Leniency policy helps people who make mistakes to start their lives over again

1. The leaders of the Ministry of Public Security always identify the work of educating and reforming prisoners as an important task that needs to be carried out comprehensively and effectively.

For example, in just the first 6 months of 2025, Lieutenant General Le Van Tuyen, Deputy Minister of Public Security, directly inspected the work and worked with dozens of criminal enforcement agencies in the provinces; visited and worked with dozens of prisons. This shows the special attention of the leaders of the Ministry of Public Security to the work ofeducating and reforming criminals to become useful people for society.

Inmates attend a music club at Prison No. 3.

At the detention facilities, the Deputy Minister inspected each kitchen, residence, and work place of the prisoners, met with them, and encouraged them to reform well. The Deputy Minister always emphasized the need to innovate the content, form, and methods of education, maintain good implementation of policies and laws as prescribed for prisoners, inmates, and students; and required officers to understand the psychology and attitudes of prisoners in order to effectively educate and reform them, combined with leniency, humanity, and legality, and timely rewards when they have achievements to motivate them to strive.

When meeting the prisoners, Deputy Minister Le Van Tuyen often asked them in detail, especially about the rehabilitation process in the prison, whether the officers were following the correct policies and regulations, and whether they had any questions or suggestions. The Deputy Minister created conditions for the prisoners to express their thoughts and at the same time encouraged them to strive for better rehabilitation. For example, at Thanh Xuan Prison, when asked by Deputy Minister Le Van Tuyen, prisoner Hoang Van Manh timidly answered and said that this was the first time in his life he had the honor of meeting such a high-ranking leader.

“I am from Van Ban, Lao Cai, I have never left my village in my life, I have never even met the commune chairman. I have little education, no job, my neighbors invited me to transport drugs so I “did it”. I benefited from 3 times of transporting “goods”, I received 4 million VND to take my child to the hospital, I did not expect to be arrested, sentenced to 15 years in prison. When the leaders of the Ministry of Public Security asked me, I was very nervous, but also very lucky. I did not expect that in this prison, I would meet the leaders of the Ministry, be encouraged, I promised to try to study and reform well so as not to disappoint the officers” – Hoang Van Manh shared.

Lieutenant General Tran Van Thien, Director of the Department of Police for Management of Prisons, Compulsory Education Facilities, and Reform Schools, said that the work of educating and reforming prisoners must be carried out with love, making prisoners trust and feel secure in reforming. Specifically, it is necessary to ensure that all regimes for prisoners are implemented in accordance with the provisions of the law, especially the regimes of food, clothing, accommodation, daily activities, and medical care; prisoners who are sick, elderly, have serious illnesses, or infectious diseases, etc. are regularly visited and encouraged. Timely grasp the developments in prisoners' thoughts to help, share, answer, and properly and satisfactorily resolve all their legitimate and lawful complaints and petitions; organize for prisoners to study law, civic education, culture, and vocational training, while constantly improving the spiritual life of prisoners, etc., thereby helping them feel secure and trust the lenient policies of the Party and State to strive to reform and soon rebuild their lives.

Prisoners read books in Thanh Xuan Prison.

2. If only listening, without seeing pictures, surely no one would imagine that the class where everyone speaks a foreign language fluently is a club in a prison - where both "teachers" and "students" are prisoners. The education staff only play the role of guiding learning methods, creating an atmosphere and motivation for prisoners to communicate and study with each other. "Foreign language lovers group" is one of many clubs that Prison No. 3 has created and maintained for many years. Lieutenant Colonel Dao Anh Son, Deputy Warden of Prison No. 3, said that these models are highly effective in educating and reforming prisoners. Specifically, the unit is maintaining the models "Love Connection Program"; "Music lovers group", "Foreign language lovers group"...

Through the above models, a healthy and useful playground has been created, forming a self-study movement among prisoners, training a sense of discipline, perseverance, optimism, and belief in a bright and beautiful future; thereby actively working and reforming to soon return to family and society. In particular, officers have self-studied, improved their foreign language and music skills to guide and communicate with prisoners, creating closeness for prisoners to share and express their innermost thoughts and feelings, serving well the work of educating and reforming prisoners.

Or at Vinh Quang Prison, each sub-camp has an art troupe to serve the activities of prisoners during the rehabilitation process. This is also one of the measures to educate and reform prisoners, which is to organize them to participate in culture, arts, sports, and reading books and newspapers. From there, prisoners have a connection, share with each other, creating motivation for better rehabilitation. The unit has created conditions, purchased musical instruments, and equipment for arts and crafts for prisoners to practice and perform, creating a joyful atmosphere, encouraging the spirit of competition to reform and progress, and soon return to their families, communities, and society.

At Ngoc Ly Prison, each cell has a bookshelf right in the room so that when returning from work or study, prisoners can conveniently learn knowledge and improve their intelligence and spirit.

3. To create conditions for those who have reformed well to have the opportunity to return to rebuild their lives, to implement the lenient policy of the Party, the State and the humane tradition of the nation, up to now, especially from 2009 to present, the President has signed 10 decisions to grant amnesty to nearly 100,000 prisoners who have reformed, worked and studied well to return to their families and communities, and become useful citizens to society.

Most of the amnestied people who returned quickly reintegrated into the community, had stable lives and did honest work, many of them became successful businessmen or actively participated in local social activities. Through monitoring, we found that the rate of amnestied people reoffending is very low. Specifically, in the 2024 amnesty, up to now, only 5 out of a total of 3,763 amnestied people have reoffended, accounting for 0.13%.

In order to help pardoned people reintegrate into the community, the Ministry of Public Security has directed detention facilities to organize community reintegration preparation classes for prisoners eligible for pardon, providing them with basic knowledge to help them reintegrate into the community and stabilize their lives; and directed the Public Security of units and localities to proactively advise Party committees and authorities at all levels to have plans to receive, manage, educate, and help pardoned people return to the community to eliminate their inferiority complex, do honest work, stabilize their lives, and limit recidivism and violations of the law.

To support people who have completed their prison sentences and employers who have completed their prison sentences to borrow preferential loans from the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies, in 2023, the Ministry of Public Security advised the Prime Minister to issue Decision No. 22/2023/QD-TTg dated August 17, 2023 on credit policies for people who have completed their prison sentences. As of May 15, 2025, more than 11,000 people who have completed their prison sentences and those who have been pardoned have been able to borrow capital, with a total disbursement amount of nearly 1,000 billion VND.

Notably, most borrowers have used the capital for the right purpose, effectively, and the credit risk ratio is very low. This shows that the policy has met practical requirements, initially brought positive results and really entered life. Supporting access to loans not only helps people with past mistakes reintegrate but also brings benefits to families, communities and society, contributing to building a humane, tolerant and sustainable living environment...

cand.com.vn

Source: https://baolaocai.vn/chinh-sach-khoan-hong-giup-nguoi-lam-loi-lam-lai-cuoc-doi-post403659.html