Prevent illegal entry to celebrate Tet safely

Happy Tet in a foreign land

In recent days, every evening, Mr. Phan Van Dong (65 years old), in Dien Thap commune (Dien Chau), calls Laos to visit and encourage his children. Not having a social media account to connect with his children, each time he has to ask his 15-year-old nephew to call for him. “I never called them before, whoever wanted to call them could call. But now it’s different, I understand they are very sad, they really want to go home to celebrate Tet. All of them have never had to celebrate Tet away from home. So I have to call to encourage them,” Mr. Dong said.

Like many other households in this wealthy countryside, Mr. Dong has four sons working in Laos. His sons' businesses are all doing very well, despite a turbulent year with the Covid-19 pandemic. After a year of hard work, they all want to return home to celebrate Tet and reunite with their families. "Everyone intends to return home. But to return home legally, they have to be quarantined for 14 days. They don't have enough time to rest that much, so they intend to return illegally. They said that the cost is not a problem, and many brokers have suggested that they are willing to bring my children back in many forms and ways," said Mr. Dong.

However, after the local authorities repeatedly came to persuade him, Mr. Dong firmly refused to let his children return home for Tet, convincing them to accept celebrating Tet in a foreign country for the first time. “If they return home, it will not only violate the law. But if something happens, it will affect the entire community. What if the whole village and the whole family miss Tet because they are sent to a centralized quarantine area. So it is best for everyone, for a safe Tet,” Mr. Dong said.

A group of illegal immigrants were discovered. Photo: Contributor

However, not all families are as conscious as Mr. Dong. In recent days, authorities have continuously discovered workers from Dien Thap commune illegally entering the country. In one day, authorities even arrested 4 people from this commune for organizing illegal immigration.

Mr. Dau Xuan Manh - Chairman of Dien Thap Commune People's Committee said that the whole commune currently has about 800 workers working in Laos. Due to the close geographical distance, every year, these workers often return to their hometowns to celebrate Lunar New Year with their families. "With the current complicated epidemic situation, if these workers return to their hometowns together, management and supervision will be very difficult. Therefore, we are very diligently going to each family to persuade people to stay and celebrate Tet in Laos," said Mr. Manh.

Many ways to enter the country illegally

Nghe An is one of the localities with the largest number of workers working abroad in the country. In recent days, many workers have ignored regulations and found every way to return home to celebrate Tet illegally. They are willing to spend a large sum of money, willing to go by any means, with the purpose of returning home to celebrate Tet with their families. According to data from the Nghe An Provincial Border Guard, the unit has recently discovered more than 200 people illegally entering from Laos, most of them are freelance workers in Laos, without management records.

Most recently, on the night of January 18, in Nam Giai commune (Que Phong), the patrol force of Hanh Dich Border Guard Station discovered7 workers are sneaking around, illegally entered the country across the border. They are all workers at the Nam Xang 3 Hydropower Plant (Laos) who now want to return home, but because they are afraid of being quarantined, they have found a way to enter the country illegally. A few days earlier, in Thong Thu commune, Thong Thu Border Guard Station arrested two people who were illegally entering Vietnam from Laos. These two people confessed that, six months ago, someone guided them across the border to Laos to work as workers for the Atapeu Hydropower Company...

A male worker from Dien Chau was discovered lying on the roof of a cabin to enter the country illegally. Photo: DH

In addition, in other provinces such as Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Quang Tri... these days, illegal immigrants from Laos have been continuously discovered to be returning home for Tet. It is worth mentioning that most of the people discovered, as well as the brokers and organizers of illegal immigration, are from Nghe An.

In Quang Tri, on January 19 alone, the Lao Bao International Border Guard Station arrested 9 cases, 29 people illegally entering from Laos. Most of them were from Dien Chau (Nghe An). A few days earlier, the authorities discovered 6 people from the same hometown of Dien Thap (Dien Chau) and Do Thanh (Yen Thanh), illegally entering from Laos to Vietnam. They each had to pay 7 million VND to a ring led by 4 people from the same hometown of Dien Thap to smuggle people into the country illegally. At Cau Treo Border Guard Station (Ha Tinh), on the afternoon of January 21, the border guards even discovered a Nghe An worker hiding on the ceiling of a truck cabin to illegally enter the country.

Efforts to close the border

In the days leading up to Tet, many forests in the mountainous district of Ky Son were covered in ice. Cold spells continued to arrive. However, the biting cold did not deter the border guards on duty guarding the border here. They continued to patrol the forest day and night, in order to promptly detect illegal immigration.

Border guards patrol the border in the cold. Photo: Tien Hung

Captain Tran Van Cong - Deputy Head of My Ly Border Guard Station said that the station has less than 60 officers and soldiers responsible for managing the nearly 50 km long border. However, due to the complicated developments of the epidemic, the station has been reinforced with more than 20 officers and soldiers. These days, facing the increasing risk of illegal workers returning home to celebrate Tet, the unit has had to increase patrols, day and night, in an effort to close the border, minimizing the number of illegal workers from Laos entering the community. In addition, a series of checkpoints and control teams have remained steady for nearly a year.

“Not only do workers return home to celebrate Tet with their families, but there is another risk that local people here have the custom of visiting relatives on the other side of the border during Tet. That is why, these days we have been busy coordinating with the authorities to visit each household to propagate and encourage people not to illegally cross the border to visit relatives,” said Captain Cong.

Warming up after patrolling to prevent illegal entry. Photo: Tien Hung

At Nam Can International Border Gate, recently, although the functional forces and local authorities have made great efforts to prevent and at the same time propagate and mobilize people not to illegally cross the border, brokers, out of greed, still secretly bring people across the border in many forms. "In order to prevent illegal entry and not spread the epidemic to the community, we are organizing many synchronous measures. First, we must step up propaganda to people in border areas, second, we must carry out procedures and inspections well at the border gate and especially do a good job of patrolling and arresting those who bring people into the country illegally, closing the border", said Lieutenant Colonel Trinh Van Que - Deputy Head of Nam Can Border Guard Station.

Senior Lieutenant General Ho Quyet Thang - Deputy Commander of Nghe An Border Guard said that to ensure a safe Tet holiday, the unit is closely coordinating with the border authorities to grasp the situation and number of workers in Laos. Thereby, classifying them from the beginning, promptly performing the quarantine task when these people return to the country legally. At the same time, based on the number of Vietnamese workers abroad, strict checkpoints are organized to minimize the number of illegal immigrants.

Associate Professor, Dr. Duong Dinh Chinh - Director of Nghe An Department of Health said that the epidemic situation in countries around the world is very complicated, many countries in the region are having to use strong measures such as social isolation. The second more worrying reason is the appearance of variant viruses, these viruses spread faster, and vaccines cannot be widely used until the fourth quarter. Therefore, people cannot be subjective about the Covid-19 pandemic, although Nghe An has not recorded any cases so far. "Through this, we hope that departments, branches, local authorities and people strictly follow the instructions on epidemic prevention and control, and raise vigilance against this epidemic," Mr. Chinh called.