WATERING THE NEIGHBOUR'S GARDEN: THE GROWING - CICRED

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LE BACH D. –D. BÉLANGER –KHUAT T. H.
“She has lost her household registration since then [when
she left for China]…[As a result] she has to rent land to
cultivate” (Relative of a returnee).
In addition to land, household registration is linked with access to
all social services and entitlements.
“Without it [household registration] it is very difficult to
support them [the returnees]. It relates to the education of
their children [children cannot enrol in schools without
household registration in the local neighbourhood]. We
hope that local authority will allow them to register. If not,
they will find themselves marginalized, and may go [to
China] again” (FGD in Ha Long).
The problem is correctly pointed out by a resource person:
“Our legal system has not been updated to deal with the
current situation. Some changes have occurred and are not
been covered by the current laws” (FGD in Ha Long).
In fact, realizing the problems, community authority in Mong Cai
have already reported the situation to the municipal police, but it will
take time to reach the central government level and even longer time
for any policy change. One local cadre said:
“In real life, a lot of things happen. So it is important for
the local authorities to inform the central government
timely. But they cannot act as long as they do not receive
feed-back instructions from the government. Since central
government offices only deal with macro issues, they do
not fully realize how things can be at the ground level”.
The cadre suggested that one way to raise the awareness of the
government and national attention to the issue is to ask the Vietnamese
television to broadcast a special report on trafficked women who
return to their communities. A documentary film would also be very
useful.
Children of returnees born in China also have difficulties in getting
household registration. The children are considered Vietnamese-
Chinese by the local authorities who do not know how to deal with
them. An interview with a respondent tells us how the situation is:
“I have a certificate from the hospital where I delivered my
child. I also have a household registration. But his father is
in China [she married him but has returned home]. So they
[the local authorities] said my child is Chinese and did not