"Abolish the Khmer ethnic culture" is an absurd and demagogue argument

Cultural activities of Khmer people. Photo: BA THI

Recently, some bad actors in Tra Vinh province have taken advantage of a number of problems such as: breaking the welcome gate, not including ethnicity and religion in the citizen's identity; fabricated information that the government would not allow people to organize folk games on the occasion of the traditional Chol Chnam Thmay Festival in 2023, etc. to make a false claim that “the Vietnamese government wants to abolish Khmer culture. , wants to implement the policy of "assimilation of the Khmer people". This is a misrepresentation and demagogy in order to entice and incite the Khmer people in the province in particular and the Khmer in the Southwest region in general to participate in activities against the great national unity bloc in the province. area.

In fact, since the founding of the Party, our Party has always attached great importance to the preservation and promotion of traditional cultural values ​​of the ethnic Vietnamese people, considering it the endogenous strength of the people. Vietnamese people to defeat all invaders.

During his lifetime, President Ho Chi Minh once advised: "The Kinh or Tho, the Muong or the Man, the Gia Rai or the Ede, the Xe Dang or the Ba Na, and other ethnic minorities, are all descendants of Vietnam. blood brothers…”. He affirmed: "We must love each other, respect each other, and help each other to pursue the common happiness of us and our children", or in the treasure of Vietnamese folk songs and proverbs there is a saying. "My dear, I love to take the same squash, although they are different from each other, they share the same truss". That is the basis for affirming that in the process of nation building, defending the country and building an increasingly civilized and modern country, the Vietnamese ethnic community always upholds the tradition of love, solidarity, equality and respect. respect and help each other for sustainable development under a common roof and “leave no one behind”.

Our Party and State always attach great importance to the cultural diversity of the Vietnamese ethnic community, considering it an extremely valuable heritage of the nation. That is reflected in the process of formulating and implementing policies for ethnic minority areas. Respect and protect cultural diversity or in other words, the cultures of ethnic groups in Vietnam are all equal, there is no distinction between "high culture" and "low culture", no matter what. What is the point of considering the culture of this and that ethnic group as "backward" in the minds of most Vietnamese people, as well as in the cultural development policies of the Party and State.

Currently, ensuring cultural diversity or in other words preserving and promoting the cultural values ​​of the Vietnamese ethnic community has helped the country to stand firm in the face of difficulties and complexities in the world. national and international, especially good resilience to "shocks" of the weather situation, epidemics, financial and economic crises... from the outside. Cultural diversity has enriched the common treasure of Vietnamese culture and is also an important factor for our country to develop dramatically and achieve the position and status it is today.

Our Party and State have been implementing many important policies for the comprehensive development of ethnic minority areas in Vietnam, including policies to promote the preservation and promotion of cultural identities, to consider cultural heritage. The cultural heritage of the ethnic groups is an important and inseparable part of the Vietnamese culture, which is unified in diversity.

The differences and cultural identities of each ethnic group in Vietnam are affirmed and treated equally in the spirit of respect. other factors to impose the cultural values ​​of one's community on another cultural subject. The achievements in the implementation of policies for comprehensive development of ethnic minority areas (including cultural development) are concrete examples of comprehensive promotion of the rights of ethnic groups in particular and human rights. general people in Vietnam.

Paying attention to and effectively implementing the conservation and promotion of cultural values ​​of traditional festivals of ethnic minorities such as: Chol Chnam Thmay traditional New Year, Sene Dolta festival, Ok - Om - Bok festival …; typical folk rituals such as: praying for rain, praying for peace, Neak Ta worshiping ceremony...; Traditional Buddhist rituals such as Buddha's Birthday, Summer Entry Ceremony, Exodus Ceremony, Renunciation Ceremony, Medical Offering Ceremony, etc. Traditional cultural values ​​in ceremonies related to weddings, funerals, and ceremonies The society is preserved and promoted with elements suitable for modern life.

Paying attention to well implementing the conservation and promotion of the fine traditional cultural and artistic values ​​of the Khmer people, traditional art forms that were previously at risk of being lost, now have conditions. recovery and development such as five tones, Sa dam, Ro hash (dance drama), Du ke (singing play). The preservation and promotion of traditional cultural values ​​of the Khmer people is also carried out through the policy of promoting the development of cultural and artistic movements of the masses in the region with a large number of Khmer people: the whole province has 112 teams of five-tone orchestra, 95 teams of Chhaydam drums, 35 teams of Chan-Monkey dance, over 100 teams of Tan music, 40 teams of volleyball, 8 teams of Ngo boats, folk games of ethnic minorities in festivals are held. recover and grow. Khmer Anh Binh Minh Art Troupe is invested and developed. Through cultural, artistic, physical training and sports movements, traditional arts and culture, folk games on holidays and Tet of Khmer people are preserved, promoted, adding modern elements, but still bold national identity.

The Khmer literary and artistic works are preserved and developed, and the collection and preservation of tangible and intangible cultural forms are paid attention to and invested in. Up to now, the Provincial Museum of Khmer Culture has been maintained, repaired and displayed over 1.000 valuable artifacts, serving the needs of visiting, studying and researching, as well as preserving material cultural values. material and spiritual for the Khmer people.

Currently, Khmer people have 03 national intangible cultural heritages: Cha Pai Cham Art, Ok - Om - Bok Festival and Ro - Hash Art, 06/16 national-level relics and 16 national monuments. /37 Provincial relics are cultural heritages of Khmer people. Currently, the province is implementing the project of Khmer ethnic cultural village in Tra Vinh province associated with the relics of Ang pagoda - Ba Om pond and Bo Luy relic - Lo Gach pagoda, forming a cultural and tourist complex with the goal of developing tourism while preserving and promoting the fine traditional cultural values ​​of the Khmer people.

In addition, the preservation and development of Khmer ethnic culture is also carried out through the preservation and development of languages ​​and scripts of Khmer people. school sites, 121/134 pagodas organized to teach Khmer characters in the summer; 143 boarding schools for ethnic minorities, forming the Southern Khmer Language - Culture - Art Faculty (now the Southern Khmer Language - Culture - Art School and Humanities) under Tra Vinh University; Pali - Khmer Middle School. The preservation of the Khmer language and writing is also done through the maintenance and development of various types of newspapers, radio and television, magazines and publications in the Khmer language: Currently, the province has 08 Khmer-language newspaper, published 01 times/week, distributed to 02/143 Khmer pagodas, 143 internal Khmer-language newspapers; 02 radio program and 01 television program with various types of information, culture and arts in Khmer language (01 minutes of broadcasting and 60 minutes of broadcasting/day).

Besides paying attention to preserving and developing the traditional cultural values ​​of the Khmer people, the policy of taking care of the material life of the people has always been implemented synchronously and effectively.

Practice shows that, in addition to the modern factors of the world, due to the globalization process, the cultural changes of the world's peoples are affected, especially the issues of material culture (eating, dressing, etc.) accommodation, means of transportation, access to information and communication), including ethnic minorities in Vietnam, the traditional culture of Khmer people not only has not been "erased", "lost". go" but also absorb the new and the modern to add value to their cultural identity, and at the same time the unique identities of the Khmer people have also been spread by the modern media. spacious to the outside.

In addition, the material and spiritual cultural values ​​of the Khmer people are respected, spread and accepted by other ethnic communities in the process of national construction and development.

Regarding culinary culture: many Kinh and Chinese people in the province in particular and the Southwest region in general know and like dishes of Khmer origin, such as: vermicelli soup, Siamese soup. , hot pot with fish sauce, flat rice mixed with sugar, grated coconut, coconut milk, cake with coconut filling, banh tet, cake with ash water (kropong), little cake (man tiel), pork skin cake (loot), coconut cake (xòm), steamed banana cake (fried chie), tube cake (pham pon), banh xeo (chác ompèn)... Among the cakes, banh tet has a special place, the Khmer people call it 'Chrut' and banh tet has a special place. Tet "Tra Cuon" contains somewhere a mixture of culinary culture of 03 ethnic groups Kinh - Khmer - Hoa.

About festival culture: many Kinh and Chinese people understand and perform a number of rituals, customs and habits of the Khmer people; actively build, develop as well as participate in folk games of ethnic minorities. There are many other proofs to affirm that the cultural values ​​of the Khmer people have spread and been accepted by other ethnic groups in a natural and harmonious way. 

From the above analysis, it can be seen that the argument "the government wants to erase the Khmer culture" is completely absurd and contrary to what has been and is happening in reality to entice and incite the compatriots to join the Khmer community. participating in anti-sabotage activities, aiming to sabotage the great unity bloc of Vietnam's ethnic groups, sabotage the strength of the nation. Therefore, Khmer people, especially young people, absolutely do not believe, do not listen and boldly reject and strongly condemn distorting, fabricating, and wrong allegations about undertakings and policies towards the people. Khmer. Not participating in organizations and activities of bad actors, actively participating in the movement to protect national security, exposing the plots and tricks of bad actors, contributing to maintaining the situation. political security, maintain the unity of the community of ethnic groups to build and develop the homeland, the country becomes richer and more beautiful.

FAN THANH DOAN