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News
December 5, 2002
Vietnam restrains lavish
bridal feasts
HANOI (Reuters)
- Communist Vietnam is cracking down on traditionally lavish wedding parties
thrown by government employees, ordering that no state money be used to fund
them.
"Weddings should be held in a civilised and economical way for family members,
relatives and friends. They should not be organised luxuriously and wastefully,"
Deputy Prime Minister Pham Gia Khiem was quoted as saying in Thursday's Vietnam
News daily.
Hanoi is concerned about the image of free-spending government officials as it
pushes ahead with an anti-corruption drive.
Nuptials in the Southeast Asian country of 80 million are serious affairs,
sometimes lasting several days with lunches and dinners hosted for work
colleagues, friends and relatives.
October through December are popular months for weddings, and expensive
convention halls such as the glitzy Hanoi Tower in the capital city are often
booked for banquets.
Khiem, one of three deputy prime ministers, also warned state employees not to
host weddings during work hours. The interior ministry had been ordered to
produce a set of rules on how to hold "proper, economical and civilised
weddings", the report said.
Even the media have been roped into the campaign. The newspaper said they had
been asked to produce stories that depict modest weddings between state workers.
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India's OVL awaits
first fruit of Vietnam venture
NEW DELHI (Asia
Times Online) - India's thrust to attain oil security through acquisition
abroad will produce its first fruit this month when the US$200 million
investment in a Vietnamese offshore field will start producing gas, Federal
Petroleum Minister Ram Naik said Wednesday.
The US$1.3 billion Nam Con Son project, where Oil and Natural Gas Corporation
Videsh Ltd (OVL) has acquired 45 percent stake, should start producing 3 billion
cubic meters of natural gas annually from December 6, he told a seminar on the
petroleum sector here. OVL, the overseas arm of state-run exploration firm Oil
and Natural Gas Corporation, would give US$60 million in revenue annually from
the venture.
The project would transmit gas along a 399km pipeline, the world's longest
gas-and-liquid pipeline, to a power complex south of commercial hub Ho Chi Minh
City, he said. At the initial stage, the basin, which is located 360 km off
southern Vietnam, would see 2.7 million cubic meter of gas per day. OVL's
Vietnam venture has British Petroleum, with a 26.66 percent stake, as operator
while PetroVietnam, the national oil company of Vietnam, has a 15 percent stake.
The remaining 13.33 percent stake is with Statoil.
Naik said OVL has invested about US$200 million in the venture that should also
produce 0.1 million tonnes of light oil condensate annually, of which India's
share should be around US$4-5 million. The project should pay off the
investments in four years.
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