News reported Thursday.
Last
year, the news service said, British and Vietnamese governments had signed a
memorandum of understanding “to tackle modern slavery.”
When
a Vietnamese foreign minister telephoned a British official Tuesday to discuss
the recent case, the two agreed they would “call on the international community
to strengthen co-operation to combat the crime.” 
In Vietnam's less-developed
towns, like Da Lat, brokers post signs offering to take locals abroad to find
work. (Ha Nguyen/VOA)
Britain's
Prime Minister Boris Johnson walks with Chief Constable of Essex Police,
Ben-Julian Harrington, as they prepare to lay flowers, during a visit to
Thurrock Council Offices in Thurrock, east of London, Oct. 28, 2019.
Barriers to a crackdown
Public security officials
could publicize the issues further and root out more smuggling organizers, Thayer
said. They catch people only occasionally now, he added.
But victims of discovered
smuggling attempts lack the means to identify the heads of trafficking rings,
he said, while Vietnam’s special economic zones with neighboring countries make
it easy for citizens to leave.
“The borders are porous and
people can cross over,” Thayer said.
Trafficking
networks have thrived in Vietnam since at least the 19th century, often taking
women and children to Hong Kong or mainland China for sale into marriage or prostitution,
according to the 2015 book Human Trafficking in Colonial Vietnam.
To
stop women from entering abusive marriages with citizens of richer Asian
countries, government officials in Vietnam now do rigorous background checks on
marriage applications, said Frederick Burke, partner with the law firm Baker
McKenzie in Ho Chi Minh City.
“For
sure they will be looking at what kind of controls (they can take)” after the
case in England, he said. “They have huge issues with sale of wives. These are
not new issues.”
Common
Vietnamese still see the UK deaths last month mainly as just a case of people
being cheated by their group leader, Burke said. Looking at emigration for work
overall, he said, a lot of Vietnamese still hold a “grass is greener on the
other side of the fence mentality.”
A portrait of Bui Thi Nhung, who is feared to be among
the 39 people found dead in a truck in Britain, is kept on a prayer altar at
her house in Vietnam's Nghe An province, Oct. 27, 2019.
Economic
incentives miss the extreme poor
At
home, Vietnamese officials effectively improve people’s livelihoods by
encouraging foreign investment in export manufacturing, which creates jobs. The
Southeast Asian country’s $300 billion economy will grow by up to 6.8% this
year, SSI Research in Hanoi says. It expanded 7.1% in 2018, the highest rate in
11 years.
Blue-collar
wages of less than $200 per month, however, hardly compare to wages in the
countries where trafficked people often end up today. Vietnamese still jump at
chances to work in factories in Russia, do construction work in Libya and get
hired on British farms.
About
10% of Vietnam’s 95 million people live in poverty, sometimes in “pockets of
extreme poverty” far from industrial job centers, IHS Markit Asia-Pacific chief
economist Rajiv Biswas said.
The
government should address these pockets, some in the remote mountains, but will
find it hard, he said.
“Now
the issue I think for Vietnam is addressing these pockets of poverty in
mountain areas, which is quite difficult to do because (of) their ability to
work in industrial jobs — they don’t have access to that kind of work,” Biswas
said.
