A Vietnamese activist blogger now under house arrest in Hanoi says she will not travel outside the country to receive a human rights award in March, vowing instead to remain in Vietnam to work for change in the one-party communist state.
Pham Doang Trang, author of a recently published book on political engagement that has angered Vietnamese authorities, wrote on Wednesday on her Facebook page that she will not attempt to go abroad to receive her prize.
“I haven’t gone abroad and don’t plan to, not even for a few days to receive the Homo Homini Prize in the Czech Republic on March 5,” Trang said.
“I will never leave Vietnam until Vietnam has changed.”
“When one is like a fish that has been born in a dirty and polluted pond, one can either find one’s way to a nicer and cleaner pond nearby or to the vast ocean, or one can try to change one’s own pond to make it beautiful, breathable, and worth living in,” Trang said.
“I choose this second option,” she said.
"She will never surrender'
Speaking on Wednesday to RFA’s Vietnamese Service, Trang’s mother Bui Thi Thien Can praised her daughter for her “beautiful ideals,” saying Trang “cannot and will never surrender or betray the path she has begun.”
Trang wrote her book, Politics for Everyone, to equip the Vietnamese public with basic knowledge about politics “so they won’t be afraid of politics or try to avoid it, especially youth and students who are afraid of the security forces,” Can said.
“I am very proud of having a daughter as smart and brave as Trang,” she said.
Security officers apprehended Trang on Feb. 24 to ask about her book and other activities and held her for 23 hours before returning her to her home under house arrest, fellow activists said at the weekend.
Copies of Trang’s book, which is considered politically sensitive in Vietnam, were seized by customs agents in the central coastal city of Danang on Feb. 9, when they were shipped into the country from abroad.
Trang recently received the Homo Homini Award from People in Need, an international human rights organization based in the Czech Republic that recognizes individuals dedicated to the development of human rights, democracy, and nonviolent solutions to political conflict.
Reported by RFA’s Vietnamese Service. Translated by Emily Peyman. Written in English by Richard Finney.
+Pham Doang Trang, I love your courage and I admire your persistence. Pham Doang Trang, Tran Thi Nga, Me Nam, and several other courageous women, you are heroes in my eyes, I support everything you do for our people. I hope a day will come soon where the communists will be taken down by our people, so that you can help us rebuild a new democratic liberal nation.
Apr 26, 2018 10:10 PM
How can simple words express so much and cut so deeply?
It’s true that anyone can be a hero if one just rises up with a clear message(s). Another VN daughter has risen above her kinsmen because of a simple belief but yet sacred. Another torch has lit to shine in darkness to lead the people and the government to think otherwise. We can’t continue on the current paths of destructions.
A majority of VNmese people are sickening with communism and they are hearing the voices of freedom again. It’s in the air that they breathe and in the blood that flows through their veins. They would need an excuse, a catastrophic event to push them over the edge.
So, let’s shout out freedom from every hilltop and roof – the time has come!
Let’s be a torch or a messenger to carry this endearing word that has gone missing from VN – freedom!
We will restore a smile on every faded lips, a sparkle in every tired eyes, and squeeze tight those rough chapped working hands again for We Are Free Again!!!
Mar 01, 2018 10:21 AM
