INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
stately yellow portico of the colonial-era courthouse in Ho Chi Minh City, a 67-year-old property developer stands accused of looting one of
Prosecutors say $27bn may never be recovered.The habitually secretive communist authorities have been uncharacteristically forthright about
this case, going into minute detail for the media
They say they have summoned 2,700 people to testify
There are 10 state prosecutors and around 200 lawyers involved.The evidence is in 104 boxes weighing a total of six tonnes
Eighty-five defendants are on trial with Truong My Lan, who denies the charges
Brown, a retired US state department official with long experience in Vietnam
campaign led by the Communist Party Secretary-General, Nguyen Phu Trong.A conservative ideologue steeped in Marxist theory, Nguyen Phu Trong
He began the campaign in earnest in 2016 after out-manoeuvring the then pro-business prime minister to retain the top job in the party.The
campaign has seen two presidents and two deputy prime ministers forced to resign, and hundreds of officials disciplined or jailed
It has long been the commercial engine of the Vietnamese economy, dating well back to its days as the anti-communist capital of South
Vietnam, with a large, ethnic Chinese community.She started as a market stall vendor, selling cosmetics with her mother, but began buying
land and property after the Communist Party ushered in a period of economic reform, known as Doi Moi, in 1986
By the 1990s, she owned a large portfolio of hotels and restaurants.Although Vietnam is best known outside the country for its fast-growing
manufacturing sector, as an alternative supply chain to China, most wealthy Vietnamese made their money developing and speculating in
property.All land is officially state-owned
Getting access to it often relies on personal relationships with state officials
Corruption escalated as the economy grew, and became endemic.By 2011, Truong My Lan was a well-known business figure in Ho Chi Minh City,
and she was allowed to arrange the merger of three smaller, cash-strapped banks into a larger entity: Saigon Commercial Bank.Vietnamese law
prohibits any individual from holding more than 5% of the shares in any bank
But prosecutors say that through hundreds of shell companies and people acting as her proxies, Truong My Lan actually owned more than 90% of
Saigon Commercial.They accuse her of using that power to appoint her own people as managers, and then ordering them to approve hundreds of
loans to the network of shell companies she controlled.The amounts taken out are staggering
ensure her loans were never scrutinised
One of those charged alongside her is a former chief inspector at the central bank, who faces a life sentence for accepting a $5m bribe.The
mass of officially sanctioned publicity about the case has channelled public anger over corruption against Truong My Lan, whose haggard,
unmade-up appearance in court has been in stark contrast to the glamorous publicity photos people have seen of her in the past.But questions
It was well known in the market that Truong My Lan and her Van Thinh Phat group were using SCB as their own piggy bank to fund the mass
But then it is such a common practice
SCB is not the only bank that is used like this
powerful figures who have dominated business and politics in Ho Chi Minh City for decades
And he sees a bigger factor in play in the way this trial is being run: a bid to reassert the authority of the Communist Party over the
They would make all the right noises that local communist leaders are supposed to make, but at the same time they were milking the city for
almost certainly have to retire at the next Communist Party Congress in 2026, when new leaders will be chosen.He has been one of the
since the reforms of the 1980s
Under his leadership the party has set an ambitious goal of reaching rich country status by 2045, with a technology and knowledge-based
This is what is driving the ever-closer partnership with the United States.Yet faster growth in Vietnam almost inevitably means more
Fight corruption too much, and you risk extinguishing a lot of economic activity
Already there are complaints that bureaucracy has slowed down, as officials shy away from decisions which might implicate them in a
Corruption has been the grease that that kept the machinery working
