Slothful bridge work clogs up Highway 1A; Ministry calls on people not to discriminate against HIV/AIDS students; Bureaucratic delay prompts wildcat strike; Foreign students come to learn about Vietnam

Work to renovate nine bridges along Highway 1A (Can Tho - Ca Mau section) is running behind schedule, causing traffic pileups during rush hour, holding up office- and school-goers.

The worst affected are at the Dau Sau and Cai Rang bridges in Can Tho City and Nang Mau and Phung Hiep bridges in Hau Giang Province.
On September 7 hundreds of vehicles queued up to cross a temporary bridge beside the Dau Sau Bridge.

The work, being undertaken by the China State Construction Engineering Corporation (CSCEC), is behind schedule because the corporation has failed to provide funds.

The project, begun in March 2007 and expected to be finished in October 2010, has seen only 40 percent completed so far.

Ministry calls on people not to discriminate against HIV/AIDS students

To prevent discrimination against schoolchildren infected with HIV/AIDS, the Ministry of Education and Training has asked departments of Education and Training in cities and provinces nationwide to call on teachers, students and parents to enhance their knowledge of HIV/AIDS.

Departments need to have effective and suitable measures to ensure that there is no discrimination and differentiation against HIV/AIDS students at schools.

Students living with HIV/AIDS are being discriminated against around the country, which has caused the ministry to act.

The ministry, for example, needs to raise its voice about the case of 15 HIV/AIDS carriers, from the Mai Hoa AIDS Center in HCM City, who were ostracized by students and parents when they recently went to school to integrate with the community.

Bureaucratic delay prompts wildcat strike

More than a thousand factory workers in Nha Trang, Khanh Hoa Province walked off the job without warning on Monday after years of vainly waiting for their social insurance contributions to be confirmed.

Le Thi Phuong Hong, director of the Rattan Processing and Export Company (Rapexco), said the delay had led the workers to suspect the company of stealing their payments instead of forwarding the money to the Khanh Hoa Social Insurance Agency.

Hong, who has 2,401 workers on her payroll, blamed the agency for the tardiness.

Bui Dang An from the agency explained that his office only had two people to stamp workers’ social insurance and health insurance books, which number around 620,000 at present.

Pham Xuan Danh, vice chairman of the Khanh Hoa Labor Union, gave the insurer and Rapexco two days to make a list of workers who had paid their insurance premiums.

He said this would put their minds at ease and get them back to work.

Supervisor caught taking bribe at Japanese-funded bridge project

Police in the Mekong Delta city of Can Tho on Sunday caught a bridge construction supervisor in the act of accepting a bribe from a supplier.

Nguyen Thai Hoa, 28, was arrested in a café when he took VND15 million from 47-year-old Lam Van Kien, who is supplying building materials for Package No. 1 of the Can Tho Bridge project.

The raid followed Kien’s complaint to the police that Hoa kept asking him for money and threatening not to sign for the materials unless and until Kien paid up.

According to Kien, the extortionist demanded he pay him VND7,000 for each cubic meter of stone that Kien supplied, or VND78 million ($4,378) in total.

A cooperative Kien told police he had given Hoa VND10 million last month.

Construction of Can Tho Bridge, which is being funded with Japanese government aid, started in September 2004. The Vietnamese government has ordained that it be finished by March next year.

The $300-milllion bridge will connect Can Tho City to Vinh Long Province across the Hau River.

The work for Package No.1, which went to the Japanese-owned Nippon-Koei-Chodai Joint Venture, is 88 percent complete. The project’s other two packages are also underway.

Foreign students come to learn about Vietnam

Dozens of students from Japan, Indonesia, Switzerland, Hungary and Israel are attending Vietnam International Week (VIW), which will last until September 14.

The VIW, aiming to promote mutual understanding in culture, education and society among participating countries, also attracts more than 200 Vietnamese students from many universities in Ho Chi Minh City.

During the 10 day event, both foreign and local students will explore Vietnam’s history, culture and society through fieldtrips – with themes like City Tour, Historical Day and Cooking Day – in Ho Chi Minh City and neighbouring areas.

Academic discussion about the countries’ culture, customs and society is also an important part of Vietnam International Week, which is organised jointly by the International Week Co-ordinating Organisation and the English Speaking Club at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Social Sciences and Humanities’ Department of English Linguistics and Literature.

Vietnam wants to lure more visitors from Britain

The Vietnamese Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism is stepping up efforts to attract more visitors to visit the country by launching a campaign called ‘Charming Vietnam’ in London.

London taxis will help, said the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Vietnamese Embassy in London at the launch on September 3.

The cabs, carrying images of Vietnam’s world heritage site Ha Long Bay, Vietnamese girls in white Ao Dai (long) dresses and information about Vietnam’s economic hub, Ho Chi Minh City, will be seen across the streets of the UK’s capital city over a six-month period.

Speaking at the ceremony, the Vietnamese Ambassador to the UK , Tran Quang Hoan, said he expected that this type of advertising will attract people living in London , who come from different corners of the world, and draw many of them to Vietnam .

Advertising in taxis has been used by many other countries such as Singapore , Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand to promote their tourist industries.

Boat passenger kills captain

A fishing boat captain from the south coastal province of Ba Ria-Vung Tau died of knife wounds on Friday night after swimming away from his boat to escape a violent passenger bent on commandeering the vessel.

Nguyen Thanh Quan was sailing far out to sea with his son Nguyen Le Rop, Nguyen Phan Loc from Quang Ngai on the central coast and another, unidentified man when Loc suddenly took out a knife and slashed Rop.

Rop and the other deckhand jumped into the water and shouted for Quan to follow them, which the 56-year-old father managed to do after sustaining two deep cuts to the arm and back of his neck.

The three were saved half an hour later by a fishing boat but Quan succumbed to his injuries two hours after his rescue, at around 11 p.m.

After seizing the boat, Loc turned off the lights and fled the scene, but the boat caught fire an hour and a half later.

A dozen fishing boats rushed in vain to save the burning vessel, and only managed to catch Loc six hours after his attack.

Trong, owner of the boat in question, says Loc was a sailor on another boat who had asked to go back to the mainland after several days offshore, so the captain of that boat had asked Quan to give him a lift.

Loc spent three days on Quan’s boat before the incident, which Trong surmises might have been prompted by a conflict with a strange crew.

The killer from Quang Ngai will be handed over to Ba Ria-Vung Tau police on Sunday.

Vietnam coastal town turns ugly

Two violent robberies by knife-wielding thugs took place within an hour in the southern province of Ba Ria-Vung Tau early Sunday morning.

Truong Van Loc, 35, was riding his motorbike in Chau Duc District when three people forced him to stop. Loc was then stabbed six times and had his bike stolen.

Less than an hour later, Le Vu Tuan and Nguyen Thi Thu Thuy were chatting in the street in the same district when three people threatened the 16-year-olds with a knife before stabbing Tuan once and robbing the pair of two cell phones and a necklace.

Also on Sunday, Ba Ria-Vung Tau police arrested three young men over separate fatal stabbings on Thursday.

Chu The Luc, 16, and Pham Van Tai, 21, are suspects in the death of Cao Xuan Hong, 20, in the seaside town of Vung Tau following an argument in a local pub.

Luc and Tai were apprehended when they were found hiding in their hometown in Binh Dinh Province on the central coast, the police said.

They join Pham Minh Ty, 17, who was nabbed on Friday for the murder.

The other arrest on Sunday was Tran Hai Long, 21, in connection with an attack on Ta Xuan Khoi, 40, for which ten men aged 20-25 have already been taken into custody.

PV