REFLECTIONS ON DEMOCRACY, DICTATORSHIP AND ONE-SIDED RULE, ADDRESSED TO ALL COMMUNITY MEMBERS IN VICTORIA
Dear Community Leaders and members,
Over the last few weeks, I have received many phone calls and letters from you inquiring about the upcoming election, whether I will be leading a team for the Executive Committee for the 2026–30 term, and about the direction our Community will take going forward. I sincerely thank you for your heartfelt concern, and I would like to share a few thoughts from the bottom of my heart.
Recently, someone, with admirable enthusiasm, told me he would vote for me if I were to be… “a dictator.” I understand where he was coming from: he wants our Community to have strong, decisive leadership that is not scattered or disrupted. That is a perfectly reasonable aspiration.
But dear friends, please recall why we had to leave our motherland. It was precisely because we could not accept a dictatorial regime, could not accept a situation where one person or a group of people imposed their will upon everyone else. So why, on this free soil, would we allow that same spirit to take root within our very own community?
Standing against Communism means standing against dictatorship, against oppression, against one-sided rule. This is not merely a slogan. It is an ideal that generations have shed blood to uphold. If our Community is to be worthy of that ideal, it must begin with the very way we organise and govern ourselves from within.
When we took on this responsibility in 2022, the Community was facing a serious crisis: a debt of $200,000 to the City of Brimbank Council, funds that had been transferred to a “private” company established and controlled by former presidents without the knowledge of community members, and an atmosphere of division and mistrust that hung over everything.
The so-called Vietnamese Musium Australia Ltd was referred to as a “private” company not because we invented that term or made it up. Can a company where the founders remain leaders in perpetuity, even if they were to become mentally incapacitated, truly be called a “private” company?
There is nothing inherently wrong with someone wanting to establish a private Vietnamese Musium Australia Ltd. But as I have emphasised, this was a “private” company set up by former presidents, who transferred Community projects and assets into their own hands without the knowledge of community members whatsoever.
We did not back down. Step by step, we restored order and rebuilt trust. The Constitutional Amendment General Meeting on 17 December 2023, attended by nearly 200 community members with over 96% voting in favour of removing Chapter VI and returning to the Constitution passed in 2012, marked the moment our community firmly and unequivocally declined to bear any responsibility for the “private” Museum Institute Company established by those former presidents.
Following that, the Constitutional Amendment General Meeting on 24 December 2024, attended by nearly 200 community members with over 75% voting in favour of an entirely new Constitution, stands as an unprecedented democratic milestone in the history of our community in Victoria.
Today, the fact that many people wish to form teams and stand for election is a genuinely encouraging sign. It is the most vivid evidence that our community has truly returned to good health. The era of one-sided rule that lasted for more than two decades has passed and will not return.
However, dear community members, every vote is a choice for the future. You will decide whether to continue building on the foundation of the 2024 Constitution that the overwhelming majority of community members endorsed, or to turn back toward the disputes and divisions of the past. That is each person’s private right, according to their own understanding.
The position of our Community Building and Development Team has always been very clear: we value healthy competition within the framework of the law and the Constitution. We are ready to invite fellow tickets to join in community activities, including the Community Fundraising Gala on Friday, 5 June 2026 at Happy Reception.
Voter turnout is the measure of our credibility before Australian authorities. A large, active community that participates in elections and has a legitimate leadership will carry real weight and hold a deserving place in this democratic, multicultural society.
If entrusted with your confidence, we will continue to build and develop the Community based on four pillars: connecting associations and individuals, mutual respect, transparency in all activities, and looking toward the future. We work not for any faction or any individual, but for the entire Vietnamese Community in Victoria.
Dear Community Leaders and members,
“Winning or losing” is not what we place above all else. What matters more is that all of us, regardless of which ticket we belong to, join hands in bearing responsibility for our community. For this Community does not belong to any one person. It is a spiritual legacy that those who came before us preserved through blood, sweat and tears, and it is a heritage we must pass on intact, and indeed pass on even more beautifully, to the generations who come after us.
The Yellow Flag with Three Red Stripes that we hold dear is not merely a symbol of the past. It is a symbol of freedom and democracy, and it is the guiding light for the present and the future. Please join us in keeping that flame of freedom burning.
Yours respectfully,
Nguyen Quang Duy
President of Vietnamese Community in Australia – Victoria Chapter
Lead Candidate, Community Building and Development Team
