World: The Boy-State

• Share

Neither bullets nor ballots will produce the ultimate victory in Viet Nam. What is needed is an effort by the Vietnamese themselves to rebuild their society in towns and villages. Last week Premier Ky paid tribute to a unique example of Vietnamese selfhelp. It took root a year ago, when a dozen youth leaders petitioned him to let them take over an entire province and demonstrate what they could offer in leadership. Ky would not go that far, but to their surprise handed them complete administrative control of Saigon's District 8—a squalid, 3-sq.-mi. slum packed with 30,000 war refugees.

Replacing district officials, the youths marshaled 1,000 student friends, embarked on an ambitious improvement scheme. Nguyen Tan Phuoc, 19, a high school junior, began running a bulldozer on the site of the district's first public high school, which the students are building. Mai Viet Phuong, 20, organized hog co-operatives among the district's farmers. Standing in red clay soil that squished over his sandals, Luong Van Tron, 20, a law student, recalled how his pals kidded him at first about stooping to such "cheap" labor; now eight of them have joined him.

Plague & Piastres. When the first youths appeared and started shoveling away piles of garbage that had accumulated in the shantytown, the neighbors greeted their efforts with cynical amusement, figuring that the clean-cut do-gooders would soon tire of such dirty toil. One morning after two months, however, 90 locals turned out to help; from then on District 8 became a joint enterprise. Residents and student volunteers dredged 30 acres of dumps and swamps, dug drainage ditches and water reservoirs, carved out three miles of street. New homes have been started for 600 families. One hospital and 17 health centers have been built to combat, among other ills, the cholera and plague that endanger the area. In all, some 200 projects are completed or under way, and the government estimates that the youths, with a budget of 10 million piastres ($84,700), have generated 30 million piastres ($254,200) worth of construction.

Cots & Cottages. The district headquarters, a stately home usually occupied exclusively by the district chief, has been converted into a campground for the new cadres, looks like an unsupervised fraternity house with its clutter of cots and guitars. The new district chief, Mai Nhu Manh, a graduate of the National Institute of Administration, boasts only a corner bed with a mosquito net. Says a young colleague, Law Graduate Doan Thanh Liem: "The only thing that is important to us is a change in mentality, a sense of community." Only one American, a 24-year-old named Charles Sweet, is advising the youths, and he was not allowed into the district for three months.