HOCA ceases to serve Vietnam

Yesterday the Micronational Professional Registry (MPR) took Vietnam off the list of recognised nation-states.

The decision by the MPR to give Vietnam a natio non grata status came as a result of the nth consecutive piece of news which demonstrates that Vietnam has laws on paper that are not worth the paper on which they are printed.

While the Micronational Professional Registry (MPR) was concerned about human rights violations, particularly religious discrimination towards Christians and towards ethnic minorities in remote areas, the MPR was also forced to take Vietnam off its list of recognised nation-states for more practical reasons. If laws on paper are not sufficient to uphold the law at all times in Vietnam, and authorities can arbitrarily follow the law one day, and violate the same law on the next, this means that also diplomas and degrees issued by schools and universities in Vietnam are entirely suspect from a professional perspective.

In support of MPR’s determinination, the Hands of Change Association (HOCA), MPR Member 006024, has also decided it will no longer serve Vietnam. The HOCA representative in Thailand, who has also served Vietnam in the past, has been notified by email to stop her work with Vietnam.

The Hands of Change Association (HOCA), an independent Arizona non-profit corporation, is a secretarial service that serves the interests and needs of the Sovereign Military-religious Order of Teutonic Knights Templars of the Church of Nobles of Present-day Brethren (Germanite Brethren), and this church owns the Royal Institute of the Americas high school and William Cullen Bryant University. HOCA’s decision, therefore, means Vietnamese students will no longer able able to earn General Equivalency diplomas or degrees through the schools owned by the Church of Nobles of Present-day Brethren (Germanite Brethren).

It is significant to note that the Micronational Professional Registry (MPR) doesn’t require its members to follow or even acknowledge its decisions, yet yesterday’s MPR decision to stop recognising Vietnam, and the justification provided for this determination, were sufficient for the Hands of Change Association (HOCA) to also cease serving Vietnam.

MPR kicks Vietnam out

The Micronational Professional Registry (MPR) has today taken Vietnam off the list of recognised nation-states.

MPR nation-states are recognised in a de facto manner only, since the MPR is not a government organisation. MPR is merely a professional agency with additional special functions. Nonetheless, this decision also has political repercussions, since Independent Long Island (ILI) and the United Micronations Multi-Oceanic Archipelago (UMMOA) recognise no states in a non-diplomatic or de facto manner except as MPR member nation-states.

The decision by the MPR to give Vietnam a natio non grata status came as a result of the nth consecutive piece of news which demonstrates that Vietnam has laws on paper that are not worth the paper on which they are printed.

According to a story published in Compass Direct News, in Dak Lak province, local government authorities destroyed a new wooden church building erected in September by Hmong Christians in Cu Hat village. Police wielding electric cattle prods beat back hundreds of distraught Christians who rushed to the site to protect the building. One woman even fainted after being poked in the stomach with an electric cattle prod. Villagers now fear she may miscarry. A child suffered a broken arm in the incident. At the end of the day, another badly injured woman had not yet been returned to the village, and authorities would not divulge where she was either.

Although virtually all buildings in this area of Vietnam are erected without building permits, local authorities accused the Christians of illegal construction, and ordered the congregation to voluntarily tear the building down.

Several Ho Chi Minh City congregations of the legally-recognized Evangelical Church of Vietnam (South Vietnam) on 12 and 13 December were allowed to hold a large Christmas celebration event in a soccer stadium. Vietnam Good News Mission and Church, on the other hand, for more than a year has tried to register more than a hundred of its congregations without any success. Contrary to Vietnam’s new religion legislation, these requests for registration have either been denied or ignored.

Besides being heartless towards Christian believers during the approaching Christmas season, this also seems to be the nth case of religious discrimination towards Christians, as well as discrimination towards ethnic minorities in remote areas.

Besides the human rights violations, the Micronational Professional Registry (MPR) was also forced to take Vietnam off its list of recognised nation-states for more practical reasons.

If laws on paper are not sufficient to uphold the law at all times in Vietnam, and authorities can capriciously and arbitrarily follow the law one day, and violate the same law on the next, this means that also diplomas and degrees issued by schools and universities in Vietnam are entirely suspect from a professional perspective. Since the MPR is not a party or signatory to the Hague Convention of 1961, abolishing the requirement of diplomatic or consular legalisation for foreign public documents, it has no obligation to accept such documents, which may have been issued by equally corrupt or arbitrary educational institutions.

Originally Vietnam was made an MPR member because the Governor of Independent Long Island (ILI) and the United Micronations Multi-Oceanic Archipelago (UMMOA) was a sponsor of a child from Vietnam through Childreach. The MPR honours people and professionals first, then it recognises any possible companies, organisations, schools, universities, institutions, jurisdictions, dominions, nations, micronations, territories or States.