Vietnam Conference of Catholic Bishops expressed growing concerns over the tensions caused by recent land disputes between Catholics and local authorities, and the extreme way these disputes have been handled. “Public opinion has been greatly concerned as recent disputes regarding Church property have ended up with law enforcement measures by the government [up to and not limited by] prosecutions and imprisonments against Catholics”, the VietCatholic News website quoted the bishops saying.
According to the bishops, the main cause of current tensions is the prolonged, unresolved complaints and denunciations on land, including religious land in general and of the Catholic Church in particular. At the heart of the matter lies the outdated and inconsistent land law.
The bishops repeated an earlier statement that “Vietnam land laws must be revised to take the right to own private property into consideration as stated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights”.
“We, therefore, assume that instead of resolving the issues by dealing with each case on an individual basis, authorities have to search for a more thorough solution, meaning to let the people have the right to own land and property. People in return must be responsible for the society.”
“According to the current Land Laws, all land belongs to the people and the state would be the representative of ownership. With their status as the representative owner, however, the State has the absolute right to decide the fate of the land.”
“Should this enormous power [be unlinked to] any guideline and an effective body to supervise, it would be inevitable for abuse to flourish [among] those who are decision makers on land issues. The problem is the abuse of power to gain personal interest, especially when land becomes a valuable commodity as it is now,” the bishops warn.
“Reality has shown that land has become people’s ‘assets’, ‘capital’, ‘commodity’ in today’s market. This is the premise or cause for desire to appropriate or to gain profits from land.
“Land [has] undoubtedly … become a most lucrative source of profit, also the best breeding ground for corruption to take place, therefore, the goal to prevent it from happening cannot be ignored in the contents of Land Laws.”
In order to deal with issues effectively, they suggest: “Acknowledgement and protection of the right to own land individually as well as preventing corruption to take place are the goals to be achieved when Land Laws are being modified.”
“Only when [it is able to reflect] the above points, the Land Laws can be truly established [as] of and for the people,” the bishops say.
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