The First Vietnamese Newspaper in Australia: Người Việt Tự Do, 01/11/1975
By Đoàn Việt Trung
(VCA Federal President 2000-2001, 2002-2003)
May 2025
Editor’s Note: Nhan Quyen would like to introduce a series of articles by author Doan Viet Trung dedicated to Nhan Quyen on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the search for freedom. Article 1 is about the Consular Agreement between Australia and Vietnam to protect Vietnamese Australians if they are detained in Vietnam. Article 2 is about a number of opinion articles by the Vietnamese community published in major Australian newspapers. Article 3 is about how the community convinced a publisher to revise its Australian high school textbooks that had provided a one-sided view of the Vietnam War. Article 4 is about one of the first Vietnamese newspapers in Australia, published on November 1, 1975. Articles 1, 2, and 3 are also published in the Yearbook that the Vietnamese Community in Australia/Queensland Chapter is about to publish (see attached front and back covers). Dr Cuong Bui passed away on 06 March, aged 80. Over nearly 30 years, the 2 men collaborated on a wide variety of community issues.
Article 4 of 4
Six months after Saigon was lost, on November 1, 1975, the late Dr. Nguyễn Văn Hưng published the first issue of Người Việt Tự Do (The Free Vietnamese) newspaper in Clayton, Victoria (see IMAGE 1).
To download the full 20-page issue’s PDF, please go here: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/c42o0lvh9dit2f26jfdlc/Bao-Viet-dau-tien-o-Uc-Nguoi-Viet- Tu-Do-so-ra-mat-01-11-1975-nvtd.pdf
Người Việt Tự Do – the First Vietnamese Newspaper in Australia
At the time, I was a student at Monash University. I created a “pocket library” in the Union Building of the Monash Student Union, to distribute and archive Người Việt Tự Do and other overseas Vietnamese newspapers. I call it a “pocket library” because it was just part of a shelf in a room for books and newspapers in the Union Building.
I also reached out to Vietnamese student associations which I knew of, asking them to send their newspapers to this library.
A number of overseas student associations sent newspapers to this pocket library, but in Australia, I didn’t see any other Vietnamese newspapers at that time. So, as far as I know, Người Việt Tự Do was the first Vietnamese newspaper in Australia.
Cartoons in Người Việt Tự Do
From the second issue onward, I contributed content by drawing cartoons for several issues of Người Việt Tự Do.
At that time, the technology was very basic — printing was done by hand using a Rodeo duplicator, the newspaper was sent by postal mail, and drawings were done by hand.
Unfortunately, during a house move I threw away a stack of about 5–7 issues, keeping only the first one as a keepsake. However, I still remember the content of one cartoon I had drawn for an issue of Người Việt Tự Do.
Today, I’ve redrawn that cartoon (see IMAGE 2). This cartoon depicts how the Communist Party deliberately terrorised the people of South Vietnam, including planting mines on roads to kill bus passengers or throwing grenades into markets to massacre women shoppers. Those bloody, horrific images — torso is here, legs are there — remain vivid in many people’s memories, including mine.
Later on, the club of cowardly terrorist organisations that included the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) welcomed new members such as Al Qaeda and ISIS. All of them have policies of targeting civilians. All of them kill deliberately and systematically. The CPV would probably be proud to be in the same league as such organisations.
“A Beginning”
On page 1 of Người Việt Tự Do, under the headline “A Beginning,” Dr. Nguyễn Văn Hưng wrote:
“We earnestly desire peace. But we oppose the concealment of the truth.” (IMAGE 3).
Fifty years on, the truth in Vietnam is still being concealed.
—The End—
