Taking advantage of mistakes to make illegal profits

(Baonghean) - Taking advantage of people's lack of knowledge, Long Son Commune Police (Anh Son) acted in a manner that is considered "arbitrary and reckless". They are law enforcement officers, but they intentionally violated the law to gain illegal profits...

At the end of October 2014, Nghe An Newspaper received a complaint from residents of Hamlet 12, Long Son Commune (Anh Son), the content of the complaint is as follows: Residents who have errors in their household registration books must pay high fines if they want to correct them. Coming to Hamlet 12, we somewhat understood the frustration of farmers in this poor rural area. Mr. NVL, one of the "sufferers" said: My wife's year of birth is 1964, but the household registration book says 1962, my daughter's year of birth is 1989, but the household registration book says 1990. The cause of the error may also be that I do not remember exactly when I made the household registration book, leading to a wrong declaration. Now I want to correct it to be consistent with other documents. However, to correct the above error, I have to pay a fine of 500,000 VND to the commune police.

In Mr. NVH's case, all documents from his identity card, resistance medals, insurance card... all recorded his year of birth as 1949, but his household registration book said 1947. Therefore, when he went to the commune police to request a correction, he was fined 500,000 VND. Mr. H said: "They said many mistakes, fined a lot, made few mistakes, fined little, then asked me "how old are you in your shirt pocket?", I found 300,000 VND left, so I owed 200,000 VND and have not paid it back yet". In Mr. NTB's case, all documents had the middle name "Thanh", but his household registration book said "Van". To complete the procedures for a bank loan, he went to the commune to request a correction, but also had to pay a fine of 1 million VND. Mr. B was upset: “I didn’t pay much attention, because I didn’t do any paperwork, and I didn’t know why I made such a mistake. But when I went to the commune, I heard the police say that this error should have been 3 million, but they only fined me 1 million. Partly because I didn’t have the money yet, and partly because I was so upset, I didn’t pay and left. But later, I needed my household registration to solve some problems, so I had to grit my teeth and pay the money...

Illustration: Hong Toai

The three cases mentioned above are only representative of many households we have approached. After paying the fine, Mr. NTB had his household registration book corrected and reissued on January 4, 2012; Mr. NVL had his household registration book corrected and reissued on January 10, 2014; Mr. NVH had his registration corrected on June 23, 2014. All households that paid the fine did not have a receipt for payment.

From the reflection of the households, verified at the commune police station, but we received the answer "must check again". However, through the argument of Mr. Nguyen Thua Giap, Head of Long Son Commune Police, somewhat revealed the incident as reflected. Because Mr. Giap said: "Pure" mistakes due to remembering the lunar date to the solar date and vice versa, each time the correction is made, the fee is 8,000 VND, but if the full name, date of birth... are "not pure" mistakes due to purpose, intentionally recorded wrongly, due to people providing wrong information... all apply the fine from 1 to 2 million as stipulated in Point b, Clause 2, Article 8 of Decree 167/2013. However, at the local level, only fines of 1 million or less can be imposed. When we mentioned looking at the fine records and receipts for cases of fines due to errors in the household registration book, Mr. Giap asserted: All have receipts and invoices. After the commune police signed the decision to impose a fine, the people went to the financial accountant to pay the money, the police did not collect it.

However, when checking at the finance department, there were no receipts for the three specific cases mentioned above. According to the commune's finance officer's response when we requested to check the fine receipts from 2012 to present: "Previously, my uncle, sister... made them so they were kept elsewhere". But right in the receipt book provided by this finance officer, there were receipts from the beginning of April 2014 to August 2014 that still did not have the name of Mr. NVH, the person who was "fined" for the mistake of correcting the year of birth from 1947 to 1949 on June 23, 2014 (correction date - PV) as we mentioned above. Returning to ask Mr. Giap about some cases of giving money without receipts to the commune police to correct errors in the household registration book, Mr. Giap calmly said, "That was the money they gave...".

With the way Long Son Commune Police handled it, except for cases of confusion from lunar to solar days and vice versa, all errors on the household registration book when people need to correct them must pay a fine. Talking to us about this issue, Lieutenant Colonel Phung Xuan Hung, Deputy Head of the Guidance and Registration Team for Residence Management, Department of Administrative Management of Social Order of the Provincial Police, said: The above errors were all due to people's mistakes, not intentional, so correcting the errors is the responsibility of the police and people only have to pay the fee to adjust the changes in the household registration book according to regulations.

Quang An