Commune creates fake list, 'soaks' disaster relief money

For many years, the people of Dien Hai commune (Dien Chau) have been extremely upset when they learned that the State's support money for households with losses in agricultural production due to natural disasters has not yet reached them. And recently, the people were even more upset when they learned that the list compiled by the People's Committee and Dien Hai Agricultural Cooperative was a fake list, with forged signatures of the people.

Many crop areas affected in 2011 were not listed by local authorities, making payment impossible.

Regarding this issue, Mr. Nguyen Xuan Vinh - Vice Chairman of Dien Chau District People's Committee said that recently, the District Party Committee's Inspection Committee also came to work to clarify the responsibilities of the relevant officials. "The inspection results of the Dien Chau District Party Committee's Inspection Committee showed that the above list was created by the cooperative and the locality and forged the signatures of the people. Currently, the district is assigning the commune to hold a meeting with the people to create an accurate list, then submit it to the district and the treasury to withdraw money to pay the people," said Mr. Vinh.

Confirming that the list compiled by the government and Dien Hai Agricultural Cooperative at that time was not accurate, Mr. Nguyen Van Vien - Deputy Head of the Inspection Committee of Dien Chau District Party Committee said that this meant that the number of households and the area of ​​damage listed were also not accurate. Meanwhile, the people who suffered damage were real, but at that time there were no documents or books to record it.

Regarding this issue, Mr. Phan Van Thuyen - Chairman of Dien Hai Commune People's Committee said that the commune had held meetings with people in each hamlet, reviewed the list to pay the money, but because the list at that time was made falsely, many people who were not victims were included in the list of beneficiaries, so the people did not agree. "The people proposed to "equalize" and divide it among all the people in the commune, but this plan was not approved by the district, so the amount of 259 million VND was deposited into the treasury account, waiting for instructions from superiors," said Mr. Thuyen.

Mr. Nguyen Van Thanh - a resident of Dien Hai commune (Dien Chau) said that the disciplinary action against the violating officials was not satisfactory.

Previously, in 2011, Dien Hai commune was affected by 3 natural disasters: storm No. 2, September floods and severe cold, causing heavy damage to agricultural production. In that situation, Nghe An province decided on a policy to support people to restore agricultural production by spending more than 148 million VND from the budget for 1,427 households/10 villages in the whole commune.

Dien Chau district supported 613 households with more than 50 million VND. In the winter-spring crop of 2011, Dien Hai commune continued to suffer from severe cold, causing crops of 697 households to die and be damaged. Dien Chau district supported 40 million VND. In addition, there were some other supports, the total amount of money approved by superiors for Dien Hai commune to restore production and support difficulties was 259 million VND.

After the decision, Dien Hai commune withdrew money from the treasury twice with the amount of 136 million VND and transferred 40 million VND to the budget of Dien Hai Agricultural Cooperative, leaving more than 95 million VND in the commune budget. Up to now, the commune has not yet completed the procedures to withdraw 122 million VND to pay to the people. The amount of 40 million VND transferred to the Cooperative has not been paid to the people even though more than 6 years have passed.

On February 9, 2017, the monitoring delegation of the People's Council of Dien Hai commune had a working session with the People's Committee of the commune on this issue and concluded: The People's Committee and the Commune Finance Board have not yet organized the payment of support money to the people according to the above decisions, which is against the regulations and lacks a sense of responsibility to the people.

Dien Hai Commune People's Committee Headquarters - where the above violations occurred.

Regarding this issue, Mr. Nguyen Xuan Vinh - Vice Chairman of Dien Chau District People's Committee added: "If there is real damage, it will be paid to the people. If there is no damage, the district will collect it and return it to the province. According to regulations, if the money is not paid to the people after 1 year, it will be collected. This happened from 2011 to 2015 and was only discovered."

Thus, up to this point, the legitimate rights of people who suffered losses in agricultural production due to natural disasters and have been supported by the State for more than 6 years have not been resolved. We request the People's Committee of Dien Chau district to promptly take measures to resolve the issue, ensure the legitimate rights of farmers, and discipline officials who have violated the regulations.

In response to the violations of the leaders of the People's Committee of Dien Hai Commune, recently, the Dien Chau District Party Committee has taken disciplinary action in the form of a Party warning, and transferred Mr. Tran Van Tien - Secretary of the Party Committee of Dien Hai Commune (former Chairman of the People's Committee of Dien Hai Commune at that time) to the position of Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee of another commune. The Commune Party Committee has conducted a Party review and reprimand against Mr. Ha Van Tai - an accounting officer and Mr. Bui Van Tien - a land officer of the commune.

However, many people do not agree with the decisions to discipline the violating officials. Mr. Le The Luy and Mr. Nguyen Van Thanh (residents of the commune) sent petitions to many levels of agencies requesting higher disciplinary measures for the officials at that time. According to Mr. Thanh, the level of warning for Mr. Tran Van Tien and transfer to the position of Deputy Secretary of another commune is too light.

After receiving the citizen's petition, the Dien Chau District Party Committee's Inspection Commission issued a document responding to the citizen with the content, the violations of the Dien Hai commune officials have been verified, concluded and disciplined by the competent authorities according to the regulations. Currently, the Nghe An Provincial People's Committee has issued a document assigning the Chairman of the Dien Chau District People's Committee to direct the handling of the citizen's complaint according to the regulations, and report to the Provincial People's Committee before February 28, 2018.