Hundreds of fishermen in Ho Chi Minh City’s Can Gio District have reportedly lost nearly VND1 billion (US$47,619) after more than two tons of fresh octopuses were seized and allowed to spoil by police in the northern province of Hai Duong.
Several lawyers have expressed the opinion that the seizure was illegal and that the police in Hai Duong had overstepped their bounds.
The fishermen and the traders who represented them are demanding compensation from Hai Duong police, who have rejected the demand thus far, saying they have done nothing wrong. Vietnam’s 2012 annual per capita income was $1,555.
On May 27, Nguyen Quang Hung was driving more than two tons of fresh octopuses caught in HCMC from Hanoi’s Noi Bai International Aiport to Quang Ninh Province’s Mong Cai Town more than 300 kilometers away.
Hung’s truck was pulled over midway by traffic police in Hai Duong Province’s Chi Linh Commune at around 11 p.m. and sent to the provincial police department’s environmental police division on the grounds that the goods “were of unclear origin and had no quarantine certificates.
According to Hung, when the octopus started spoiling at around 4 a.m. of May 28 as it was not preserved, the police allowed him to take back his truck and the consignment, but he refused to accept the rotting seafood.
But Senior Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Trong Thai, deputy director of the environmental police division, said the responsibility for the spoiled octopuses was on the driver since his office had allowed the latter to receive the vehicle and goods at 1:15 a.m.
Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper found that the official permission for the truck to leave was delivered to the parking lot of the police station only at 10 a.m.
The octopus traders in HCMC’s Can Gio District have demanded that the the Hai Duong environmental police division compensate them for losses of nearly VND1 billion, but this has been rejected. Now the traders plan to take their complaints to the Ministry of Public Security and the court.
Several lawyers have said that the environmental police did not have the right to ask for quarantine papers, as this was vested with the animal health agency.
Do Huy Long, a senior official with the Department of Animal Health under the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, said with aquatic products that are consumed in the domestic market and not from a region where marine creatures have been reported to be ill, there is no call for authorities to ask for quarantine certificates.
He also said that his department’s HCMC branch has confirmed that there are no health problems with octopuses in HCMC in general and Can Gio District in particular.
Long also said his agency was yet to receive any report on the case, so he could not conclude “who was right or wrong.”
Colonel Pham Van Loan, deputy director of the Hai Duong police department, said Saturday the consignment was destroyed on Tuesday as it had disintegrated and causing pollution.
Tran Van Dong, a resident of Can Gio’s Can Thanh Town, was quoted by Tuoi Tre Sunday as saying that he and other 16 other traders are responsible for the catch of more than 400 households in Can Gio.
Late last month the traders had assembled the the biggest octopus consignment in recent years, owing to a high tide that the fishermen said offered their families more than twice the normal catch of between one and two kilos a day.
For nearly a decade, the traders have brought the octopuses to the Tan Son Nhat International Airport from where it was sent to northern provinces and cities including Hanoi, Hai Phong and Quang Ninh. After the catch is sold, the money is sent to the south two or three days later, the Tuoi Tre report said.
Dong of Can Thanh Town said middlemen like him will only know the exact selling price of the octopuses after purchasers in the north have sold the goods, and they would then deduct costs such as fuel for transportation and ice used to preserve the octopuses, and give the rest to the fishermen.
The middlemen are paid a commission of a few thousand dongs a kilo of octopus sold, he said.
Meanwhile, Truong Thi Khanh, another trader, said apart from the VND1 billion loss from the destroyed octopuses, the fishermen in Can Gio were also burdened with debts of VND140 million in total for packaging, ice and transportation costs.
After this bust, many fishermen have lost their capital. How can they survive if another consignment is busted and the octopuses die and rot?
2008 by Thanhniennews.com