Nguyen Ba Thanh

Controversies

Da Nang has been planned and expanded during the last 10 years resulting in the relocation of almost one-third of the city's former inhabitants for urban planning. Thanh was sued by some of these but he was acquitted by official investigations which purportedly showed that all his actions were in accordance with the law. Thanh was elected to the National Assembly.

Nguyen Ba Thanh was also accused of involvement in a major corruption case, in which the contractor building the Han River Bridge, Pham Minh Thong, was arrested. According to Radio Free Asia, the People's Procuracy of Da Nang City concluded in the Document No. 73/KSDT-KT (October, 2000) and Document No. 77/KSDT/KT (November 2000) sent to the Supreme People's Procuracy of Vietnam and Phan Dien (then-Secretary of Communist Party Committee of Danang) that Nguyen Ba Thanh received bribes from Pham Minh Thong (4.4 billion VND in total) in the construction projects of Han River Bridge and North-South Street in Danang. However, the case was eventually dropped. Vietnamese mass media (which, according to Human Rights Watch, are all strictly controlled by the government) were censored and even praised Thanh for his "many contributions" in the development of Da Nang City.

The article alleges that recent reports from the Central Directing Office of Anti-Corruption submitted to the Prime Minister of Vietnam and the Secretary of the Central Committee of Communist Party of Vietnam confirmed that accusations of Nguyen Ba Thanh's corruption by some citizens of Da Nang are legitimate. In addition, two conclusions of inspection by the Ministry of Public Security indicated sufficient grounds to open the case, but the Police Department of Da Nang City have not charged Nguyen Ba Thanh with any offense to date.

In 2009, several high-ranking Vietnamese police officers, including Major General Tran Van Thanh (Chief Inspector of the Ministry of Public Security of Vietnam), Lieutenant Colonel Duong Ngoc Tien (Chief Representative of Ho Chi Minh City's Police's Newspaper in Hanoi), and a former police major were arrested and sentenced to jail. All were accused of "abusing democratic freedoms of association, expression, assembly to infringe on the interests of the state". According to an article from Radio Free Asia, general Tran Van Thanh was fighting against corruption and trying to expose Nguyen Ba Thanh, albeit without success.

Legal scholar Cu Huy Ha Vu has commented in some interviews that he believes this case was created to punish anti-corruption activists, and that "police general Tran Van Thanh had directed the investigation of corruption cases directly related to Nguyen Ba Thanh (who at that time was President of People's Committee of Da Nang City)". Vu claimed the court case was an instrument of revenge by Nguyen Ba Thanh.

Talking to Radio Free Asia, Do Xuan Hien, a former Head of Economics in Da Nang and General District Commissioner, revealed how Nguyen Ba Thanh became rich through urban planning and relocation implementation: "Nguyen Ba Thanh took the land from people, for each square meter he gave them only 19,500 VND as compensation, while having demanded 150,000 VND per m² for himself from contractors, try asking a how many times fold! Thus is it corruption, bribery or not?" According to an annual report of Human Rights Watch, land seizures and local corruption are the main grievances in Vietnam recently.

Death

On 13 February 2015, Thanh died at his home at age 61 after being discharged from the Da Nang Cancer Hospital.