Good morning! Hello to all new readers and welcome to the latest edition of the Vietnam Weekly, written by Ho Chi Minh City-based reporter Mike Tatarski. Today’s newsletter comes to you from Hanoi - I had already planned this trip before Yagi’s arrival, and it’s turned into something of a reporting visit.
This week’s article for paying subscribers was on Ho Chi Minh City’s ongoing inability to get its economy back on track despite the efforts of the highest levels of leadership.
Instead of my usual call to support the Vietnam Weekly financially, this week I’d suggest - if you have the means - donating to Blue Dragon Children’s Foundation, which is delivering emergency aid to people in Hanoi and other northern provinces. As you’ll read below, help is needed.
A new episode of The Vietnam Weekly Podcast drops Monday morning on all podcast platforms.
On to the news.
The Long Road to Recovery
As of 5 pm Thursday, the death toll from Typhoon Yagi and its aftermath stands at 199, with 128 people missing and 807 injured, largely from landslides. Nearly 200,000 homes across northern Vietnam have been damaged.
All of these figures will likely rise. While the region finally got a respite from rain yesterday, landslides remain a risk in hard-hit mountainous areas, and rescuers haven’t even reached some areas yet.
Thankfully the worst is over for Hanoi as the Red River is receding, though outlying districts will likely be flooded for some time. River flooding was the worst in 20 years, forcing the closure of numerous bridges in multiple provinces (in addition to destroying one major bridge) and inundating parts of the capital outside of the dyke.
The Thao River, meanwhile, broke a record set 53 years ago and the Cau River passed a mark that had stood for more than six decades. River flooding was exacerbated by dam releases ordered to reduce pressure on hydropower reservoirs in both Vietnam and China.
As of Wednesday, EVN had restored power to over 4.8 million of the nearly 6 million people who lost electricity.
On the coast, Quảng Ninh and Cát Bà Island were shredded by Yagi’s powerful winds, while numerous factories in Hải Phòng industrial parks sustained wind and water damage. (I’ve heard nothing about the status of VinFast’s factory, which sits between mainland Hải Phòng and Cát Bà.)
The worst toll has been in the mountains, especially in provinces like Lào Cai and Cao Bằng, which were hammered by relentless rain for days. Just check out the aftermath of flooding in Lào Cai City here, or the scene of a landslide that completely buried Làng Nủ Village.
Prime Minister Phạm Minh Chính visited the site yesterday as he continues to offer support in disaster zones. General Secretary Tô Lâm distributed supplies in flood-hit Tuyên Quang as well.
Yên Bái and Thái Nguyên saw heavy river flooding as well, with residential neighborhoods turned into lakes.
As a long-time resident of Vietnam, it’s incredibly upsetting to see such damage. I’m no stranger to seeing the aftermath of powerful storms having grown up on the U.S. Gulf Coast - and my own neighborhood in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
But this is extremely unusual for northern Vietnam, and remote mountainous communities in particular are hard places to live even in the best of times. It will take them a long time to recover from Yagi, even as life returns to normal in Hanoi - minus the downed trees. To give an idea of how remote these places can be, officials thought 115 people in a village in Lào Cai had gone missing, only to discover them taking shelter higher up a mountain with no cell service.
To be sure, help is on the way: Vietnamese across the country are working to bring food and supplies to impacted areas, while military helicopters have begun delivering goods to hard-to-reach locations. The Australian government provided US$3 million in support, while USAID announced US$1 million in support on Wednesday and more will come from other international partners.
Such support is badly needed, though the Vietnamese government hasn’t yet provided an estimate of overall damages given the ongoing focus on search and rescue operations in the mountains.
Yagi’s remnants also caused dangerous flooding in Laos and Thailand.
The VNG Mystery
Now for something very different.
Last Friday dozens of police officers raided the headquarters of VNG in Ho Chi Minh City’s District 7. VNG is one of Vietnam’s four tech ‘unicorns,’ or startups valued at over US$1 billion. It operates the ubiquitous Zalo messaging app, ZaloPay, gaming platforms, and more.
Articles covering the raid in Vietnamese media quickly disappeared, leaving Reuters and Bloomberg to report on this ‘surprise investigation.’ Other than stating that it is cooperating, VNG has said nothing on the matter, nor have the police.
The following day, VNG announced that deputy CEO Kelly Wong was taking over as acting CEO, replacing Lê Hồng Minh, the company’s founder and (former?) CEO.
VNG did not, however, explain what had happened to Minh - this development is opaque even by Vietnam’s robust standards for opaqueness.
Adding to the weirdness, on Tuesday VietnamNet published an article titled ‘Le Hong Minh: The risk-taker behind VNG's rise and challenges’ which discussed some previous regulatory issues while avoiding whatever this investigation is about.
Even my normally well-informed sources have diverging takes, though there is mild consensus that it may be related to VNG’s withdrawn U.S. IPO filing.
In another twist, yesterday VNG informed the State Securities Commission that Minh, in fact, has not resigned and is still the company’s CEO - adding that Wong is simply supporting Minh.
It just so happens that VNG’s 20th anniversary was this week, leading to a number of cryptic LinkedIn posts from current and former employees, such as this.
Your guess is as good as mine, though presumably, we’ll learn more about this at some point. As Jon Russell noted in Asia Tech Review, there is cause for worry:
“Early concern has focused on the harm that the investigation could have on Vietnam’s overall startup ecosystem. IPOs and exits generally are key to bringing more investment into a country, and enabling ecosystem growth as local investors and former employees enjoy a windfall and reinvest their experience and capital. It’s impossible to say much more until further information about the investigation emerges, hopefully in the coming weeks.”
I haven’t forgotten about Data Corner - it will return!
Extra Links:
Extreme weather is making life harder for Vietnam’s delivery riders (Rest of World)
In Vietnam, environmental defense is increasingly a crime (Mongabay)
The New York Times to open permanent office in Vietnam (VnExpress International)
How did the Vietnamese Take Over the US Nail Salon Business? (Postcards from Vietnam)
The world’s coffee mostly comes from two countries. That’s a problem (The Seattle Times)
Have a great weekend!
Nope, I won't donate any penny to any organization in Vietnam. If I want to help the poor, I'd better to donate to the Church because they will know how to use money effectively to help the poor.
"USAID announced US$1 million in support on Wednesday"
kind of paltry when considered in the context of the countless tens of BILLIONS going in military support to Ukraine and Israel.........