LETTER
TO MR. DICK RICHTER, PRESIDENT OF THE RADIO FREE ASIA
From: Thuan T. Do
2901 W XXX street
Santa Ana, CA 92703
To:
Mr. Dick Richter
President, Radio Free Asia
2025 "M" Street, NW, Suite 300
Washington, DC 20036
Santa Ana 18th February, 2005
Dear Mr. Richter,
You are probably aware that the case of Mr. Ly Tea Hout, aka Ly Dinh Phat in
RFA broadcasts to Vietnam, has been on the Internet for the last couple of
months with a lot of netters discussing his situation, and not a few
expressing rather critical opinions of RFA in your decision to terminate his
employment as Vietnamese stringer in Phnom Penh.
After nearly eight years working for RFA, Mr. Ly Dinh Phat has earned
himself quite a name not only in Vietnam but also in Cambodia where he is a
household name. This is because, and only because of his reporting from
Cambodia that the Vietnamese Diaspora in that country is known to the
outside world and to the Vietnamese audience at home in Vietnam. With his
termination RFA, for all practical purposes, has basically stopped reporting
on this million-strong component of the Vietnamese Diaspora. And RFA should
not wonder why it has essentially lost that audience in a country which is
so strategically positioned in regard to Vietnam, an audience which is
almost organically linked to the southern Vietnamese population of the
Mekong delta.
It is not our intention to inmix ourself with the quarrel between Mr. Ly Tea
Hout, who believes that he has been dealt with in a sordid manner, and the
management, especially of the Vietnamese Service, which has dismissed him so
arbitrarily. As much as we are aware of the intricacies of the case, many
in the Vietnamese media community think that RFA could have dealt with him
in a much more considerate manner--especially considering his long service
to make RFA what it is today and especially considering his situation (he is
an undocumented alien in Cambodia) which, upon hiring, RFA is fully aware
of.
Your prompt dismissal of such a loyal worker not only does severe damage to
the name of RFA, it truly impoverishes the Vietnamese program of RFA in
terms of coverage, and it sets a very poor precedent for anyone
contemplating working for your radio station--besides losing possibly a
million or more listeners, in Cambodia and in Khmer Krom country in southern
Vietnam.
As media representatives, we hope that RFA can come up with a better, more
humane and more just solution to the case of Mr. Ly Tea Hout.
Sincerely yours,
Thuan Thi Do
http://www.butvang.org/ics-uci/public_html/
