Land Reform Urgent Need In Vietnam

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31621, 6 March 1968, Page 9

Land Reform Urgent Need In Vietnam

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter —Copyright) WASHINGTON, March 5.

South Vietnam needs urgent land reform if its agricultural countryside is to be made secure from the Viet Cong, according to a United States Congressional Committee report. The committee adds, how- of the past 14 years provides ever, that based on its past scant basis for the hope that record, the South Vietnamese the Government of South Government is unlikely to Vietnam will institute such a start a meaningful system of programme in the near redistributing the land in the future.” near future,

The Government Operations Committee is harshly critical in its report of American officials in Vietnam for their “uncertainty and indecision” in, land reform, adding that the thrust for an aggressive new policy must come from Washington. .In another section of the report, the committee criticises the “lack of co-operation and commitment” by the Saigon Government in handling American economic aid. Even with military victories over the Viet Cong, the committee says, the pacification of the countryside will be difficult unless land reform is begun immediately.

The report says that, since 1962, the South Vietnamese Government has acquired no land for the land reform programme, and that only a limited distribution of Gov-ernment-held land to the peasants has taken place. The Communist guerrillas, on the other hand, are operating their own land reform system, which is winning for them the allegiance of the peasants.

“In these circumstances, pacification will be difficult to achieve unless military victories over the Viet Cong are accompanied by immediate and meaningful efforts in the field of land reform,” the report says. “Unfortunately, the record