Vietnam jails 30 people for graft worth US$45 million

HANOI: A court in Vietnam on Friday (Jul 11) jailed 30 people including several former senior officials over graft that cost the state US$45 million, with one ex-official convicted of taking suitcases stuffed with cash bribes.

The communist nation's crackdown on corruption in recent years has seen two presidents and three deputy prime ministers deposed and top business leaders taken down.

On Friday, state media said a Hanoi court announced verdicts for 30 former officials and 11 businesspeople charged with bribery, abuse of power and violating bidding and contracting laws.

Thirty of the 41 were convicted of corruption that prosecutors say caused damages worth more than 1.16 trillion dong (US$44.6 million) to the state, Public Security News said.

The bribes themselves totalled far less.

Prosecutors said that between 2010 and 2024, chairman of the Phuc Son Group, Nguyen Van Hau, spent over US$5 million bribing officials to win contracts in over a dozen multi-billion-dollar infrastructure projects in three provinces.

Hau brought suitcases of cash to other defendants' offices or private residences for the bribes, prosecutors say.

For that and other violations he was handed 30 years in prison.

Former party chief of Vinh Phuc province Hoang Thi Thuy Lan was given 14 years behind bars for taking the biggest bribes - almost US$2 million in suitcases weighing up to 60kg.

"I recognise my mistakes and my crime and fully accept the indictment," Lan told the court.

"I would like to ask the court to reduce sentences for my comrades in the most humanitarian manner," she said.

According to lawyers, Hau and his group paid over US$45 million as compensation for the damages in the case.

In April, Vietnam jailed former deputy minister of industry and trade Hoang Quoc Vuong for six years after finding him guilty of "power abuse" in a solar energy development plan.

The 62-year-old had admitted to taking a US$57,600 bribe to favour solar power plants in southern Ninh Thuan province, but his family paid the amount back before the sentencing.