VietNamNet Bridge – A young woman for the first time has been elected village chief of a Chut ethnic minority group, the highest honour in their society, in central Ha Tinh Province’s Huong Lien Commune.

Ho Thi Kien, the female village chief of the Chut ethnic minority people in central Ha Tinh Province’s Huong Lien Commune. — Photo thanhnien.com.vn

She is now attempting to eradicate backward customs such as cousin marriage and improve reproductive health for local women.

At the age of 28, Ho Thi Kien never thought she would become the village leader.

According to the Chut ethnic minorities’ customs, the village chief must be an old experienced man who was proficient in hunting and gathering and respected by villagers. If the chief becomes too unhealthy to lead the villagers, he appoints another elder in his family.

Things changed when villagers decided to alter how they chose their leader in 2015. Thanks to support from Lien Commune’s People’s Committee and the provincial border soldiers in Rao Tre Village, the villagers held an election for the position.

Kien was among few people in the village who attended school. She was talented and had the respect of villagers, leading to her victory in the voting.

In her first days in her new position, Kien told the Thanh Nien (Young People) newspaper that she felt resistance when trying to change the old habits of local people.

Chut people used to live in the forest in Huong Khe District until border guards helped them settle down in Rao Tre Village in 2001. Currently, more than 40 Chut ethnic minority households are living across nearly 400 hectares in the village.

However, Chut people continued to marry with their relatives or give birth in the forest to protect their customs.

Kien said many people disagreed with eradicating the old habits. They also doubted new rice–planting and cattle-raising techniques. They were furious when she encouraged women to give birth at hospitals and asked ill people to get treated at hospitals.

Kien was said to have betrayed the village’s traditional customs. She was even asked to resign.

“People thought that all the diseases were caused by the forest ghost, and they hired a man who they called ‘master’ to help them take the ghost away and save ill people”, she said.

Previously, village chiefs hired the master in July as a way of wishing a peaceful year for the villagers.

Kien said she was upset by the deaths of new-born babies who suffered from weak health due to cousin marriage, or the deaths of both mother and baby due to severe infection when giving birth in the forest.

There was only one way Kien could win her people over: farming.

Kien, together with the support of a village-based team, focused on agricultural production. By applying cultivating and raising techniques, she had bumper crops, bigger and healthier chickens and pigs.

She introduced new techniques to local people, and went to every house in the village to wake people up to work in the fields. Now, local living conditions are remarkably improved and Kien is in charge of taking ill people and pregnant women to hospitals for proper treatment.

What the young village chief most wants to change is the custom of cousin marriage.

Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Van Sam, Chief of border soldiers of Ban Giang said that it was difficult to explain the impacts of cousin marriage to local people.

Therefore, the village-based team was set up to as a matchmaker service for young people between Chut minorities and the Kinh and Ruc ethnicities.

Kien said more activities should be done to increase the exchange between Chut people and other people.  

“I hope that I could do more to gradually change the mindset of the villagers,” she said. 

VNS