On Tuesday ( Dec. 24 ), more than a dozen Vietnamese officials were detained in Hanoi on suspicion of corruption in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic, a scandal that saw 54 people imprisoned last year.
The investigation is a significant step in a major anti-graft campaign that has resulted in the resignation of two deputy prime ministers and a president in a nation where democratic transitions are typically properly planned.
Next time, 54 officials and businessmen were found guilty of receiving, offering or acting as the go-between for gifts that state internet said numbered US$ 9.5 million.
They included four former senior officials at the ministries of international affairs, heath and public security, who were handed living words.
Transport department, municipal officials, as well as employees of travel companies, are among the 17 defendants in court on charges of corruption, energy abuse, and hiding of criminals.
Tran Tung, a former national for northeastern Thai Nguyen state, told the judge he had accepted around US$ 300, 000 in bribes and payment for structuring quarantine facilities.
” I did it as I saw a chance to make money and gain myself”, he told the judge, according to the state-run Vietnam Law paper.
The test is anticipated to continue about a year.
The accused allegedly gave or took money to help people get seats on relocation flights at the top of the pandemic in early 2020, when Vietnam had closed its borders to almost everyone table returning people.
At the time, returnees faced complicated access techniques, cheap flights and quarantine fees.
A Hanoi family reported to AFP last year that, at the height of the pandemic, she had spent more than US$ 10, 000 to transport her young girl again to Vietnam from a boarding school in Europe.
The bone claims come as part of an anti-corruption drive that has uncovered a number of deals done during Vietnam’s COVID-19 epidemic response.
Last season, the country’s rubber-stamp National Assembly removed original foreign affairs minister Pham Binh Minh and Vu Duc Dam, who oversaw the COVID-19 pandemic answer, from their jobs as deputy prime ministers.
The assault also brought down President Nguyen Xuan Phuc after he” took political duty” for several officers ‘ deficiencies.