Two thousand Catholic demonstrators, who assembled for a march from the suburb of Tan Sa Chau to the Supreme Court building in Saigon October 31, were beaten back by Thieu’s police and plainclothes goons. About seventy-five civilians were reported injured. Two opposition deputies were seriously hurt, and a Catholic priest was knocked to the ground and bloodied, the November 1 New York Times reported.
The leader of the anticorruption campaign that has developed over the past few months. Father Tran Huu Thanh, was punched in the face and had his glasses broken by a plainclothes cop.
At a news conference after the events, Thanh demanded – for the first time in public – that President Thieu resign and turn over power “to the people for the sake of their lives and for the sake of the nation’s survival.” An end to corruption in government has been the nominal target of the Catholic campaign so far, but it has developed into a broad movement whose minimum goal is the ousting of Thieu.
The night before the demonstration, 3,000 Catholics gathered for a torchlight rally at Tan Sa Chau church. Thanh called on them to return in the morning for a dawn mass and the march to the city. But starting at 4 a.m. police ringed the whole neighborhood with barbed-wire barriers and forcibly prevented the march from proceeding.
The police also raided the Saigon Press Club in the early morning of October 31. There they beat up opposition deputy Dinh Xuan Dung, and dragged him and several journalists away. They returned later to arrest twenty-five more journalists. The journalists and deputies had been organizing for demonstrations that day.
A group of deputies and lawyers did succeed in penetrating the barbedwire barriers. They marched on the Supreme Court building, where the trial of three opposition newspapers was due to take place. (The papers are charged with libel for having printed Thanh’s six-count indictment of Thieu.)
The government postponed the trial, with the excuse that the government prosecutor had not completed his brief, but the attacks on the press continued.
One of the papers charged, Dai Dan Toc, announced October 26 that it would suspend publication “indefinitely” because government confiscations had driven it into bankruptcy. The paper’s press run had been seized eleven times in the last month.
The opposition daily Dien Tin was seized for reporting on the violence in the Tan Sa Chau neighborhood on October 31. Other papers were forced by the censor to delete references to the punch thrown at Father Thanh.
Thieu’s crackdown on the opposition movement is in effect an admission that the various phony concessions he made the previous week had done little to rally support for his dictatorial rule.
His first gesture had been to remove four members of his cabinet, including his cousin, Information Minister Hoang Duc Nha, who was responsible for press censorship. They announced their resignations October 24. Nha and the departing commerce minister had been under strong attack from the anticorruption movement.
This move failed to satisfy Thieu’s critics, however, as Catholics, Buddhists, publishers and lawyers vowed to continue their struggle. “The people demand peace and reconciliation, not a cabinet reshuffle,” said Senator Vu Van Mau, a leader of the Buddhist National Reconciliation Force. “It’s nonsense. It can’t save President Thieu.”
On October 25 Thieu announced that 377 army officers, including twenty colonels, would be fired for “corruption and dishonest activities.” This step, too, failed to mollify the opposition.
“Why are the generals safe?” asked deputy Nguyen Van Binh, a leader of the Catholic anticorruption movement. “If Thieu really wants to clean up the army then he’s got to fire most of the generals.”
Another deputy, Phan Xuan Huy, a leader of the National Reconciliation Force, went further. “If Thieu wants to eliminate corruption in the army he must fire himself first,” he said.
On October 30, in a final effort to appease his critics, Thieu transferred three of South Vietnam’s four corps commanders to teaching posts in military schools. Two of the three generals had been particular targets of the anticorruption campaign. Thanh rejected the transfers as a “maneuver.” Addressing the torchlight rally at Tan Sa Chau church that night, where Thieu was hanged in effigy, Thanh declared:
“When a few province chiefs were transferred, I was asked whether the movement was satisfied. I answered, ‘never.’
“And when four cabinet ministers resigned, I was asked the same question and also answered, ‘never.’
“Now, after three corps commanders have been transferred, I was asked the same question. I still have the same answer, ‘never.’“
The opposition campaign has now clearly focused on the demand for the ousting of Thieu. Duong Van Minh, the retired general who led the coup that removed Ngo Dinh Diem eleven years ago, and who has now associated himself with the Buddhist National Reconciliation Force, described the Thieu government in a statement issued November 1 as a “violence thirsty” regime that “has completely lost the confidence of the people.” He said that South Vietnam needed new leaders to bring peace to the country.
In a speech on National Day, November 1, the anniversary of the overthrow of Diem, Thieu took a tough stance. He vowed to enforce law and order “to the maximum” and described the opposition as political opportunists and “underground henchmen” of the Communists. According to the November 2 Washington Post, Thieu’s speech contained many bitter references to “Communist and colonialist” financial support to the protesters. Apparently in Saigon “colonialist” is a euphemism for Washington.
Publicly, at any rate, Washington is still backing Thieu. President Ford sent Thieu a National Day message reassuring him that the American people “continue to support your government.”
But Thieu’s position is becoming increasingly shaky. Besides the main forces, a dozen small fronts and committees have joined the attack. And the movement is spreading geographically. In Hue and Quang Ngai, the Buddhists have held rallies to inaugurate local chapters of the National Reconciliation Force. In the Mekong Delta, a predominantly Buddhist area, the Catholics held a rally in which 10,000 persons participated.
On October 29 the head of the largest trade union in South Vietnam also came out against Thieu and called for the eradication of corruption, the implementation of the Paris truce agreements, and the establishment of democratic liberties. After a visit to Tay Ninh on November 2, Father Thanh claimed that the Cao Dai sect had also pledged to join the opposition.
A further focus for the opposition has been a petition demanding Thieu’s immediate resignation. It is being circulated in the National Assembly. Although Thieu has the assembly safely stacked with his own puppets, thirty-two deputies had signed it by November 2.
Thieu still has the support of most of his appointees in the National Assembly and of the police and the armed forces, but nearly every other segment of the population is demanding his removal.
“Few are willing to guess how much longer he will remain in power,” wrote James M. Markham in the October 23 New York Times, “but it is almost impossible to find anyone who believes that he will be able to run for a third term next October.”
Source: https://www.themilitant.com/Intercontinental_Press/1974/IP1240.pdf#page=8&view=FitV,35