Newsgroups: soc.culture.vietnamese



Subject: [news/TheEconomist] VN: North-South divide still evident

4 April 1992                                                  ----------
  The country is like a dumb-bell. Its weights are the deltas of the
Red River in the north and the Mekong in the south, where the best
land and most people are found. The handle is a mountainous corridor
more than 1,000 kilometres (620 miles) long, balanced in the middle by
the Hai Van pass, between Hue and Danang.
  Cross the pass and the climate changes. The old Saigon government
used to make much of this difference, arguing that the 1954 partition
of Vietnam was no more than recognition of a fact of nature. As the
government of a unified Vietnam moves away from socialism towards a
market economy, the fundamental differences between the country's north
and south are once again becoming apparent.
  Nowhere is the gulf more obvious than in the gap between Hanoi and Ho
Chi Minh City, as the Communists renamed Saigon when they took it
over in 1975. Hanoi has changed greatly over the past three years. The
streets are now lined with shops - there used to be none - and clogged
with motorbikes. But Lenin's statue still shakes its fist at the army
museum across the road and sentries guard Uncle Ho's mausoleum.
  Southerners view the capital as a nest of bureaucrats and dreamers,
happiest sitting in cafes reading poetry. The northern picture of Ho
Chi Minh City is just as dismissive. "They shout and drink a lot, but
don't know how to choose or change their leaders," is the view of an
academic in Hanoi.
  Underlying these stereotypes are two different economies. After four
decades of communism, nearly all of Hanoi's industry is state-owned
and most of it runs at a loss. In Ho Chi Minh City private business is
back with a vengeance. By the end of January foreign investors had
been granted 383 licences to invest a total of $2.8 billion in Vietnam.
Three-quarters of this money will go into Ho Chi Minh City and its
hinterland. The city's middle class is losing its inhibitions about
flaunting its wealth - tennis clubs are full of Vietnamese sporting
graphite rackets and the owner of the franchise for Kenwood stereo
systems reports strong demand for upmarket sets selling at $2,000 a
time.
  "In economic terms, the north is 30 years behind the south," says
Nguyen Xuan Oanh, who has taught at Harvard (many Americans find it
easier to call him Jack Owen), served briefly as prime minister of
South Vietnam and now advises the government on economic matters. "We
can't call ourselves unified and have differences as glaring as they
are now."
  Is there a risk that the country could once again snap in two? Not if
Hanoi can help it. The north has a historical fear that without the
south it would be too easy a morsel for a rapacious China to swallow.
It also needs tax revenue from the south to help rebuild its
infrastructure.
  The government will therefore do all it can to strengthen the links
between north and south. While Do Muoi, the head of the ruling
Communist Party, is every inch a northerner, Vo Van Kiet, the prime
minister, and Phan Van Khai, Mr Kiet's first deputy, are southerners.
They are trying to speed up the process of economic reform by applying
the south's experience of running a market economy to the north.
  Though Vietnam is in little danger of splitting in two, it faces a
more insidious threat. The Hanoi government's message to the
provinces is simple:  since it has no money, they must attract foreign
investors, otherwise they are on their own. That means the provinces of
the north will remain grindingly poor while they wait for wealth to
trickle up from the south. Compare, for example, the provinces of Nghe
An and An Giang. Nghe An is probably the poorest in Vietnam. American
bombers and the guns of the Seventh Fleet left only one house standing
in Vinh, its capital, which was later rebuilt by the East Germans in a
predictably hideous fashion. The annual rice crop of 700,000 tonnes is
equal to 250 kilos (550lb) per person, little more than subsistence
level. The province's only industry is an outdated cement plant, which
needs $10m spent on it. "We are waiting for foreign investors to come,"
says a forlorn provincial official.
  An Giang, on the other hand, is booming. It is not troubled by the
typhoons that sweep the north each year and its soil is fed by the
Mekong. This year's two rice crops will, it is hoped, produce 900 kilos
per person. The main tractor dealer in Long Xuyen, the provincial
capital, sold private farmers 10,000 tractors last year, each costing
80m dong ($7,200). The editor of the provincial newspaper guesses there
are at least 50 dong-billionaires in town. The tricky part for the
government will be when it tries to redistribute some of An Giang's
wealth to places like Nghe An. The real danger is not that Vietnam will
split into two countries, but rather into 49 baronies, each of them
loth to share power with the centre, either because it has failed to
help them, or because it takes too much money in tax.
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