Vietnam's complicated attitude toward repatriating Chinese workers
- Source: Global Times
- [22:44 July 01 2009]
- Comments
“Vietnam will repatriate 182 Chinese caught working illegally there!” The Vietnamese media’s June 25 report attracted the focus of media outlets in China and around the world.
The Youth, a Vietnamese newspaper, first reported the news, saying the 182 Chinese were discovered in a cement factory in southern Vietnam’s Dong Nai Province. The Dong Nai government decided to fine each of them $281 and is considering sending them back to China.
“There are always these kinds of cases in Vietnam,” said Wang Qing, a director of international projects with a Chinese construction group investing in Vietnam.
Under Vietnamese law, foreign companies can select management staff and technicians from other countries after they obtain legal contracts for their projects, but must acquire work permits for them.
To protect domestic employment, Vietnam has set strict restrictions on foreign workers, as have many other countries. Chinese workers without special skills cannot get the permits.
A Chinese businessman investing in Haiphong city said his company often needs Chinese technicians for short-term work in Vietnam. The complicated procedure to get work permits takes a long time and costs a lot of money.
“Sometimes, the contracts we sign with Vietnamese partners are not standard, and we cannot get work permits following the formal procedure. We have to use other methods.”
Among these are human smuggling, overdue residence and using tourist visas to enter the country for work. The Vietnamese government lacks the capacity to stop these practices. That, combined with corruption, only increases the number of Chinese workers entering the country.
Some projects’ Chinese contractors employ hardly any Vietnamese workers, choosing mainly Chinese workers.
“Actually, the labor cost of Chinese workers is very high, as each of them earns a month salary over 5,000 yuan ($732), while we only need to pay Vietnamese 1,000 ($146) to 2,000 yuan per month,” Wang said. “Many may wonder why we don’t employ Vietnamese workers. It’s because they are not as diligent as Chinese workers and their work efficiency is low. Usually we need three to five Vietnamese workers to equal the efficiency of a single Chinese worker,” he explained.
Chinese workers usually own better skills and are easy to manage. Chinese enterprises can hardly recruit skilled Vietnamese workers. Even if they could, obstacles like culture, language, work habits and others still exist.
With more and more Chinese workers coming to Vietnam, more conflicts take place, usually caused by misunderstandings and lack of communication. Some conflicts turn into major disturbances that win the attention of the police and the media.
According to Wang, police have found some Chinese workers’ illegal identities when dealing with disturbances between Chinese and locals, and among Chinese themselves. These Chinese workers are then sent back to China.
Disturbances alone won’t usually push the Vietnamese government to send Chinese workers back. Fining is the more common practice. Usually only those without legal passports or visas, or with overdue visas, are sent back to China by the government.
“The Vietnamese government’s action doesn’t mean it’s against Chinese workers working there. They are simply trying to manage the situation and avoid conflicts and disturbances,” Wang said.
Vietnamese media tend to avoid these cases. “The media of other countries, especially China, pay more attention to this,” said a Vietnamese scholar of Chinese descent.
He believes the problem is actually the complicated relations between China and Vietnam. Vietnam’s government hopes to maintain a good relationship with China to develop its economy, which is reflected in the Vietnamese media’s mild attitude toward the case. But there are still different opinions and unfriendly voices against China in the country.
International Herald Leader