Culture

Vietnam war veterans still forgotten after 45 years

Ho Chi Minh City, Apr 30 (EFE/EPA).- Forty-five years after the end of Vietnam War (1955-1975), hundreds of Vietnamese veterans from the defeated side who were injured in the conflict are still without any entitlement to a disability pension and are forced to work till the end to survive.Nguyen Huu, 66, still remembers Apr. 30, 1975 with bitterness as the day the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam and North Vietnamese army took Saigon – now known as Ho Chi Minh City – and sealed South Vietnam's defeat. For him it was the day "we lost our country." FOOTAGE SHOWS THE FO.LLOWING SOUNDBITES IN VIETNAMESE:MR. HUU NGUYEN (00:12 – 1:01) " April 30th, to Communists, it’s their Victory day, a day of happiness. But to we Nationalists, the people of Republic of Vietnam, this is the day we lost our country, the “National Day of Hate”. This is the day when fathers were separated from their children, wives lost their husbands, some people lost their life, some others went to jail. The grief, the misery will always stay inside me whenever I recall that day"(1:04 – 01:46) "If only there were no Communist, I would have not been a beggar but had a shelter for myself instead. And I would not have had to wander from provinces to provinces to beg for food and slept on the street.MR CHAU HONG (1:46 a 1:58) " After finishing my vocational program, I was allocated by the Department of Veteran Affairs to work at Cho Quan Hospital. "(2:22 - 3:0) "After 1975, they sacked me. I became a homeless man, then had to make brushes to earn my living and took my shelter at Thi Nghe Nursing Home. After a few months, I was taken to Song Be (Binh Duong province at present). Then I left and rented a room on Ky Dong Street to continue my craft. "(3:08 - 3:24) "Liberation came and I lost my home. They sealed a sign and locked my front door. I could not enter and that was it. "(3:37 - 3:45) "I became a homeless man in Saigon, sleep wherever I can. "