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FM AMCONSUL HO CHI MINH CITY
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INFO RUEHHI/AMEMBASSY HANOI 3408
RUCNARF/ASEAN REGIONAL FORUM COLLECTIVE
RUEHHM/AMCONSUL HO CHI MINH CITY 5331

S E C R E T SECTION 01 OF 03 HO CHI MINH CITY 000988 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL:  11/3/2018 
TAGS: PGOV SOCI PREL VM
SUBJECT: IN HCMC, TWO RISING STARS FOLLOW TWO DIFFERENT PATHS 
 
REF: (A) HCMC 978  (B) HCMC 450 
 
HO CHI MIN 00000988  001.2 OF 003 
 
 
CLASSIFIED BY: Kenneth J. Fairfax, Consul General, U.S. 
Consulate General Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Department of 
State. 
REASON: 1.4 (b), (d) 
 
 
 
¶1. (C) SUMMARY:  The career paths of two prominent political 
leaders in Ho Chi Minh City reflect fundamental divisions with 
the leadership of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV). 
Contacts tell us that conservative elements within the CPV 
leadership are promoting the career of the Deputy Secretary of 
the Communist Party of HCMC, Nguyen Van Dua, while reformers are 
grooming City Council Chairwoman Pham Phuong Thao.  Both are 
"young" (in their 50's) HCMC natives who joined the Communist 
Youth League in former Saigon during the war and subsequently 
worked their way up the party ladder.  Both were also selected 
partly because they fit into key demographics that their backers 
reportedly hope to exploit.  Frustrated that previous CPV 
decisions to balance the representation of northerners and 
southerners in the Central Committee and Politburo have led to 
growing influence for southern reformers, conservative elements 
in the CPV are promoting Dua, a conservative southerner.  The 
choice of Thao as a leader in the next generation of reformers 
was reportedly influenced by another demographic, the much more 
recent decision by the CPV to increase the portion of women in 
the senior leadership ranks to 30%. While the two leaders are 
being supported by rival camps, they generally do not clash 
since Dua's area of greatest activity is cultural/information 
control while Thao's is the mechanics of delivering good 
governance.  END SUMMARY. 
 
DUA AND THE CULTURAL CONSERVATIVES 
---------------------------------- 
¶2. (S) Multiple interlocutors, including former People's 
Committee Chairman Vo Viet Thanh, current Deputy Chief of Staff 
of the People's committee Huynh Khanh Hiep, National Assembly 
Member Nguyen Dang Trung and External Relations Office (ERO) 
Deputy Director Nguyen Vo Tu, have all independently explained 
to us that culture is the most politically sensitive of all 
topics in HCMC and serves as a dividing line between rival camps 
within the CPV.  For the conservative core, the threat of 
"evolutionism" -- the gradual peaceful transition from a 
communist to a democratic state -- has become their central 
rallying point.  Our interlocutors explain that unlike in Hanoi, 
where overwhelming majority of the population supported the 
North Vietnamese government during the war, a large percentage 
of southerners, particularly in HCMC, never supported communism 
-- and still don't.  The fear is that enemies of the CPV will 
become increasingly emboldened with progressing reforms and 
eventually challenge the legitimacy of the party.  (Comment: The 
number of senior CPV members in HCMC who have confided to us 
that they believe that the Vietnamese people will eventually -- 
and rightfully -- demand full democracy demonstrates that the 
conservatives have a good reason to worry.  The reformers, on 
the other hand, welcome "evolutionism" as their country's 
long-term salvation.  End Comment.) 
 
¶3. (SBU) Near the end of 2007, the already difficult process of 
pursuing public diplomacy goals took a marked turn for the 
worse.  Rules were tightened in a number of areas, but 
particularly those that apply to exchange programs.  New 
requirements imposed included onerous reporting and clearance 
rules announced by the External Relations Office (ERO -- the 
HCMC branch of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) that at first 
appeared to undermine our ability to pursue programs.  While we 
have successfully engineered a work-around to circumvent the 
controls, the process of selecting and inviting program 
participants is more complex and dangerous than ever, as one 
journalist invited to participate in an IVLP program recently 
learned when she was summed to HCMC Communist Party headquarters 
and personally reprimanded by Deputy Party Secretary Nguyen Van 
Dua for agreeing to participate in such a program without first 
seeking the party's approval.  Dua ordered her to cancel her 
participation.  Given that the CPV has recently demonstrated its 
willingness and ability to punish recalcitrant reporters, the 
IVLP nominee had no choice but to cancel her participation at 
the last moment. 
 
¶4. (S) While contacts were initially unwilling to reveal more 
details concerning the origin of the shift in policy on 
exchanges, some insiders, such as ERO Deputy Director Tu and 
Deputy Chief of Staff of the HCMC People's Committee Huynh Khanh 
Hiep, have recently independently confirmed that the source of 
the new order is HCMC Communist Party First Deputy Secretary 
Nguyen Van Dua himself.  While he is certainly not alone in his 
campaign to tighten the reigns on cultural activities, contacts 
describe him as the movement's most senior advocate in HCMC. 
Contacts, including long-time colleague and former Communist 
Youth League counterpart Dinh Ba Thanh, also describe Dua as an 
extremely politically ambitious individual whose career is being 
 
HO CHI MIN 00000988  002.2 OF 003 
 
 
backed by some of the most conservative elements of the 
Politburo and Central Committee.  Contacts explain that a number 
of Party hard liners have been frustrated that the Party's 
desire to include southerners in its leading institutions has 
had the effect of increasing the power of reformers.  To 
counteract this, the conservative faction within the CPV 
searches for and supports conservative southerners, with Dua 
being their prized student.  Contacts willing to venture a guess 
believe that Dua will be promoted into a more important position 
within the CPV hierarchy with a few years. 
 
DUA'S IS NOT THE ONLY RISING STAR 
--------------------------------- 
¶5. (S) On a more optimistic note, Tu and others have told the CG 
that conservatives such as Dua are not the only southerners 
enjoying top-level political patronage.  HCMC City Council 
Chairwoman Pham Phuong Thao, a leading force for more open, 
transparent government and an advocate of direct elections for 
commune and city leaders with no "pre-filtering" of candidates 
by the CPV or Fatherland Front, is also reported to be 
benefiting from internal CPV personnel policies.  At the Party 
Plenum earlier this year, the CPV adopted a policy goal of 
increasing the number of women in top leadership positions to 
30%.  Multiple interlocutors have told us that this policy goal 
is helping to propel the careers of the next generation of 
female CPV members, including Thao.  In addition to being 
female, her background includes years of service in the 
Communist Youth League of HCMC during and after the war as well 
as a stint as the chief of the CPV of HCMC's office of 
ideological purity.  In local parlance, she has a "pure red CV." 
 
¶6. (C) In her current position as the Chairwoman of the City 
Council, Thao has been remarkably public in her criticism of 
government inefficiency and corruption, proudly citing the 
number of CPV and HCMC city officials who have been fired for 
corruption and/or negligence under her watch as a major 
accomplishment.  Thao has forced every district, ward and 
commune level chief to hold monthly open houses where ordinary 
citizens can make their grievances known and personally hosts a 
very popular Sunday morning television show called "Talk and 
Action" that focuses on some of the most pressing -- and 
controversial -- issues the city is facing.  Just as the 
conservatives are looking for conservative southerners to back, 
the reformers see in Thao an ideal combination of gender, 
stellar CPV credentials and a proven commitment to pushing the 
frontiers of reform.  According to local contacts, over the last 
several months leading CPV reformers have been actively grooming 
and assisting Thao. 
 
¶7. (C) While not commenting on her personal political ambitions, 
Thao herself did recently tell the CG that her drive for new 
reforms, including a new city charter, has benefited greatly in 
recent months from the excellent advice she has been given by 
some senior CPV leaders in Hanoi.  At their specific advice, for 
example, Thao has reached out directly to a number of 
reform-minded members of the National Assembly as well as to 
senior officials in the Hanoi city government in order to build 
a broader base of support for her reforms.  Thao explained that 
"friends" had suggested to her that by building a geographically 
diverse base of support for legal changes that would impact 
multiple cities, she could blunt criticism that HCMC was seeking 
special treatment.  These same friends suggested to her specific 
individuals within the Hanoi city government who share her 
commitment to more open, responsive government.  Similarly, the 
deputy leader of HCMC's contingent of representatives to the 
National Assembly, Tran Du Lich, another rising reformer, 
carefully coordinates his work on national legislation with Pham 
Phuong Thao.  He has also lined up reform-minded members of the 
National Assembly to appear on her talk show to voice concerns 
and complaints on topics ranging from pollution to land rights. 
 
¶8. (S) At a recent dinner with the CG, Dinh Ba Thanh, the former 
head of the Communist Party Youth League and currently the 
Chairman and CEO of Vietnam's largest advertising company, 
commented that Dua and Thao were both members of the Communist 
Youth League at the same time as he was and cooperated closely 
for years.  Thanh explained that while they had all joined the 
Party out of a desire to serve their country, their lives have 
taken them down somewhat different paths to that goal.  Dua 
believes that the CPV is the guarantor of Vietnam's long-term 
security and thus works to maintain Party supremacy.  Thao 
believes in the ability of the Vietnamese people to build their 
own future and thus focuses her energies on building a 
government that is responsive to the needs of the people. 
Meanwhile, Thanh sees himself as contributing to Vietnam's 
future by building a successful business that helps the economy 
grow and creates linkages with foreign partners. 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
¶9. (C) Perhaps it is not surprising that Tip O'Neill's famous 
adage that "all politics is local" can be turned on its head in 
 
HO CHI MIN 00000988  003.2 OF 003 
 
 
communist Vietnam, where it appears local politics are being 
driven by national rivalries.  The differing paths being 
followed by Dua and Thao not only reflect what appears to be an 
ongoing battle over the future direction of the CPV, it also has 
concrete implications for our work in HCMC.  Despite its bright 
lights and vibrant economy, HCMC is not an easy place in which 
to work, particularly in the cultural arena (ref A).  The 
combination of internal divisions within the CPV and the GVN's 
frequent failure to establish and enforce a single, uniform 
policy means that dealing with officials here can be eerily 
reminiscent of scenes from "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde."  We can 
never predict when the government will show its dynamic, 
forward-looking face and when we will be confronted with the 
unreasonable demands of a paranoid and reactionary entity. 
Simple dividing lines such as north/south or party/non-party are 
not effective tools for predicting behavior and even when we do 
know whom we are dealing with, we can't always know who is 
calling the shots behind the scenes.  While the front for rival 
camps within the CPV, Thao and Dua have never clashed public, 
partly because they focus their energies in different spheres: 
Dua in culture and public information and Thao in building 
responsive local government with an emphasis on quality of life 
issues such as the economy, city planning and the environment. 
 
¶10. (U) This cable was coordinated with Embassy Hanoi. 
FAIRFAX